O'Reilly Street Machine Nationals, Horsepower at the Fairgrounds

This weekend was the second year for the O'Reilly Street Machine Nationals in St Paul, MN. Since the Car Craft show moved to Milwaukee, O'Reilly stepped in to fill the weekend in Minnesota.

When I got back in the car after registering Saturday morning I noticed that my ALT light was on. After finding a shady spot inside the fairgrounds I made my way to one of the tool vendors and bought a cheap multi meter to verify that I wasn’t putting any juice to the battery. I full fielded the alternator and no change, I was going to need an alternator to make it back home. We were off and shopping the vendor displays where I found a Ford alternator with GM style one-wire guts and I headed back to the car. A couple of guys sitting by a 64 Chevelle saw me under the hood with my single adjustable wrench and, after the requisite ribbing about me driving a Ford, they brought over some tools and helped me install my new alternator. I didn’t get their names but we all know them. The guys with the knowledge and time to help a fellow hot rodder and ask nothing in return. They wouldn’t even take me up on my offer to buy them a couple of beers. It was only 11:00 in the morning but it was hot out! Good people, great cars and lots of fun watching the driving events.

People are allowed to block off parking spots inside the fairgrounds for club members or friends but at 10:00 AM all cones are supposed to be removed and parking made available on a first come first serve basis. Although this was announced over the public address system several times there was apparently no enforcement as several areas were blocked off with cones and tape for the entire event. As "grown-damn-folks" we really shouldn’t need parking enforcement in an event like this. Let’s all try to show a little courtesy to one another and take down the cones when we’re supposed to. Maybe event personnel could spend the time they were going to put on parking patrol to open another entrance gate.

About entrance gates, one downside of the whole event was traffic control. All vehicles entering the fairgrounds go through the same gate and there has to be a two-mile back up of burping, loping, coughing street machines waiting to get in in the morning. There are always a few along the side of the road overheated etc. Why this event still insists on having that many cars pass through one gate is boggling. Same for spectator parking where some entrances and exits were blocked off and which ones were open changed during the day but there was very little in the way of guidance to help people navigate. That being said it was a fun weekend and we’ll be back next year.

My son went to the Car Craft show in Milwaukee the same weekend and kept sending me pictures of Roadkill cars. That seems to be the only edge car Craft had over Oreilly so work on the traffic control and take my money for next year.

Any else out there this year?