NEW attractions for this year's Cotswold Show have been announced, and visitors have been promised thrilling stunts, rare breed displays and top competitions.

Plans are well underway for the annual show, which will be held in Cirencester Park this July 4-5. Organisers have announced that many new attractions have been booked to keep the popular event fresh.

Headlining the main Bathurst Arena in the park will be Moto Stunts International, a stunt team of cars, quad bikes and motorcycles with the drivers performing jumps, wheelies and high speed routines.

The Scurry Driving Arena Challenge will also be a featured as well as the the Apsley Arena, which displays many rare breeds. There will be the Reedlands Retrievers gundogs demonstrations, dog agility shows, and sheep shearing competitions.

Also on the 100 acre site will be a traditional rural skills area showcasing countryside crafts and activities, an element to the show which is close to the host, Earl Bathurst’s, heart.

"It’s important to us that we can show what happens and why in the countryside," he said. "Many traditional skills are being lost as new technology overtakes them but our display shows many are still being used every day."

Cotswold Show has been running for 27 years and still holds the ethos "where town meets country". Visitors travel from all over the country to get a taste of the rural show, and people young and old try their hand at archery, clay target shooting and other activities. Children are also entertained with circus skills lessons, donkey rides and climbing walls. Dogs are always welcomes and have their own agility trial.

The food festival this year will have a new cookery theatre featuring chefs form Cotswold hotels and restaurants.

Lord Bathurst added: "It really will be a bumper year for us – we won the Cotswolds Tourism Event of the Year award but we’re not resting on our laurels – it will be a tremendous show again this year."

Visit cotswoldshow.co.uk for more.