If you live around the Belgian coast, an excellent Concours d’Elegance takes place around these days in and around Knokke-Heist. The event looks back to a decade of success with a constantly growing audience growing beyond 250.000 visitors last year.
The Zoute Grand Prix comprises five events held throughout the four days at various locations: the Zoute Top Marques show, the Zoute Rally, the Zoute Sale by Bonhams Auction, the Zoute Concours d’Elegance and the closing Zoute GT Tour. Some of these events are public, others might require additional investments from the spectators. The organisers promise cars like the Bugatti Centodieci, the Pininfarina Battista, the new De Tomaso concept or BMW’s recently unveiled concept car for their new 4 series coupe that I could witness in Frankfurt:
BMW Group and its new tenants: Jag, Landy, Opel and a Swedish tank
For more info on timing, access and up to date info, visit the event’s website.
The Zoute Top Marques is an open-air car show featuring the world’s most prestigious marques. It will last from Thursday to Sunday and will take place at a few streets of the city centre with the newest models of 15 premium marques.
Spread over 15 stages, Alpine, Aston Martin, Bentley, Jaguar, Ferrari, Mercedes-Benz, Porsche, Land Rover, Audi, Rolls-Royce, McLaren, BMW, Alfa-Romeo, Lamborghini and Lexus present their premium models in the stylish setting of Kustlaan in Knokke Le Zoute. Visitors can also visit the various car partners exhibiting on Zeedijk in Le Zoute or in their own pavilion on the beach. The legend precedes the events, as the newsletters brands also mentioned above started to hit my mailbox. These included promotional tickets by Lexus and an almost live facebook coverage of the setting up of the Alpine stage.
UPDATE: the post on the Top Marques is ready:
The Zoute Rally by Stow is a regularity race and parade for vintage cars and will last from Thursday to Saturday 12 October 2019. The race will start and finish in Zeedijk opposite Albertplein.
The two-day rally enlists about 200 unique classic cars that were first registered before 1965. The participating cars cover around 250 km per day, most of it on public roads with picturesque spots to allow great shots (watch out for the weather forecast).
The Zoute Sale is the official auction run by Bonhams, with previewing cocktail from Thursday and auctions to be held on Friday. The exclusive catalogue promises rare collector’s items like the former F1 driver Nigel Mansell’s Ferrari F40, the Porsche 911 R Type 991 Coupé, the Ferrari 599 SA Aperta and the Mercedes-Maybach G650 Landaulet.
A preview of the lots will be held between 10 am and 5 pm on Thursday and Friday 11 October and the auction is scheduled to start at 5:30 pm on Friday and will last until 8:30 pm. The event is only open to holders of the official auction catalogue, for an extra charge of 50 euros.
The Zoute Concours d’Elegance by Degroof Petercam is scheduled to Saturday and Sunday at the Royal Zoute Golf Club. The event shall feature exceptional cars presented in a concours d’elegance for the rarest, most exceptional classic cars.
Some of the might be familiar to the experienced petrolheads, as this lovely set of BMW M1s were to be seen at Autoworld last year:
The event will showcase around 70 unique pre- and post-war cars of international class, split into some 15 categories (including 100 Years of Bentley, 110 Years of Morgan and Cars of the Belgian Royal Family), with the winners of each category competing for the Best of Show Award.
UPDATE: I visited the Concours on the Saturday morning I left truly impressed by the incredible cars that the owners still decided to showcase despite the bad weather. One of the highlights was the special stage where the hypercars of the (quite near) future are presented. Each of the six cars could steal the show at any major car event.
There is a summary article on the Concours with over 150 photos:
Legends, rarities and beauties – the Zoute Concours is a truly refined car spotting experience
The Zoute GT Tour by EY is the concluding tour and parade to be held on Sunday in Knokke-Heist. The event traditionally concludes with the Zoute GT Tour with around 200 exclusive modern GTs (built within the past 20 years to will take part in a 120km parade ending with a prize ceremony of the Concours d’Elegance open to the general public.
FOR SIMILAR EVENTS, CHECK OUT MY ULTIMATE AUTOMOTIVE EVENTS CALENDAR:
The ultimate European automotive events calendar for 2019 – DECEMBER UPDATE
[…] of these events are public, others might require additional investment. The 2019 event guaranteed a full day of activities with a comprehensive set of programmes. For us, this was the best car event of 2021, hands down. […]