The Mdina Classic Race: Vintage Speed in the Silent City

Mdina is called the Silent City for good reason. Behind its walls, footsteps echo off limestone and conversations drop to a murmur. For four days each October, that silence breaks completely.

In Mdina, the Silent City, the engines
awaken with stories in their roar. Classic cars gleam
under the Maltese sun, stone curves whisper old legends…
And that scent of ancient adventure makes your heart
race faster than the wheels.
A perfect day to drift through echoes of the past on
four timeless wheels.

How a French idea became a Maltese tradition

The race began with an outsider's enthusiasm. In October 2007, Thierry Giovannoni, a French entrepreneur with a weakness for old cars, persuaded Malta to close the Valletta ring road and let pre-war Bugattis, Amilcars and Astons race each other around the capital. Islanders had never seen anything like it.

Two years later, the enthusiasts he had gathered founded the Valletta Grand Prix Foundation to keep the idea alive. Permits for the capital eventually became impossible, so in 2011 the whole thing moved to the roads beneath Mdina's bastions, and stayed. What started as one Frenchman's weekend has become one of the island's most anticipated events.

Four days, three very different events

The weekend opens with the Hill Climb at Mtaħleb, where cars run alone against the clock up a cliffside road, with Filfla sitting out in the water below. It is the oldest and purest form of motor racing, and arguably the most beautiful setting on the island for it.

Then comes the Style & Elegance show inside Mdina itself. No engines, no noise, just polished machines parked among medieval palazzos while people wander between them.

The Mdina Grand Prix closes the weekend. The circuit is genuinely difficult: tight bends, a plunge downhill where the road narrows to barely a car's width, then an opening out before a climb back to the line. Straw bales do most of the work that armco would do elsewhere.

Why it is worth going, even if you don't care about cars

What makes the Malta Classic unusual is how close you get. Drivers open their paddocks, let people look into the cockpits, and often let children sit in cars worth more than a house. There is very little of the roped-off distance you find at motorsport events elsewhere.

And the backdrop does half the work. Mdina's walls have been standing since the Arabs fortified the hilltop, and the city has played a fictional capital on television and a real one for eight centuries. Watching a 1930s Alfa Romeo come through that landscape at speed is a strange and lovely collision of centuries.

Malta Classic 2026

This year's edition runs from Thursday 1 October to Sunday 4 October 2026, across Mtaħleb and Mdina. The Grand Prix itself is on the Sunday. Programme and tickets are on the official Malta Classic site.

Malta has a habit of putting the extraordinary right next to the everyday. Racing cars beneath medieval walls, adventure hiding in plain sight. It is the same instinct behind the stories we publish.