With a conflict for last year's Canadian International Auto Show that couldn't be resolved, the 2024 edition was the first show we've attended since before Covid, so we were excited to get back out and see what the show had to offer in the new, post-Covid era, and of course to see what motorsport offerings the show had.

 

Starting in the south building with the Porsche reveal was a bit disappointing as a marque as distinguished in motorsport history as Porsche had nothing on offer for the motorsport fan, save a small collection of diecast models at the back of their display. They did have their gamer Grand Turismo inspired prototype parked in front of their hall, but not really my kind of thing, unless they plan to actually race it somewhere that isn't on a monitor.

 

Shannonville Motorsport Park has a Ford Mustang in their display promoting the GT Race Experience. (https://shannonville.com/gt-race-experience/). 

 

 

Karting was well represented with with displays from Canadian Mini Indy and Mosport Karting together, as well as Goodwood. 

 

The only NASCAR Canada representation we saw was the DJ Kennington Castrol Dodge Challenger. 

 

The two big displays you're going to want to check out in the south building is the Rev TV hall and the Red Bull Fan Experience. 

 

Red Bull has a "full-sized static Show Car of the World Championship-winning RB18 car driven by Max Verstappen in the 2022 Formula One World Championship" or as we refer to it, the Red Bull RB18(ish). The display also has a series of racing simulators to try out as well.

 

The REV TV hall has the biggest display of race cars, so make sure you get in and check it out. Cars in the display include the #77 Emzone Radical that Jonathan Woolridge drove to a perfect season in 2022, one of the new Porsche GT4 RS Clubsport cars that will be driven by Cayden Goodridge in this years FEL Series, the #71 GSR Engines Sprint Car and looking back in time the Pop 84 Rothamans Turbo Porsche of Scott Goodyear and my personal favourite, a 1985 Reynard F2000 that I very likely worked on back in my Spenard David days, now used by Toronto Motorsports Park for their track day experiences. 

 

 

Moving to the North building we find most of the manufacturer displays. Unfortunately, there wasn't a lot of race cars out with the manufacturers on Media Day. Only Nissan, with a Sentra Cup car and Hyundai with Conner Attrell's FEL Series TCR car had anything on display. 

 

One of the more interesting cars in the show is Belleville, Ontario-based Scalar Performance and their Toyota GR86-based electric conversion SCR-1. Currently the SCR-1 is probably the only all-electric car competing against internal combustion cars, competing in the NASA Super Touring Series. 

 

And while not a manufacturer, Pfaff did have their crowd favourite McLaren 720S GT3 Evo GTD Pro class IMSA race car, along with another crowd favourite, team driver for the endurance races James Hinchliffe. You can see Hinch at the show on Saturday Feb 17 from 2:30 to 3:30 at the Pfaff booth on level 300 of the North building. 

 

 

Downstairs in the North building is the Canadian Motorsport Hall of Fame display and a pair of IRL cars from Dario Franchitti, this year's inductee into the Hall in the International category, while the Ferrari hall has the #61 R. Ferri Ferrari Challenge car. 

 

 

And while not race cars, there were some really outstanding cars in the Auto Exotica/Cobble Beach Concours display including one of my all-time favourites, the 1929 Bentley Speed Six, the type the won LeMans in 1929 and again in 1930. Also in the display were a Shelby Cobra, a Ferrari 250GT Tour de France car and a great old Porsche 356. 

 

 

All in all, there have been better shows in the past for motorsport fans, but still a lot to see and the RB18(ish) is definitely worth checking out, along with the REV TV hall. 

 

The Canadian International AutoShow runs from February 16 to 25 at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, from 10:30am to 10:00pm each day. Tickets are available by clicking HERE