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We are not frequent attenders but regularly attend about 2-3 meetings a year and enjoy the presentations. On this visit we had good and bad experiences but overall a high standard and value for money event (August bank holiday) Being a scorching day, we went along early to try and a position with some shade - as did a few hundred others. Car park still pretty quiet and well managed so we parked up, discharged everything from the car and headed to join the mammoth queue. As we arrived, around 12:00 for 13:00 start - all turnstile doors were closed but the queue began to move - seems a main gate was serving as the entrance. For around 15 minutes, the queue moved slowly forward when suddenly a turnstile door behind us opened with the inevitable splitting of the queue and a bit of a melee occurred as folks jockeyed for position. Fortunately it sorted itself out without any unpleasantness but it could have been so different. Nice? Little touch when the cashier offered me a price concession as I was an OAP! Ah well, I couldn't really deny it! Once inside the first thing we had to do was to be given a wristband. Although only taking a minute or so to fit it, this hold up was causing a backlog as more people were coming through the pay point. This, I am sure contributed to the half hour delay to racing needed to let folks in. The race surface is now shale. Not sure why (the announcer could have given some info on this change) but the racing definitely suffered. Car speeds were down, too many slippages into walls causing red flag stops (funnily the juniors didn't suffer as much), dust was a problem (despite great efforts to keep this down with constant watering) with one large tanker completely obliterating a corner as it wasn't removed from the arena between races. Programs, normally found in or at the turnstiles were not available but seeing someone with one and enquiring where he got it, I got one from the shop. Clearly the guy running the shop was surprised when I told him they didn't have any at the gates, but great communication, when I got back, the tannoy announced (and repeated the info), where folks could get programs. Nice when a customer is listened to. The announcer, however, was less than competent with many mistakes, wrong car identification and communication between him and the lap counter was suspect on many occasions. To be fair, he did apologise at the end, pointing out that he wasn't 'on home territory' which probably explained things. Marshals seemed to be in short supply and I felt that this contributed to what appeared to me to create an increased risk to drivers, highlighted in the time it took to respond to 3 fire incidents with cars. The slick and efficient marshalling I experienced in previous visits, just wasn't there today. Final big plus was the efficiency of the security team in managing cars off-site. They were excellent and a big improvement over the chaos which occurred in years past. All in all, an enjoyable visit which had all the hallmarks of a new team running it - not sure if that is the case but if it is, they need to improve the entry process, have more marshalls inside and think twice about the shale!…
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Date of experience: August 2019
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+1
Fantastic racing, great nights entertainment, burgers and beers always good, get up close to the action on this shale (dirt) surface oval race track, can walk around the pits and see all the cars up close
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Date of experience: November 2018
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An afternoon of noisy fun and excitement for all the family. Food and drink available. Definite highlight of the day was the final race - a caravan destruction derby! Hilarious. Pays to take folding chairs as otherwise you'll be sitting on the grass. The new shale surface has slowed things down a bit (I assume that was the intention) but it shows off the drivers skills better. Makes it a little like speedway.…
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Date of experience: August 2018
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Fab, value for money day out. Only thing that could have been better is stewards to help Manage the flow of cars exiting the car park.
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Date of experience: August 2018
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Wasn't aware of track surface having been changed from tarnac to shale. Drove for 2 hours, only to find cars barely able to move. Managed to almost stay interested for 1 race. No refund offered.
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Date of experience: July 2018
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