Sydney turns red for the first edition of the Ferrari Festival
Sydney, 13 April 2014: For three days Sydney has been awash with a sea of red as the first ever Ferrari Racing Days to be held in Australia commanded the attention of the city. Thousands of people travelled from across the country to experience the three-day festival, held at the iconic Sydney Motorsport Park, the home of motor sport in Sydney.
Kicking off the festivities on Friday evening was the official ‘Welcome Party’ at one of the city’s most beautiful locations, the Sydney Opera House where local and international visitors where treated to a visual spectacular, as the marquee provided a back-lit glow of the famous Ferrari red onto the House, the colour du jour for the next 72 hours.
Saturday morning however marked the true foray into the festivities, as a cavalcade of 150 Ferraris travelled en masse from Glebe Island, across the Sydney Harbour Bridge onto the Sydney Motorsport Park. Marking the official kick off to Australia’s first Ferrari Racing Days, the largest gathering of Ferraris in Australia ever, the cavalcade totaled an impressive $70 million worth of new and classic Ferraris.
On-track, visitors saw Max Blancardi take the top podium spot on Saturday and Sunday for the Pirelli Pro classification, while Philippe Prette took the honours in the Pirelli classification for experienced drivers and David Tjiptobiantoro took first place in the Coppa Shell race for both races.
While the first-ever leg of the Ferrari Asia Pacific Challenge was a key highlight of the weekend, one of the stand out moments was when the Ferrari F1 car took to the track with F1 test driver Marc Gene behind the wheel. Gene commanded the full attention of thousands when he reached over 300km/h on a flying lap.
Throughout the weekend visitors on-site were treated to the full ‘Festival of Ferrari’ with five showroom spaces in full operation, with Ferrari fans taking in the Supercar Chronicles and Classiche displays, featuring the stunning LaFerrari and the $5 Million 166MM. The kids were buzzing as they experienced an array of Ferrari opportunities including the ‘Podium Finish’ picture stand in the F1 Kids Zone and a chance to get behind the virtual wheel, with the F1 simulators kept busy all weekend.
Eom/Ferrari release
