Santa Pod Raceway Avis 11

I attend lots of events and I'm never disappointed.
Although at first glance the ticket prices seem high but in reality for what you get there are great value for money.
Where else can you get 2 -3 nights camping with clean facilities.
Full days entrainment, drag racing, monster trucks, stunt shows, fair, drifting, plus loads of traders, side shows, food outlets and bars ....
Various night time live bands , disco's , dance tent etc
Beer is no more expensive than the majority of pubs and food is also reasonable priced ( I tend to take my own though ) ...

Great venue and I have been going for 20 years, but being ruined by high pricing like admin fee to book online, when there is no option to purchase at the gate anymore.

Thought I'd go to the BMW show at Santa pod (22nd june) and take my disabled friend next week but there's no accommodation for concessions on the website.
So I asked the live chat to my astonishment they said you have to do an application form and then it will be reviewed in 7 to 10 days and then maybe you might be granted the concession.
In all the years I've never had to do this. Usually I'll take it disabled carers card which is registered along with the person I'm taking who also has disabled registered card and usually some ID like disabled bus pass or disabled railcards and this is being sufficient for many years. I can't believe the system you have to go through to go to Santa pod raceway for one day.
Unbelievable!

I arrived at Santa Pod on Finals Day (Sunday 8th September) at 9-00am. It had been raining all night but had just stopped. The Pod team set about getting the track and shut-off area dry for racing. At 11-00am they were ready to start racing, when the heavens opened and it rained heavily for 45 minutes, I thought that the day was ruined completely. The Pod team set about getting the track and shut-off area dry and by 2-00pm they were ready to start racing. They ran all the scheduled racing from then until 9-00pm that night, with the finals in the dark. What a fantastic spectacle that was. The highlight was a side-by-side Top fuel run, with both cars recording 3.8 seconds and over 300mph, in fading light, with flames shooting out of all 16 headers, WOW! That was worth the entry fee alone. I have been watching drag racing over 55 years, with many years at Santa Pod, which has improved tremendously over the years in both facilities and the standard of cars that are racing. A family next to me, attending for the first time were well impressed and said they would definitely come again. Well done to the Santa Pod team for not giving up with the typical British weather and making this an event to remember.

What a fantastic weekend.
Superbly organised. Fast, Brave, extremely close racing. Great seats up top of the grandstand. Sooo much choice when it came to food. Very reasonable prices for event catering and great value for money, no scrimpage on the portion sizes and everything that I tried tasted amazing. Superb atmosphere family friendly, visitors from far and wide, our own country and so many more.

The competitors in the pits were amazing. Gave everyone the time of day. Happy to answer all the questions that we had and show us around one beast of a V8 engine (a Swedish team) we did miss the driver as he had popped out to local shops for supplies.

All in all one hell of a weekend. Thank you Santa Pod.
See you soon

WE were unable to book online for the FIA European Finals for the Sunday . We telephones and were sent two online tickets. which I thought were for the Sunday event. I didn't download them until Saturday 9th only to find they were booked for the Saturday event which were of no use to us. Well that's £100 down the drain. But we will save on future events as we wont be going again.

As a wheelchair user I expected to encounter issues with accessing the arena.l due to uneven ground and the slopes up to the hill. However, what I was not prepared for was the slew of man made obstacles. The disabled camping was at the front, great 5 stars oh but wait let's put a concrete block in the entrance way so you now can't get your wheelchair onto the road and have to go right the way round on the uneven grass... not helpful. Then to be told the disabled showers were out of use, but there was a disabled toilet inside the ladies block. Extremely had to access when there are queues of able bodied individuals. Next we thought we would try the toilets on the other side of the arena. Fab a dedicated disabled toilet. But no, we open the door at the top of the slope to find a bit of 2x2 across the entrance meaning I couldn't get up on my own. We went to the disabled viewing platform to watch the races. I have 2 young children who are 5 and 2. They were so excited to watch the monster trucks. However the start of the race was disrupted by the steward coming to say 1 carer only , erm okay, so my partner can stay with me but not my children?? Where do you suggest they go? I paid to attend this event as my children love monster trucks, not seeing their enjoyment would take any out of it for me. Santa Pod I would happily pay to book a space on the platform like you do with grandstand seating to ensure that as a disabled mother my family can enjoy events together.

2023 price hikes have gone way to far ..I take 11 lads a year for the full camping weekend ...the early bird tickets were £68 each which was very reasonable...you ramped the same ticket up to £112 each.....Also pretty much ALL the merchandise you sell the prices almost doubled ...may bank holiday gone only five of us came as the rest refused to pay such ridiculous prices....normally we would all buy a pod fleece jacket and more however this year we declined....Santa Pod your to greedy and do not care less about the average working class people anymore....this is a real shame as we looked forward all year for our pod weekend...will not be coming again unless you realise that being greedy dosnt always work out.

I love Santa Pod. I've been taking the kids to the festival of power for years. It's a thrilling day out, and hugely exciting for my boys. But this time, the prices have been hiked enormously. I was expecting to pay around £80 for my booking, but it turned out to be £142. On top of that the festival of power was postponed due to bad weather. I quite understand that sort of thing happens, but the problem is that I only found out by chance because my wife happened to check the website to look for directions. Santa Pod did not even bother to send me a message to say the event wasn't running. I could easily have driven for an hour, only to arrive and be told to go home again. I feel disgusted at the way I've been treated.

Cant fault the venue but getting in and out of the pod is plain nuts and been that way for 40yrs+

Fantastic day out watching The Festival of Power, weather was perfect, dragsters were fast and loud, kids loved it. Loads to do at the Festival of Power for all ages
Be prepared for LOTS of walking to see everything, access to the pits to see the cars being prepared my youngest was going mental with excitement, the teams were happy to chat to the kids (If they weren't busy doing something to the cars) bring a rucksack with water, ear defenders for the kids and sun cream, and sun hats are a must.
Small things, Bars running out of ice (Warm drinks) , and the toilets..... well, its a racetrack so not the Hilton I suppose.
But see you next year, loved it