If you see a few loud — and large — trucks tooling around Gainesville in the next few days, don’t be alarmed.

They won’t crush your car. Honest.

But the six monster trucks in town for the Southern Monster Truck Showdown this weekend at the Chicopee Woods Agricultural Center are the same ones you might have seen on TV, said event promoter Orville Hill.

They’re 10 feet tall, 12 feet wide and driving with at least 1,600 horsepower. In contrast, a Ford F-150 truck has about 350 horsepower, Hill said.

"These are full race machines, very fast and powerful," he said. "They really don’t use the speed as much as they use the power. To come up to a car and just hit that thing in the side wide open, the truck goes 20-30 feet in the air; they can fly way up in there."

Hill said the event is billed as a "weekend of destruction," with car crushing, trucks popping wheelies, racing and a freestyle event each night that allows the drivers to test the truck to its limits.

Before each day’s events, Hill said, there will be a pit party, which allows spectators to come out into the arena to see the trucks up close and get autographs from the drivers. The pit party is included in admission. The monster truck show then begins at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday and at 2 p.m. Sunday.

And if you’re a fan of four-wheelers or quad racing, the weekend’s events also include a chance for residents to participate in some events, too.

"We’re also doing the quad racing. So local participants and others from other states are coming, where you can bring your quad out and actually race it in competition," Hill said.

Participants must register in advance for the quad racing.