Lapsley Hope spent most of the entire three days of the Experience lapping Road Atlanta strapped into his big-block-powered, Richmond five-speed-shifted '69 Chevelle. This is the same car that competed in our '04 Real Street Eliminator contest. The A-body now sports sticky 17-inch Kumho tires and monster Wilwood brakes. That's Air Ride Technologies' Brett Voelkel wheeling his Mach 1 on the Chevelle's rear bumper.
It used to be that an outdoor car show with a decent parking area, a few nice cars, and some spectators qualified as a good show. Not any more. Now we need action, and Year One has delivered with a series of events that included this year's Year One Experience Presented by Car Craft. This year's event moved to the springtime and took over the entire Road Atlanta road course as well as Atlanta Dragway in Commerce a few miles up Interstate 85 to do some heads-up drag racing.
The typical blustery springtime weather brought a ton of rain on Friday, and the rest of the weekend was breezy but still fun. The best car show day was Saturday, highlighted by the presentation of the prestigious Year One Cup, which comes with a handsome $5,000 gift certificate redeemable for anything in the company's catalog. To have a shot at this prize, you only had to enter the show and be around for the judging, so now you know what you need to do for next year. But that's only the headline copy, as the Year One Experience also offered autocrossing, laps around the impressive Road Atlanta road course, a zero-to-60-to-zero go-whoa contest sponsored by Stainless Steel Brakes, a chassis dyno, and, of course, drag racing at Atlanta Dragway.
The 1,320-foot portion of the Experience hosted the Factory Appearing Stock Tire (F.A.S.T.) and Factory Stock class musclecars in addition to a string of classes for the later-model GM LT1/LS1 cars. It was tough to squeeze all this into three days, but Year One pulled it off. The fun part was jamming to do and see it all, and we've got the wind burns to show we did just that.
For more coverage of the Year One Experience or to learn about next year's show, see yearone.com.
HIGH-SCHOOL Nova
Not all high school kids are into Hondas and that bling-bling stuff. Michael Cooper talked his dad Mike into helping him build a '70 Nova project back when Michael was 14. It started out at as a high school driver buildup, but like most car projects it got out of hand. While maintaining his grades and working to fund the buildup, the Nova quickly escalated into the excellent ride you see here. Michael's now 17 and drives a second-gen Camaro to school because the Nova's too nice.
The Nova sits on a Ford 9-inch rear with a homebuilt 6-inch minitub effort that looks very professional. The 350 small-block spins a polished Weiand miniblower and a Comp Cams hydraulic-roller camshaft for power. The Nova uses a complete Air Ride Technologies airbag system for its aggressive stance, and young Michael already has about 1,500 miles on his first creation. Now Michael is hot to build up his Camaro.
Year One Cup
Each year since its inception in 2001, the Year One Cup has gone to the car deemed most deserving in attendance at the Year One Experience. An impressive list of media representatives act as judges, and the only criteria is that the car be a registered participant at the event and fit into one of the Year One catalog lines.
Year One awarded this year's Cup to Scott Whidby and his excellent '69 Camaro and its big-block, seen here. What was most impressive is that the Camaro is an entirely home-brewed effort.