by Mike Gulett –
Monterey Car Week starts on Friday August 7 and ends on Sunday August 16. Notice this is more than a week and at one time, long ago, it was a mere weekend. It keeps getting bigger and more expensive every year and I am not sure that is a good thing but what can we do?
This year the Bonhams auction has moved from The Quail to Laguna Seca race track and the Broad Arrow auction has moved from the Monterey Jet Center to The Quail taking over for Bonhams. So that should be interesting.
It looks like the weather is going to be excellent. A big problem, as usual, is going to be the traffic, you should plan for extra time to get around. Monterey County has put together a web site with traffic updates and a description of all events – see here. Links to all events can be found at this web site.
Overview
Monterey Car Week is a 10-day series of concours, races, auctions, luxury showcases, and public car meets that attracts manufacturers, collectors, enthusiasts, celebrities and regular people who love cars. The problem is that many people are being priced out of attending especially when hotel costs are considered.
Some of the main events are:
- Rolex Monterey Motorsports Reunion at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca – historic race cars racing.
- The Quail, A Motorsports Gathering – an exclusive luxury automotive showcase featuring world premieres and rare vehicles. It is very expensive – the price leader for the week.
- Exotics on Broadway – one of the largest events, with hundreds of supercars lining the streets of Seaside.
- Concorso Italiano – a celebration of Italian marques like Ferrari, Lamborghini, Maserati, Alfa Romeo, and Ducati. Plus other makers – anyone who pays can get in. Visitor tickets are now $250 per person.
- Concours for a Cause – Set along Ocean Avenue in the heart of Carmel-by-the-Sea, the event brings together vintage cars, cultural experiences, and local artists for charity. It is free for visitors.
- Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance – the grand finale, where some of the world’s most significant collector cars compete for Best of Show, which can increase the value of the owner’s car significantly. It is also very crowded and can be difficult to actually see the cars because of all the people.
If you go I hope you have lots of fun.
Let us know what you think in the Comments.
Text by Mike Gulett and images by ChatGPT (except the map).
Ah, size creep.
Here in Connecticut we used to have a “Cars & Coffee” in an upscale but quaint little town.
It was started many years ago and got rave reviews from the vintage community with about 30 cars lining two streets and a good size crowd of spectators making the local business community very happy.
There were about 6 or 7 of these C & Cs each season.
Over the next 15 years, word got out and it seemed that the those 30 cars exponentially grew. As the attendance also grew it brought in out of state vintage car owners and trailered full blown race cars.
Over that period of time the towns folk had a problem on their hands. You know the usual, crowds, gunning of high red line engines, street racing, the aroma of burning rubber and general mayhem. Then came the reduction of events a season and the moving of the scene off the streets and into a local park.
The culmanation of this, by now infamous, C & C was two events a year with approximately 2300 cars per event.
When I last heard of the event, it was down to one a season and a town proposal to eliminate it permanently.
This is a generalized summation of what really happened but you get the idea.
I have no doubt that there will always be a Pebble Beach Concours d Elegance and a Laguna Seca Vintage Festival but as you point out Mike, beware of the negative effects of “Size Creep”.
As a fine artist please tell me the nice illustration is not done by some robot. It is out of focus but still csptures sports cars going through Monterey-like settings maybe on the way to Pebble Bech. Once we have robot artists and robot writers, creativity is done for…
As a racer myself, when the ‘Historics’ became the ‘Reunion’, I lost interest, and that was in 2010. The concours in Carmel where Alan and Donald called up cars to feature was special for entrants and spectators alike.
Hi Mike
Car Week is not only a nightmare when it comes to traffic and restaurant reservations, it can be a “budget buster”.
If you do not want to spend $5000 plus per person to attend all the “high end” events and auctions, you can have a fabulous Car Week experience by attending some of the free to spectator shows such as:
Concours For a Cause on Tuesday
Astons on the Avenue on Wednesday
Concours D’ Lemons on Saturday
Exotics on Broadway on Saturday
Pacific Grove Concours on Sunday
In addition, one can see the latest and greatest cars on Ocean Avenue in Carmel……most any time of the day.
$250 for the Italian Concorso? What? Are you allowed to drive them?