Last weekend was the end of the Audrain Automotive Museum of Newport, Rhode Island Concours week. LOTS of very big bucks events going on all week; road rallys, tech seminars, a cars and coffee that looked interesting (and affordable), a "Car Corral" of everything from originals to Hot Rods to exotics (also affordable) and then the weekend of the Concours (at $300/day, a little steep). It is New England's closest thing to Pebble Beach or Amelia Island and a bunch of celebrities show up (most probably invited) like Jay Leno, Donald Osborne and Rod Emory, who often are event judges, too.
Tom Gilchrist (Lower Rhode Island) took his Beck 550 Spyder over and here is his FB report:
Attended the Audrain Cars and Coffee a couple weeks ago at the Polo Grounds in Portsmouth, RI. Had a great time and met a guy that purchased the 25th Beck Spyder as a barn find and is building it up. He was pretty happy when I offered to open the clam shell so he could see the works.
After cars and coffee we stopped by the Newport Car Museum. As we pulled into the parking lot I noticed 15 to 20, 356's parked in a roped off area and guys waving me in to join them. We had stumbled across the TYP356NE annual outing. At their invitation, we joined on the spot and had a great time, we even made the news letter!
This morning I went to a local C&C and found Hot Rod Charlie there with his new Cayman S Turbo and he told me that the Audrain Museum had put out the word that they were looking for Hot Rods for the Friday show day during Concours week, so Charlie and his wife, Gloria, took a couple of their Rods down - His is a double for the California Kid flamed '32 coupe, and hers is a beautiful, Beige '37 Ford Phaeton. Because they brought their Rods down, the Audrain folks gave them tickets to the Concours weekend and banquet (those are about $500 each) so they showed up early each day.
As they were walking in at the entrance on Sunday, there was a commotion behind them that was Jay Leno and Rod Emory and their entourages arriving. Jay walks right in saying "Hey! My FACE is my ticket, and they're always trying to punch it!"
Charlie and Gloria had driven down in his 911 Outlaw that I posted a few weeks back because the Audrain people told him he could enter it in the Porsche "Born on the Track" class being judged by Rod Emory:
After all of the judging, his Outlaw placed "1'st runner up" (which I guess would be 4'th, to you and me) in the "Born on the Track" after 1960 division. Not too shabby for a guy who has built Hot Rods for the last 50+ years. He's invited me to a PCA event in Mid-Mass tomorrow at Palmer Motorsports Park that I just might go to after an early morning bike ride. Always fun going out there.
