Every year we give it the ol' magazine try to see which street rod will end up with the coveted title of STREET RODDER magazine's Street Rod of the Year. Aside from some incredible bragging rights, the honoree will have a photo on the STREET RODDER Street Rod of the Year Wall of Fame at Darryl Starbird's National Rod and Custom Car Hall of Fame in Afton, Oklahoma, along with other past winners. (There will be lots more to this program in 2003, but right now we are on double-secret probation and can't tell!)
By now you should be aware that in order to receive coveted this title or a STREET RODDER Top Ten award you must attend at least one of seven Goodguys events. By doing so your car becomes eligible for a Top Ten selection. If you are wondering which events were on the cherished list for 2001 and which issues SRM covered them in, they were: Del Mar (August '01), Indianapolis (November '01), Columbus (December '01), Puyallup (January '02), Pleasanton (February '02), Rhinebeck (March '02), and Charlotte (April '02). For 2002, six of the seven events will be the same with Charlotte swapped for Kansas City, Kansas-a first-year event.
Once you have attended one of the "magnificent seven," your car is in the running. A SRM staffer is appointed to select each Top Ten. Now all you need to do is hope for good luck and a dose of fate to take over. When your car is selected for a Top Ten, it's entered into a group of 70 from which one is selected for the title Street Rod of the Year.
Before we make the announcement, here are some thoughts on what were some of this year's notable trends. There's little doubt red, black, and green hues were the shades of choice. A good guess would be that black and red will always be in favor. Eighteen rods selected had red as a primary color, while eight were black and four were in primer. As for green-six made the list. The most brilliant paint we saw all year was at Columbus, and it was on an incredible Apple Green '40 Ford coupe owned by Don Bunch of Morristown, Tennessee. (We know this is highly subjective, kinda like being an ice-skating judge.)
Since we are on a fact-finding mission, here are some other bits of info: We lumped roadsters, convertibles, or removable hardtop rods into the same category. Hence, 29 that were chosen are considered "open" cars. Wow! We might add that five open cars were selected at Rhinebeck (East Coast), matching Pleasanton's (West Coast) number, while Del Mar (West Coast) had six. It appears that Right Coast rodders love their roadsters as much as anyone does. In the fendered-versus-fenderless group we had 16 sans fenders and, yes, the West Coast does appear to be highboy, or lowboy, heaven. Twenty-seven that were chosen would be termed fat-fendered rods and, you guessed it, Chevy was the engine of choice.
If you want specifics, here goes: at Del Mar ten Fords were selected; at Indy, seven Fords, two Chevys, and one Willys; at Columbus, seven Fords, one Chevy, and two Mopars; at Puyallup, seven Fords and three Chevys; at Pleasanton, eight Fords, one Mopar, and one Crosley; at Rhinebeck, eight Fords, one Chevy, and one Willys; and at Charlotte, six Fords, two Chevys, and two Willys. Safe to say, Ford is still the emblem of choice, while Chevy is holding its own and Willys and Mopar are hanging onto the edge. The "lunatic fringe" award this year goes to the Crosley-it takes a great deal of effort to make a Crosley stand heads-up with the rest!
Trucks, including woodies, were more popular than ever. Just think: 10 Top Ten winners were trucks from around the country, and four different staff members were involved in the selection! However, it's not the '47-54 Chevy/GMC truck that was the trend several years ago, but rather the Model A (mostly open), '33-34 closed cab, the woodie, and '37 or '40 pickup that showed up. The early models appeared to be built in the old-timey nostalgia style, while the later models were built with a more contemporary feel. It makes for good viewing-we like what's happening with trucks.
One of the top three picks in the truck category was the radically chopped (5 inches) and channeled (6 inches) '34 Ford closed-cab pickup of Southern California's Jimmy Shine. It had the "look" in its bare metal finish, '40 Ford dashboard, properly outfitted Merc Flathead, period wires, and wicked set of exhaust pipes. It's our belief that this truck could stand with the best in the rodding world without ever accepting a drop of paint. Jimmy captured his Top Ten while attending the Goodguys Del Mar event.
Another truck fave was the '37 Ford pickup owned by Jim Lambert of Rabbit Hash, Kentucky. Complete with its "mile-deep" black paint, set of Torq Thrust II wheels, and Chevy LS1 for power it's a stunner. We saw this black beauty while covering the Goodguys Charlotte event and couldn't resist placing it into our final selection.
Up next in our trio tribute of trucks is the '37 Ford woodie of Dave and Kathy Geiger of Bristol, Indiana, who captured their Top Ten while attending Goodguys Indy. The Lobeck-built lumberyard was highlighted with a very appealing PPG Copper paint, Billet Specialties wheels, and Classic Instruments. Boy, does it sit low and right!