Supercar Sunday at Gaydon has now been running for a number of years, and 2011 marked my 5th consecutive attendance at an event where the term “supercar” is interpreted in the widest sense, to include performance cars and other vehicles of interest. Back in 2007/8, the event was notable for the strong showing of Lamborghinis, the relative paucity of Ferraris, and a representative selection of many other exclusive and rarely seen marques and models. In the past couple of years, a greater variety of cars has applied to enter the event, so whilst the Lamborghinis are no longer so dominant this does mean that there are now all sorts of different cars to enjoy. 2011 was no exception, with several Owners Club groupings, as well as individual cars whose owners wanted us all to see them and to revel in the variety of models that have sold in anything from small quantities to significant volume over the years. In addition to the static displays, the Sporting Bears had assembled a group of cars in which people could take a ride in exchange for a charitable donation, and there were a number of different activities taking place in the arena ranging from a contest for the loudest car on site, to some stomach churning motor-cycle stunt riding. Here are just some of the highlights of the 2011 event.
ABARTH
Assembly point for the Abarthisti was the nearby Gaydon Inn, which was also a venue chosen by the Mitsubishi 3000 Owners, and was clearly nearer than wherever the Lotus people were meeting, as we saw and heard several such cars accelerate away from the venue. With 6 of the 9 expected cars rendez-vous-ed in one place, and last minute bug removal completed, our task was to get not just these cars into one contiguous block in the venue, but also to try to leave spaces for those who had declared they would arrive later.
Somehow, the plan worked, and we got all the cars together. Initially it looked like the display would be confined to 500s, but when someone approached us and told us that we needed a Punto, we were a little surprised to find that in fact he had one, but had parked it up in the public car park. As you can see from the pictures, we were able to use the spare pass that someone had, so he could bring his car down to join the display.
ACA couple of Cobras were to be found in the event.
ARIELA couple of Atoms.
ASTON-MARTINUnquestioned highlight for many people was this, the One-77. Parked up right by the entrance to the museum, it was hard to miss this car, and I would guess that few did. Whether you think it is truly worth the £1m plus tax price tag is a matter perhaps for some debate, but there is no denying the fact that were you to muster that sum of money to buy one, and some of the 77 cars are still available, you would definitely be getting something which will retaining many modern Aston styling cues is quite distinctive.
Among the more affordable Astons were examples of the car produced since the DB7 brought the marque back to life, with a current DBS and Rapide drawing particular attention.
AUBURNThis 1936 Speedster made quite an entrance, arriving in the company of a couple of Corvettes.
BENTLEYBentley had both the Oldest and Newest cars at the show with this 1930s Supercar and the very latest 2011 model Continental GT.
BMWThere were very few BMWs at the event, which is a little surprising, as I would have thought that several people would want to bring M cars along, but instead, all we got were a couple of AC Schnitzer modified cars and a Z3 and (in the background of another photo), a Z4 Coupe.
CATERHAMPerfect weather for a Caterham, as the owners of these models would doubtless discover once the sun had come out.
CORVETTEThere were quite a few Corvettes, with examples from the 1960s to the latest C6 model cars.
DE TOMASOJust the one De Tomaso, a Pantera
FERRARIAlthough there was no sign of support from the Ferrari Owners Club, there were plenty of the Prancing Horse cars on show this year. Oldest, and by some margin was this 275GTB.
The rest of the Ferrari mix included a 308 GTS, several 360/430 cars, a Testarossa, a pairing of 456 GTs and a recent California.
FORDThere were a couple of the current generation Mustang among the display cars, as well as this, an early car.
A brace of GT40s were parked together. Only they were not the same. Look carefully, and you see that one is an example of the many replicas that were made long before Ford decided to reinvent this iconic model with the GT of recent times.
The Cougar Owners Club were once again out in force, with a line of cars parked on the approach road to the venue.
Of more recent provenance were the duo of Focus RS cars.
HONDAAlthough there were fewer NSXs than has sometimes been the case, there were still plenty of examples of this popular and usable supercar.
JAGUARImmediately following the Cougars were the XK Owners, with a preponderance of the XK8 and XKR models complemented by a couple of the current XK models.
This replica D Type arrived mid morning.
JENSENSole Jensen was this late model CV8.
LAMBORGHINIAfter the massed rank displays of previous years, the event attendee would probably have to admit to disappointment if their prime motivation for attending the event was to see Lamborghinis, as there were just a quartet of cars in the middle of the event, and a couple more among the Sporting Bears.
Mind you, one of the Sporting Bears machine was the completely barking mad LM002, a vehicle which appeared particularly difficult to manoeuvre, judging by the number of times the owner stalled it. 
LANCIALone Lancia was this Delta Integrale.
LOTUSThere were two separate displays. On the hard-standing were numerous examples of the Esprit. Most of the cars were from the later stages of the model’s life, with a couple of earlier models showing how the Giugiaro styling was softened by the Peter Stevens restyle.
Over near the TVRs were the more recent cars, with Elise and Exige a-plenty.
There was one 340R, which was seeking solace from the sun under this awning, and there was also a classic Europa. 
MARCOSJust the one car.
MASERATIThere were only a couple of Maserati in attendance: this 4th generation Quattroporte and a modern GranTurismo.
MAZDAMX5s were parked up on the banks opposite the Cougars.
MCLARENI did see an MP4-12C, but sadly it was not at this event. It was on the A46 between Teddington Hands and Tewkesbury headed towards the M5. It was tempting to flag the car down and suggest he was headed in the wrong direction! Perhaps next year we will see this latest car at the event?
MERCEDES
A lone SLS AMG was parked in the centre of the assembly, and although these cars are now starting to be seen on the roads of the UK, at least in the areas currently the preserve of Aston, Ferrari and Gallardo, this was quite a crowd puller.
Almost next to it was an SLK55 AMG.
MGSole MG was this ill-fated SV.
MITSUBISHINumerous examples of that he-man car, the technology tour de force of the early 1990s, the 3000 GT were on show.
NISSANIn previous years, the Nissan display had been dominated by Z cars and the R32 – R34 Skylines, but in 2011, it was the GT-R that was the most numerous Nissan model, by far.
NOBLE There were a trio of Nobles in attendance.
PORSCHEConsidering the number of Porsche on our roads, the display of cars organised by various elements of the Porsche Owners Club was perhaps a little small, but there was plenty of variety, with the Panamera representing the latest model, as well as examples of the long running 911, Boxster, 928 and 944/968 cars.
TESLAThis car had a reserved parking space, so it could be plugged into a source of power allowing the owner to get home.
TRIUMPHNot by any categorisation that I can possibly think of is this Acclaim even close to any of the attributes required for entry, but it is an example of a car that is nowadays rare. Some, of course, may think that to be a Good Thing.
TVRAs in previous years, there were more TVRs than any other marque at the event. They were parked on the grass which I can recall does not always drain the water away that quickly, so it must have been a relief for the TVR Owners Club to find that this area was still firm underfoot despite the rain of the days preceding. Most of the cars on show were from the last 15 years of production, with a good number of Griffith, Chimaera, Cerbera, Tuscan, T350 and Sagaris cars augmented by a handful of the earlier models.
ULTIMA
VAUXHALLWhilst the uncertainty evidenced by the data shown on the howmanyleft.co.uk website of how many of these cars were made and remain, caused no doubt by the way they were reported to the DVLA when registered, a couple of VX220s were at the event to remind us that Vauxhall did indeed sell a few out and out sports cars in their recent past.
WESTFIELD
Numerically, there were more Westfields than there were Caterhams. They were all parked together, and whilst the visual differences with some of the cars are obvious, some others are harder to tell apart.
ZOLFEA pair of these diminutive cars were parked up at one end of the arena.
After some rather murky weather early on, the sun came out and you can see from the pictures that it turned into a really warm and sunny day. With the variety of cars on show, it was hard to tear myself away, but sadly I had to leave at lunchtime so I could pack a bag to head off to foreign parts, about more of which will be reported in due course.2011-06-27 19:59:26
