A car takes part in a burnout competition during the Summernats Car Festival in Canberra, Australia, Jan. 4, 2020. (Photo by Liu Changchang/Xinhua)
Heat and smoke vs fast and fury! Australia's most iconic automotive festival, the 33rd Summernats Car Festival, wrapped up in smoke and rumbling sound in Canberra, attracting over 100,000 attendees.
CANBERRA, Jan. 6 (Xinhua) -- In smoke and rumbling sound, the 33rd Summernats in Australia's capital city Canberra is drawing to an end on Sunday.
According to its organizer, the four-day event was expected to attract more than 100,000 attendees.
"Over 2,000 cars come and participate in the Summernats this year," said Andy Lopez, Summernats co-owner.
According to him, the event started in the beginning of 1988 and happened every year now in January.
"It's straight after the New Year," said Lopez in an interview with Xinhua. "Australia has a great love affair with the automobile."
Talking about people's passion, he believed that there are mainly two reasons. "We are a very big country. People have been using cars to get anywhere. We have a long and proud history of manufacturing cars in Australia as well," he said.
A car takes part in a burnout competition during the Summernats Car Festival in Canberra, Australia, Jan. 4, 2020. (Photo by Liu Changchang/Xinhua)
Starting with a much smaller scale, the festival is becoming more professional. "The sport size is much bigger. The burnout competition is enormous and the quality of cars is outstanding," said Lopez.
In retrospect, Lopez said one of the highlights was the cruise of cars, "so you can see thousands of amazing cars going past you."
"The burnout competition is amazing as well," he said. He noted that the burnout competition of Summernats was the world's biggest burnout competition. "Australians invented the burnout," he said.
According to Lopez, there are four criteria to judge the burnout performances.
"Making smoke instantly, making smoke all the time, the driving skill, and keeping your engine making the constant noise," said Lopez.
A car takes part in a burnout competition during the Summernats Car Festival in Canberra, Australia, Jan. 3, 2020. (Photo by Chu Chen/Xinhua)
The four-day event started and finished in two smokey days, when Canberra was among the most polluted cities in the world. Saturday saw the city swept by heatwave with 44 degrees Celsius, the highest reading ever recorded in the city.
However, the extreme weather condition failed to prevent automobile lovers to the festival.
Dean Douglass, 48, came from Perth in West Australia more than 3,000 kilometers away with his girlfriend.
"I come here every year to the Summernats," he said, adding that he first attended the event when he was a teenager.
A car takes part in a burnout competition during the Summernats Car Festival in Canberra, Australia, Jan. 4, 2020. (Photo by Liu Changchang/Xinhua)
"Perhaps it is the only event in Australia where you can see a lot of different cars," he said.
He compared Summernats to a big party, where all people, little or big, old or young, participated.
His father was 68 and his younger brother in his 30s. They were all at the festival. "You can have people of all ages," he said.
Like most people at the festival, Douglass did not wear facial mask. Talking about the smoke, he said: "It is better without it, but people here are trying to live life as normally." ■
