From Parklands to Pagani: How Adelaide’s Motorsport Festival became a global draw
What began as a car club event in 2014 has evolved into a world-class celebration of cars, culture and glamour, with the Adelaide Motorsport Festival now attracting global drivers, rare machines and tens of thousands of visitors – all just moments from the CBD.
The Adelaide Motorsport Festival didn’t begin as a grand vision for a globally recognised event. It started, as many South Australian success stories do, with a modest idea, a conversation and a deep connection to place.
“The Adelaide Motorsport Festival started after I had a conversation with the Sporting Car Club of South Australia about running events together,” CEO and owner Tim Possingham says.
“In 2014, our first event was a hill climb on a public road near Windy Point, paired with a day of activity in the Adelaide Park Lands using a section of the former Adelaide Grand Prix circuit – now known as the Adelaide 500.”
In its first year, the Adelaide Motorsport Festival attracted 1800 people. “It was quite a small club event,” Possingham says. “Today, in 2026, we are expecting to attract more than 60,000 attendees, bringing in excess of $20 million in economic benefit to South Australia – one of the strongest returns on investment of any major event in the state.”
The growth has been deliberate rather than accidental. In the early years, Possingham focused on shaping the look and feel of the festival as much as its mechanical credentials. “I curated elements of the event in order to show the guests the broader greater vision for the future ” he says.
That visual identity helped secure government backing and positioned the Festival as something distinctly different from traditional motorsport.
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Part of its success lies in its authenticity. Adelaide has a unique history with Formula One, which was raced on a track only 950m from the city centre between 1985-1995. “We recreate history with F1 drivers like Mika Häkkinen, Thierry Boutsen and Stefan Johannsson, having them back driving part of the original track,” Possingham says.
That connection resonates with Adelaideans who remember the city’s Grand Prix era – and with international visitors who recognise its significance. Possingham expects around 20 per cent of ticket sales for the 2026 event to come from interstate and overseas visitors. Many stay on to holiday in South Australia before heading east, reinforcing the Festival’s broader tourism impact.
The Festival’s timing, one week before the Melbourne Grand Prix, is no coincidence. “That’s how I attract all the personalities you’ll see at our event,” Possingham says. “Many of them are going to Melbourne the following weekend.”
Possingham’s own story is inseparable from the event. Raised around motorsport – his father an engineer and active car club member, his mother also taking part in hill-climbs – his earliest memories involve being lifted into race cars as a child.
“My mother actually won the Women’s Winter-Cup Hill Climb Championship in the 1960s,” he says.
A Leyland Mini at the age of 15 sparked a hands-on obsession that led to a mechanical workshop, an early online automotive business in 1999, and a global automotive distribution company while also racing competitively himself in drag racing, circuit racing and tarmac rally disciplines.
Travel to international events like the UK’s Goodwood Festival of Speed and Germany’s Professional Motorsport World Expo among others helped shaped his vision. “I took learnings from all of those events and combined them with the authenticity of what we have here in South Australia,” he says.
This year’s highlights include a Pagani worth more than $6 million – one of only two in existence – and European collectors flying in with multiple Formula 1 cars. “We are the only event in the Southern Hemisphere where visitors can get up close and experience these cars first- hand,” Possingham says.
The driver line-up reinforces Adelaide’s place in motorsport history. Mika Häkkinen returns to the city where his life was saved after a 1995 crash, alongside David Coulthard as well as 1989 Adelaide Grand Prix winner Thierry Boutsen, and Martin Donnelly – whose real-life crash footage features in the latest Formula One film.
Add V8 Supercars stars, global YouTube personalities, and cult figures like Mad Mike and his flame-spitting McLaren, and the Festival becomes less about racing and more about spectacle.
“It is a museum in motion,” Possingham says. “It’s about seeing and experiencing cars – as art, displays, and hearing and feeling them on track.”
That shift is attracting a broader audience. “I often hear from guests who say, ‘ It is much more than a motorsport event – and it was completely different.’ It’s more of a lifestyle event with its feel and vibe, making it great for all the family.
What sets the Festival apart is the high-end hospitality suites showcasing prestige brands, with Penfolds pouring Grange, champagne flowing, caviar on offer and luxury car dealerships collaborating on immersive experiences.
“It’s motorsport as social theatre – glamorous, walkable and unintimidating,” Possingham says.
For Possingham, the Festival’s success still feels surreal. “I think about myself as a child sitting outside the fence of the Adelaide Grand Prix because I did not have the money to buy a ticket,” he recalls. “I would just listen to the cars and feel the vibration going through me, and I absolutely loved it.
“Now I am in the privileged position to have Damon Hill ringing me or Stefan Johansson sending me a text, and I often stop and pinch myself as they would have been driving the cars I listened to leaning up against the fence.
“It’s quite bizarre – but I love it.”
Adelaide Motorsport Festival runs from February 28 to March 1. More details and tickets here.
