Supercars head down south

Thursday, 20 May 2021

The mighty Lamborghini Huracan Evo will be making its South Island Debut this weekend in Christchurch.

If you are in Christchurch this Saturday and feel like checking out some high-end performance and luxury metal, then you are in luck: following on from the incredible public response to the Starship Supercar Show, which raised over $225,000 for the Starship Foundation, the Giltrap Group is taking a tenth of the show to Christchurch.

“We were genuinely blown away, not just by the 5500 strong crowd that attended the event, but also by the passion that so many people of all ages have for supercars,” said Giltrap Group general manager of communications and PR, Shaun Summerfield.

The McLaren GT will also be making the trip down south.

The Starship Supercar Show took place in Auckland last month and featured a 90-strong line up of “extreme cars” including the local debut of the McLaren Speedtail, along with the “Holy Trinity of Hypercars”, the McLaren P1, Porsche 918 and Ferrari La Ferrari.

While those hypercars are safely tucked away with their owners again, the 10 per cent of the show that is making the move down south is still pretty impressive, with a total value of more than $3.5 million between them, and a combined power output of more than 4000kW.

Watch as Alex Goy puts Aston Martin first-ever SUV, the DBX, through its paces off the road and on the track. (Video first published August 2020.)

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“Bringing nine of the cars that featured in the big event down to my home town is pretty cool,” said Summerfield.

“Growing up in Christchurch, I only ever saw one Lamborghini. It was a Countach at the 1985 motor show, as part of an Alpine Car Stereo display. Unfortunately, I didn’t even get a good photo of it.”

Summerfield says Canterbury car fans are invited to get up-close up and personal with a displaying of “the most impressive new cars in New Zealand” at Avid Group, 59 Harman St, Addington from 9am until midday this coming Saturday.

The line up of exotics includes two Lamborghinis, two McLarens, two Aston Martins and three Bentleys.

The Lamborghini Huracan EVO, McLaren GT, Aston Martin V8 Vantage Roadster and Bentley Flying Spur will make their South Island debut, alongside the all-new Aston Martin DBX.

“There is no substitute for experiencing these cars in the flesh, especially completely new cars like the Aston Martin DBX, which is one of those cars that photos seldom do justice to,” said Summerfield about the line up.

“Then there are the extreme cars like the Huracan EVO, a high-performance version of the already high-performance Huracan. But, even standing still, every one of these cars has an x-factor.”

Three Bentleys will feature in the display, with the Bentayga V8 and Continental GT V8 joining the Flying Spur W12, while two of the world’s performance benchmark’s: McLaren’s 341kmh 720S supercar and Lamborghini’s record-setting super SUV, the Urus, will also be part of the showcase.

“We’ll have experts from all four brands on-site, ready to answer any question about the cars. I challenge anyone coming to try and stump them; I’ve tried and failed every time.”

Admission is free, with plenty of giveaways for all car fans.