Hot Rods and Kustom Cars
2016 GoodGuys Heartland Nationals
While a giant rain storm caused issues from Oklahoma through Nebraska the edge of it was right over Des Moines. We had bouts of sprinkles but never all out rain. It sure helped keep the temps down and the day was downright pleasant. The crowd didn’t seem as big as normal but I heard that Friday’s crowd was big so maybe it was just spread out from what I am used to.
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2016 GoodGuys Heartland Nationals
After strolling through the area of the show full up with 1932 Fords I went on through this next section. As I walked through the area I ran into Chris and Karma Carlson. Evil Karma had a bucket of amazing chocolate chip cookies that she force fed to a group of us. It was torture, pure delicious torture. If you go to the Des Moines GoodGuys Heartland Nationals, get yourself some of those cookies, period. You’ll thank me.
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2016 GoodGuys Heartland Nationals
Since the rain was ending just as I got to the Iowa State Fairgrounds, it was fitting that the spectators poured in all morning. If I could have something to complain about it’s that there are just sooooo many people at this event. That’s a small price to pay for one of the best GoodGuys events on the schedule each year.
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2016 GoodGuys Heartland Nationals
For a quarter century the Goodguys Heartland Nationals have been bringing cool cars to Des Moines, IA. This year with Independence Day on Monday giving many folks a 3 day weekend the Iowa State Fairgrounds were packed with people and cars. When I checked in around 9 am they were registering car number 3984. There was a light rain that had just rolled through and a cool breeze made for a pretty fantastic morning.
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The 2nd annual GoodGuys Day At The Hay was a lot of fun, I hope you saw some cars that you don’t normally see and maybe next year you can join us!
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I didn’t get to check out the Autocross action due to the track finally getting wet, the timing didn’t work out. No worries though as I’m sure I’ll see plenty of racing action this weekend in Des Moines.
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The rains stayed away mostly through the morning, just a few sprinkles here and there. The temps were low, which kept it pretty tolerable. As we walked around I got to see friends from across the region, the Wolk family and their trio of rides, Bill Wiekert and his Sledsel, GasserLouie and is beautiful “Gold Digger,” and a bunch of buddies from Omaha that I’d be shooting with on Sunday. Great people make good car shows better.
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For the last 2 days I showed you the Speedway Motors Kickoff Party for the the 2016 GoodGuys Day At The Hay. I had a great time meeting folks, eating BBQ & ice cream and hanging out with friends until nearly Midnight. Saturday morning I headed over to the Haymarket area to the show with an eye on the sky. There was a pretty serious rain storm moving in as I left the hotel, it was raining on me and I was sure that the morning would be postponed a bit. We lucked out for the first few hours of the show.
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It’s no secret that it has been hot in the midwest lately. The Friday of the kickoff party at Speedway Motors was no exception. I was grateful for the food tent, smattering of trees and slight breeze as I walked the parking lot checking out all of the cars that you see here.
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2016 GoodGuys Day At The Hay
Last year a new Goodguys event was announced that was bit of a departure from some of the other events on the schedule. This one was to be a one day event held in Lincoln, NE. I went and took my dad and my uncle, we had a great time even though we felt like we were melting. So this year I was excited to get to go again.
As happened last year, Speedway Motors hosted a kickoff party on Friday evening. The parts counter was open, there was a DJ set up, lots of giveaways, free BBQ and folks could take a tour of the incredible Museum of American Speed on the grounds next door to Speedway. There were probably 300-400 cars in the parking lot and tons of folks walking around.
I had the pleasure of meeting a bunch of the Speedway employees this weekend, a great group of folks. More to come all week long.
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In 2015 I got ahold of my buddy David Bennett in northern Colorado and we set up a time for me to go up there and shoot some video. He used that as an excuse to gather up a bunch of the hot rod family and have a picnic at his place. We had a great time.
This year he got ahold of me and invited me back up! David and his fiancé Sam had moved to a new place and they were inviting a ton of folks to come join them. He contacted me and told me that there was a special event going on, once the entire crowd was in attendance, he and Sam were to be married. Talk about a surprise!
Well it all came together perfectly! Our friend Gus’ band Hendershot along with another friend Phil Lucier played some music, BBQ was served to a hungry crowd and a bunch of folks brought their rods and kustoms. A great time was had by all and the happy couple pulled off a great surprise.
Congrats to you David and Sam, thanks for letting me be a part of the big day!
For this 6th and final post of the 2016 Hot Rod Dirt Drags we conclude the racing day, give out the awards and then line up for some night racing! That was a ton of fun!
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Well, I’ve miscalculated on the number of posts it would take to cover the 2016 Hot Rod Dirt Drags, this post will have nearly 100 photos in it and I still will have to do a 6th one. More for you to enjoy!
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2016 Hot Rod Dirt Drags – Click This Photo To Buy A Print Of This Photo!
The 2016 Hot Rod Dirt Drags was a day of awesomeness. You can see the cars were amazing, seeing them run down the dirt track throwing dust in the air was incredibly cool. The smiles on the faces of the drivers and occasional passengers were the only smiles bigger than the spectators. I didn’t hear any complaints all day long, which is rare at an event. The drags ran from about 10 am until about 4 pm then started back up around sunset for some night racing.
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One of the coolest parts of the 2016 Hot Rod Dirt Drags is the location. When I first heard Monte Vista, CO I had no clue where it was. A little google search showed me that I was going to hit a whole new area of Colorado, pretty cool. There event happens at a Best Western hotel that has some unique features. There is a 2 screen drive in theater on site and you can watch the movies from your room if you want to. That’s super cool but the rooms were snatched up quickly and I was forced to get a room down the road a couple of miles.
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As you may have seen in yesterday’s coverage of the 2016 Hot Rod Dirt Drags, I got to the Best Western Movie Manor where the show is held and I was able to hang with some friends and shoot some night shots. Early the next morning we all gathered up for the drivers meeting led by Mike. Shortly afterwards it was time for the singing of the national anthem and a vintage plane flyby! So cool. Now it’s time for some photos of the racing action, enjoy!
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The T33 replica built by Nick’s Hot Rod Garage sitting outside of the hotel at the 2016 Hot Rod Dirt Drags over the weekend.
For the last two years on this weekend I’ve driven the Galaxie to Indianapolis for the Custom Car Revival, last year my friend Mike Nicholas of Nick’s Hot Rod Garage announced a new event for this weekend called the Hot Rod Dirt Drags. I was intrigued but committed to go to Indy. I LOVE the Custom Car Revival and hated to miss it this year but after the awesome time that I had at the Hot Rod Hill Climb the last two years I decided to switch things up this year and go to the Dirt Drags. While missing CCR sucks, the Dirt Drag were pretty awesome!
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With so many great events going on this weekend some were surprised to hear that I wasn’t attending any of them. With a big non-car event going on in my second home of Emporia, KS I just decided to take the weekend off. I missed seeing my friends at the Marysville Autofest, Queen City Riot and Rockabilly On The Route, but I was able to sneak a great car event with some good friends too.
Welcome to the final day of coverage for the 2016 Kansas Pie Festival and Car Show. I’m happy that Uncle Paul and our friends and family have put on such an event. It’s awesome to see our small town teeming with people. The weather was muggy and hot and the event ended just as some rain rolled in but the turnout was still amazing. I hope that you got to come experience our town and if not I hope that maybe next year you can come join us. Heck, why not start your own event in your town and invite all of us to come join you?
For the full story on the Pie Festival and more you can listen to last week’s Chrome Pipes & Pinstripes radio show here.
Enjoy the second batch of photos, 1 more day of coverage will be on the way soon!
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As late as 1pm on Saturday afternoon the main ways into and out of Gypsum, KS were technically closed due to flooding. By the time that I returned to Gypsum later that afternoon the roads were opened. The shoulders were washed away in areas, the paved road was dusty in other areas from the muddy waters that had been flowing over the driving surface. That did not stop the cars and people from showing up! 2 years ago with about 3 weeks notice the event attracted more than 70 cars, last year about 150 showed up and with the push on social media this year looked to surpass that number. There were more than that many cars in town by about 9 am and the streets of Gypsum were swimming with people.
For the full story on the Pie Festival and more you can listen to last week’s Chrome Pipes & Pinstripes radio show here.
Enjoy the second batch of photos, 1 more day of coverage will be on the way soon!
Continue reading “2016 Kansas Pie Festival & Car Show Pt. 2”
For the 3rd year in a row the Kansas Pie Festival and Car Show has taken over our tiny town and temporarily swelled our population of 400 to this year an estimated 2,000. With cars from across the region the official count stopped at 240 but many more cars were in town and came into the show. My uncle Paul Kruse aka PovertyFlats has spearheaded this event and had a ton of help from our friends and family and they have put on another fantastic event. For the full story on the Pie Festival and more you can listen to last week’s Chrome Pipes & Pinstripes radio show here.
Enjoy the first batch of photos, 2 more days of coverage will be on the way soon!
Continue reading “2016 Kansas Pie Festival & Car Show Pt. 1”
These shirts are only available until May 24th! Get one now while you can!
Aside from the sunburn I had a great day hanging out at the 2016 Flatland Cruisers show in Emporia, KS. Lots of old friends were there and I met a few new ones. I hope that these show coverage pieces show you that you don’t always have to hit only the big events, my favorite ones are usually the medium sized events like this one. To keep up to date on the Flatland Cruisers club you can follow them on Facebook here.
These shirts are only available until May 24th! Get one now while you can!
This year I’ve been working to take more weekends off and spend more weekends traveling to shows that I’ve never been to before. So this weekend I was in Emporia, KS for the 23rd Annual Flatland Cruisers Show. I spend a lot of time in Emporia and love the town, especially the downtown where Studio 11 is located. The show was just up the street on Commercial, the main downtown area of the city. Around 150 cars lined the street on both sides and spilled over into a parking lot. It was a great turnout with a variety of kinds of cars and people. The threat of rain had me worried but except for a couple of sprinkles it was a beautiful day. To keep up to date on the Flatland Cruisers club you can follow them on Facebook here.
These shirts are only available until May 24th! Get one now while you can!
I want to say a huge thanks to Timm McKenny for providing these photos of the Pete & Jakes Open House for us all to enjoy and a huge apology for spelling his name wrong yesterday! It’s amazing how I’ve known him for years, seen his name 100’s of times on Facebook and I still spell it wrong. He was cool with it and didn’t even bring it up. Sorry man! Okay on with the coverage!
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These shirts are only available until May 24th! Get one now while you can!
While I was off galavanting across western KS and eastern CO I was missing the Open House at Pete & Jake’s in Peculiar, MO. Just because I couldn’t be there doesn’t mean you miss out on coverage! Timm McKenny was there and took these photos and sent them wth me to share with you! Enjoy!
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