Another wet day at the show. Pictures by Peter Flemmich

Attendance figures for the Royal Welsh Show are more than 7,000 down on last year, organisers revealed today.

And they said that although the four-day day event at Llanelwedd, Builth Wells, was not weather proof, rain has failed to dampen the spirits of those who have attended it. Organisers are hopeful that the final two days of the event will bring high numbers.

David Powell, show treasurer, said that by yesterday afternoon 52,698 visitors had passed through the gates compared with 59,983 last year.

He said it was well below the five-year average of 59,880. He said: “The reason for this is obviously the wet weather but we’re hopeful that today will be a better day.

“I was asked yesterday whether or not the show was recession proof but I couldn’t really give an answer but what I can say is that the event certainly isn’t weather proof.”

Haydn Jones, publicity officer for the Royal Welsh Agricultural Society, said yesterday’s wet weather had kept people away.

He said: “It’s not surprising that some people decided against coming to the show yesterday the rain has a tendency to keep people away.

“But we’re hopeful that attendance figures will improve over the final few days because the weather is expected to get better.

“However, I am pleased to report that things have been running as planned but obviously it was unfortunate that the Lancaster bomber had to cancel yesterday because of the weather, but these things do happen and we can’t do anything to prevent it.”

Brian Rees, the show’s traffic manager, said that despite the wet weather things had gone very smoothly with the traffic.

He said: “Things went very well yesterday there was no hold ups. We didn’t park as many cars as we did the first day but we’re pleased to report that everything went according to plan.

“However, some of the car parks did get a little bit wet because of the rain and we took the decision to put an extra 400 metres of tracking down on some of the fields in a bid to prevent any cars from getting stuck in the mud.”

By Anwen Evans