Subaru WRX Performance Mod Sup?  Time to update you all on Project Subyrod, my 2002 Subaru Impreza WRX.  I was getting really excited for Speed Week 2010, the Nugget Cruise in and everything that goes with being at Bonneville.  For Subyrod's first trip to the Salt Flats, I felt an itch to have a custom axle back exhaust made for it, something that would turn some heads, maybe make my car fit in with all the old iron running around with loud exhausts.  It had to be on a budget.  I kicked around the idea and then dropped in at JDM Legends (See my Introduction Story of JDM Legends here) to see what Eric Bizek could weld up for me on a small budget. Take a look at some in-process photos below of the custom exhaust work.  I was thinking of a few options, mild steel painted or stainless and 2.5" or 3".  We ended up going with stainless 3" dia. tubing to match the rest of the exhaust system.  One way to achieve my budget was using some of Eric's stainless scrap pieces laying around. Here's Eric Bizek of JDM Legends...

Cruise Night: Utah Cruisin Car Show Taking the wife and kids to a local car show is one of my highlights of the summer.  We like to check out the Burger Stop Cruise In that happens the last Wednesday of each month in the summer time.  It's a small show by most standards, probably about 50-75 cars from the local area.  It's cool because its not all Mustangs and Camaros, there is a little bit of everything.  Variety is the spice of life is it not? I've seen this orange/red Model A coupe at this show before.  It also sports tons of Bonneville Salt Flats decals, so I know it gets run hard at the Flats.  Last year he came to the show with the Salt still stuck to the car. Here's the Model A coupe next to a pickup brother, both in a more traditional flavor.  Love the white walls and steelies with the white firewall.  Good lookin'! While the kids were waiting in line for some Clown-made circus balloons, I found a light blue convertible GTO looking showroom stock with some Cragars.  Dig the chrome everywhere. I...

We first told you about this Studebaker Avanti and its Land Speed Racing legend status in the Land Speed Racing Avanti intro.  We have a quick update for you.  Dan and crew took the #88 Avanti and its borrowed twin supercharged Studebaker V8 to El Mirage for some runs down the dry lakebed at El Mirage.  It was 191 days in the making and it was well worth it. The Stude looks right at home on the dry, cracked lake bed.  Dan suited up and was able to make 2 runs, well, 1.5 runs.  Before actually getting down the dirt track, it took many hours and helpful hands to get the Avanti to pass tech inspection.  Most of the little things are safety related, like sealing off the interior from fire hazards and the correct protection. Avanti Dan suiting up.  No racing happens without help of family and friends. Two land speed racing Avanti's at the starting line at El Mirage is a beautiful sight to see.  Dan and team were able to figure out a bunch of bugs, get tech inspected, and get another list together to get ready...

Bonneville Salt Flats: Jeep Race Car This story is: "My Ride is Me"!  Combine Bonneville Salt Flats Racing, a Jeep Comanche and a father and a son.  Perfect! Meet Peter, a new member here at MyRideisMe.com, he's a Jeep guy, but not the off-road type  you might expect.  Here's his story... It was too good for me to mess with.  ha ha  I asked him one question, that's all it took to get him talking. -Hechtspeed Written by: Peter Lechtanski "The Inspiration?   Why do people do what they do?  What makes something (a car) so important to us? I guess to answer your question, I have to go back 40 some years, it was 1963, and a saw a story on the evening news (on a black and white TV) about this 24 year old guy named Craig Breedlove. He'd just gone 400mph+ at the Bonneville Salt Flats, breaking a record held by the British since 1949.   He was the first man to go over 400mph in a car (and later the first man to go 500, and 600mph). I was about 12 years old at the time, 2 years before we elected...

Bonneville Salt Flats: Traditional or Modern? It's no doubt I have Salt Fever.  For me, the car that represents the Bonneville Salt Flats, El Mirage Dry Lakes and the hot rod hobby as a whole is the early Ford roadster. At Speedweek 2009 while hangin' out at the starting line just soaking in the Salt, I spotted 2 Lakes Modified Roadsters.  I knew I dug the stance on both rods.  I went in for a look-see.  CLICK on each Picture to Zoom in. The dark blue roadster is a more traditional style rod with its dual carbed flatty V8, cowl-less engine bay, floorless interior (ok, so there was some wood "floor panels"), bomber seats and wire wheels and skinny tires.  The orange roadster has a plush interior, shiny paint, an independent rear end and hot rod style big n little wheels and tires.  I actually dig each style for different reasons.  But, if I could only have one...which one would it be?  Let's take a closer look. Again, the difference is easy to see.  Bomber seats, no door panels, wood floors, a couple guages and big steering OEM wheel on the left, plush leather interior, shiny...

Truth be told, I haven't been to an indycar race since I was a kid. At age 9 I was convinced I would be an indycar driver when I grew up. That profession was won over by being a doctor, then being a designer... and on and on the years passed. But when I got an offer for some tickets to the Grand Prix of Long Beach this weekend from Optima Batteries, I couldn't think of anything else I'd rather do on this beautiful Sunday. Ever since I by chance ended up driving these streets while they were blockading them off for the race, I'd wanted to check this event out. It's not some boring circle track - this 1.98 mile track has hairpin and ninety-degree turns and is on the actual streets of Long Beach! This has been a whole 3-day event, but the culmination of it was with today's IZOD Indycar Series race. All 170,000 spectators saw the 25 drivers speed away from the finish line (of these 25 drivers, I'm glad to say 3 were women!) I'd forgotten that there's nothing quite like all those cars...

Sapporo, Japan is NOT what people think of as a center for hot rodding car culture and they're right, its not.  But, there is a cool dude from Japan who's a real hot rodder living the hot rod life.   Kiyoshi Tanomura (aka Tano) and I became Facebook friends a couple weeks ago.  I accepted Tano's request solely because of his Profile Picture.  It was a picture of this 1926 Ford Model T roadster, built in the Traditional rod style.  I saw his Japanese name with that American hot rod picture and said to myself, "I need to find out about this guy!" Just looking at the roadster, would you expect this to come out of Japan?  As you can imagine, the hot rod parts came from the States.  The build is a well thought out, period correct hot rod that few could achieve.  Japanese car nuts are just the type to achieve such a build.  Why?  From what little I know about the Japanese culture is they have great respect for their ancestors and history, they are very detailed oriented, even passionate about the details and seem to be natural engineers. Tano mentions two friends from the USA...

You don't have to look that closely to see the dust piling up. My friends never let me forget what I already know. That ain't right. Good news is,  MyRideisMe.com is growing, but it's at a cost to why I made it: The fun of driving and working on cars. No regrets, but just the same, I'm glad to have Bonnie, my 1927 Ford Roadster back on the road. So what was wrong? General laziness Get out there son! Stripped out threads for 1 header bolt I've never done a Heli-coil before Sounds even more pathetic when I write it down. Backing up some... A friend had a gift certificate for ceramic header coating that he couldn't use, so knowing I'm a fellow car dude, he offered it to me. I needed to do something! If you've been following the build/update progress of my roadster for a while, you saw this post (Click to read it): Home-built Header finish-ATF! After applying the ATF (and after the smoke cleared...) the header was an amazingly cool gray-blue. I loved it and you couldn't beat the cost! It looked pretty good for...

Bonneville Salt Flats Streamliner Dallas Volk, my Salt Flats insider, sent me this link.  He is good friends with the Burkland family.  I knew I needed to share their website with you all.   This post does come with some sad news, that Gene Burkland has passed away this week.  I mean this post to be in deep respect and a tribute to Gene and his family's great history at Bonneville. The Burkland Streamliner is a twin Donovan Chrysler powered, 4 wheel driven racecar that has gone over 400 mph.  Please take a look at their website HERE as it is full of pictures and information, as well as links to other Land Racing websites and stories.  This blazing fast Streamliner was designed and built by Gene and his son Tom Burkland.  If that's not "My Ride is Me" I don't know what is...Here's a quick blurb from the site about the Burkland family: "Gene and Betty Burkland, from Great Falls, Montana (the first SCTA members from that state), have been active in racing, and at Bonneville in particular, for over three decades: their first Bonneville car was a chopped-top, Chrysler-powered '53 Studebaker...

Salt Flats Tribute Car: Boy do we have a treat for you guys?  I've wanted to do a "work in progress" story on Larry Volk's street roadster since I found out about it earlier this year.  It's finally progressed to a point where there's good progress  showing.  The Volk garage is part hot rod time warp, part skill and craftsmanship, and part inspiration. We'll get to the 1929 Ford Model A Roadster project car in a second.  First, let's talk time warp.  Larry and his family have been into racing and hot rods since the early 1950's.  He started out drag racing  and dirt sprint car racing.  His race buddy Terry Nish invited him out to the Salt Flats in the late 1950's/early 60's and that was it for Larry.  He's gone every year since (unless it was rained out) and his life has become engulfed in the Salt.  Currently Larry is in his second stint as President of the 200 MPH Club, Chairman of the Save the Salt Committee and current holder of the SCTA Bob Higbee Award given out at the Opening Ceremonies of Speed Week 2009. With all this and more, Larry's garage...

Bonneville Salt Flats Race Car: ...oh ya, and its FRONT WHEEL DRIVE.  Tell that to the "wrong wheel drive" haters! Pikesan and I first met Dr. Bonner Denton, Professor of Chemistry and Geosciences at the University of Arizona, in the starting line at Speed Week 2009.  His crew was performing the final preparations for a speed run.  He gave us his whole land speed racing's history in about 10 minutes.  The more he explained the workings of the Berkeley, the more interesting it got. Racing on the Salt Flats is a funny thing.  Bonner Denton, owner/driver of this record bearing 1959 Berkeley sports car describes racing on the salt similar to driving on 1-2 inches of wet snow.  Try putting 2400-2500 HP's of twin turbocharged 540 cu in of  Donovan V8 goodness to the salty ground.  Nope, he doesn't need a push truck either.  This baby drives off the line under its own power. Going back to 2000 when Bonner first started running this particular Bad Berkeley, it replaced his Bocar.  The Bocar set the record at 264 MPH with an A motor in 2001. The first thing you notice about the Berkeley is...

Bonneville Salt Flats World Finals Pictures I took a couple hundred pics at World Finals at the Bonneville Salt Flats a few weeks back.  I thought I should start sharing some of my favorites. This 1955 Chevy Bel Air Post built by Hot Rods by Dean was absolutely gorgeous.  I don't know squat about the car.  It runs in the B/CGC (B engine size is 373 cu in to 439 cu in, and is a competition gas coupe) class.  I dig the yellow interior too.  It gives the cockpit some pop. The first thing that grabbed me is that two-tone paint.  Cream and grey is not the usual color combo for a hot rod, but it works perfectly.   The paint is a smooth, matte or flat finish, it goes nice with those moondiscs. The car is run by Sidney Allen and ran a 172 MPH in the first Mile.  Then on Friday it actually spun, according to the Results page on SCTA-BNI.org. Check out this cool reflection in the crazy chrome bumper.  The bumper was the second part of this Chevy that caught my attention.  This car oozes CLEAN.  Hot Rods...