Bright and early- 8:00AM on a Saturday. This isn’t just a normal Saturday though- this is car show Saturday. You guys know what I’m talking about. The pre-show anticipation and excitement that could make a 4:00 AM alarm exciting where any other day it would be the largest inconvenience in the world. I roll over on the floor at the airbnb and think “Wow, I’m too old for this now.” Don’t get me wrong, my sleeping pad makes a difference, I’m just a geriatric now- might as well sleep with a life alert.
We make our way to Black Forest Industries’ pop up shop once again, with the store came together quite nicely, and very quickly at that. Everyone did a phenomenal job putting everything together, including Trevor and Michael setting up some special lights for the front display area showcasing two of the carbon fiber prototype knobs, featuring a gloss and matte red weave. With BFI all set for their 2:00 PM opening, I geared up and headed over to Red Horse Motoring Club.
As one might expect, any kind of building with the words “motoring club” anywhere in their name adds a layer of sophistication to the attention it attracts. To put it into words best I can: this is the kind of place you’d expect to see Nigel Mansell, Steve McQueen, Ayrton Senna, Alain Prost, and Michael Schumacher all having a drink after having taken one of their many four wheeled steeds out for a Sunday drive. This place oozes class and demands a thoroughbred quality to it’s attendees. Luckily, VW Classic just dropped over a hundred thousand dollars shipping two prototypes over- both of which the public has seen very little of in person, and neither of which the US public has ever seen- and as it was, this was the location they were to be unveiled officially to the public.
After the briskly paced half mile walk to Red Horse (a clever call back to the vintage Mobil 1 Pegasus commonly seen up until the late 90’s) I arrived at the parking lot, which had some super high quality stuff (VW wise, not necessarily vintage Ferraris or Porsches one might expect- but this should be no surprise given the weekend) right off the rip. A beautiful pistachio base Golf Harlequin in it’s relatively stock glory sat right near the front- my eyes drawn to it immediately, naturally. (I told myself I’d get photos of it on the way back but it ended up leaving, go figure) A few clean 20th anniversary GTI’s, a gorgeous orange bagged Tiguan R-line on slant lipped three piece Porsche twists and a really rad pin striping job, amongst others.
That’s not why I came though- not truly, anyway- call it a fringe benefit. I came for the two german unicorns sitting in the building across the way. Seeing a little gateway into the halls of motoring heaven, I slip through an open door, and almost break my neck from how quickly my head turned. There she is.
Oooooh yeah. OH YEAH. Reveling in it’s glory, there it sits. What’s the story? Glad you asked. In 1992, VW embarked on a journey to build a car that could win the 1994 World Rally Championship. They outsourced for a bespoke engine built by Schmidt Motorsports (SMS) to build a 1998cc square bore, aluminum engine with a T3 turbo, making a (then very impressive) 275bhp. Despite the model being authorized to have 2500 units built to meet homologation requirements, the project was scrapped due to budget constraints. Before being scrapped, however, an estimated four total production units were built- SMS having the original prototype, two cars/shells floating around, a lost wind tunnel prototype, and car number ONE. The very “one” you see before you, the very one I saw before me.
Cancelled due to almighty dollar (or euro, in these cars cases)? Speak of the devil- enter the MK8 GTI TCR. This is the less admired of the two for me as MK8’s don’t rank very high for me personally on a lot of fronts, but the presence of this cannot be denied. The MK8 GTI TCR was destined to- naturally- replace the MK7 GTI TCR, but was cancelled as all motorsport activities were cancelled by VW in December of 2020. This sports it’s anti-paparazzi livery still, and will be stored and kept this way. A full blown racecar is always a sight to behold, much more so when it’s one not displayed to the public.
After admiring these forgotten beauties, I decided it was probably time to go look at some other cars as well. I ventured into the parking lot and saw the humble mechanic‘s (Charles is awesome, go check out his stuff- very informative) Ginster Yellow MK7.5 Golf R spektrum, as well as one of the Irish Green MK7.5 Golf R’s spektrums! The orange bagged Tiguan R line roped me in real quick- gorgeous pinstriping and Porsche brakes with twists is a big win. The parking lot had some beautiful things parked there- a VR swapped MK2 GTI with a shaved bay, Imola Yellow 20th on CCW’s and In-pro clear tails (super period correct). On my way out, I saw Brandon Quail (@that_1.8tcabby) riding in probably doing super important show things. 😉
Heading back to the shop, I was blessed with a lovely Shiba Inu courtesy of Cathy (@cmb_32t), Shiba breeder/owner as well as big turbo 8P S3 owner. After heading next door to Rotiform to grab some of their sweet shirts, then Solo-werks for a sick Harlequin box logo tee (Thank you @kw_glen!), I headed out once again with the BFI video rig in one hand, and the TR photo set up in the other. Lucky for me, it also happened to be a classic car show as well- a eclectic spread of bikes, old american, and euro stuff.
During my ventures down High St., I saw Charles (the humble mechanic) being interviewed by VW, the official VW tent, and Jamie Orr’s Golf Country with a Golf Rallye on a trailer behind it! Talk about as close to an A59 as you can get! Talked with the homie Damien (@tastefullyalive) with the sickest thunderbunny Mk5 out there, and his buddy Chobey (@chobester), whos mk6 I took pics of from Southeast Euro Eurofest earlier this year. After a rad meet and talking to some of the raddest people alive, we headed back to the airbnb where I almost made a grave time calculation error (thank you google maps) costing us some bomb Mexican food. And then, ther ew as one day left.
