Fort Worth Porsche Parade Concours 2004 aka Insanity on Main Street U.S.A. By JoAnne Trinkle
To want to take Part in a Parade Concours in the Touring Classes you have to be a little off. To want to do it in Full Concours Class you have to be INSANE!!! I guess that is where Robert and I fall in line, with the Insane! We arrived in Fort Worth on Friday July 2nd , three days before the beginning of the Parade with all the other Concours nuts and immediately unloaded Max our 1955 Pre-A 356 Continental Coupe from the trailer and found the perfect spot in the Parking Garage where we can continue to prepare him for his big coming out Party. Part of the ‘fun’ of doing the Concours is in the preparation days spent in the garage. It’s where the excitement about being at the Parade begins. It is where we sweat, swear, break fingernails and sometimes toes, strain our backs in trying to reach those impossible spots that somehow magically the judges have no problems getting to, and where we make new fast friends. There’s nothing else at the Parade that is quiet like it. Ever see 15,000 q-tips on a garage floor? You’ll see that and more at Parade.
Figure 1 Robert and J oAnne stop to chat the day before the Concours
Figure 2 A sealed and B agged 2004 GT3. Insanity ruled the Concours prep garage!!
Monday July 5th, Concours morning dawned sunny and warm. That was a very good thing considering that it had been raining in the Dallas/Fort Worth area for about three weeks. Max was ready to show and was entered in MI Full Concours so he was in the first group that had to be placed on Main Street at 6:00am. You read that right, in place at 6:00am. The Concours didn’t officially start until 9:00. With over 90 cars in the Concours and 50 or so Porsche’s in the special interest group (S.I.G.) displays, someone had to be first. Lucky us. Slowly Main Street began filling up with a total of six blocks of nothing but pristine Porsche’s!
Figure 3 Robert does light dusting pri or to the arri val of the judges.
At 9:00 judging officially began with the PA announcing that light dusting was the only thing that was allowed from now on. All we had to do was wait, and keep on dusting ever so…… lightly. Let me add that Robert and I had entered regional Concours events before on the west coast, but always in the Wash and Shine class (a class where the exterior and interior only is judged). Never in Touring class (exterior, interior, front and rear compartments) and absolutely NEVER in Full Class (interior, exterior, both compartments and the entire undercarriage, everything). Thank goodness we didn’t have to wait too long as the judges got to us at 10:30. Since we were entered in the Full Concours we had 6 judges assigned to check out every nook and cranny on Max. There were eight pages of score sheets! The judges had 5 minutes to judge the car. I’m telling you, they checked everything. You should have seen how far under Max the two undercarriage judges got and they now are allowed to use flashlights, something unheard of before. Robert used over 750 q-tips just on the undercarriage and it’s a good thing that he did. Those 5 minutes felt like an eternity! Once the judges finished our car we were free to roam the Concours as long as one of us stayed with the car with our keys at all times. Robert chose to stay and I got the job of walking the entire Concours with our DVD camcorder in hand. What a view! There was everything from 356’s to 996 GT3’s, 993’s to 914’s, early 911’s to 968’s, and on and on being judged in the Concours. There was some disappointment voiced by many that this years Parade had no 550’s, 906’s 908’s, 917’s or really historic cars on display as in the past. Even with that said, it was a sight to behold. Porsche’s of ever color of the rainbow on display. Robert and I were the only Ozark Region members to enter the Concours. However there were the Special Interest Groups on display on the side streets off of Main Street. Our very own Ron and Joani Mott, and Josep and Ricard Requena, and John and Fredda Swanson were showing off their 914’s with the others from the 914 S.I.G. Also on display were the Tractor S.I.G., RS America S.I.G., the Club Racers and even a special display celebrating 40 years of the 911. The 914 S.I.G. had their own fun awards such as the ‘Most Romantic’ 914, ‘Most interesting 914 Conversion’ etc. Leave it to Charlie Davis to come up with something for the guys to enjoy!
Figure 4 The 914 S.I.G. is al ways colorful.
Figure 5 The Concours stretched six bl ocks down Main Street!
By the time I finally made it back to Robert and Max I could tell something was up. People were shaking Robert’s hand and he had a huge grin on his face. He had found out that we had taken first in our class! Not only that, but our front undercarriage judge gave us a 100% perfect score straight across the board and that doesn’t happen too often. We didn’t expect to win anything at all so this was a major surprise. It almost made all the months of preparations to be able to go Full Concours worth it.
Figure 6 We were happy with a Class win. Little di d we know that there was more judging to come!
It was getting late and we were really hungry so I headed out to find the box lunches that I saw everyone tearing into. The lunches were provided by Porsche Cars of North America. Robert and I, Wade and Angela Robertson, Robert Bumpas all had lunch sitting next to Max, and may I add that the food was really quite tasty. After lunch, Robert took off to check out the Concours on his own and I stood guard with the Robertson’s trying to keep the non Porsche car people from sitting on the fenders to take pictures. No Kidding! This actually did happen to another Concours entrant before they were judged. And the woman who wanted to sit on the bumper got insulted when they told her to get off. This is why the organizers asked us to stay with our cars at all times. The even was open to the public since it was on city street and things can happen.
Figure 7 Angela Robertson and Peter Porsche pose next to Max.
When Robert finally got back from his leisurely stroll it was time for another BIG surprise. Right when we thought we were done for the day and actually started to pack it up, the judge that heads the Overall judging team came to us to congratulate us for also winning our Division. Then she
calmly told us we had 15 minutes to do more light dusting as were we going up for the Overall award in the Preparation Group! Being newbie’s to the Full Concours world and not really knowing all the intricacies of the groups, division etc., we could not believe it. I actually caught Robert muttering a few choice words as he climbed way underneath Max to get to the inside of our rear wheels that had picked up dust during the mandatory six block drive we had to do prior to the Concours. The previous rear undercarriage judge had marked us 1/10th of a point off for that, saying that he had to mark us off for something….. I had thought the first judging was nerve racking but preparing for this second one as worse until we found out who our competition was. We were up against a brand new, brought to the parade from the factory in a sealed bag, 2004 GT3 and a 1990 911. Once we found out about going against the GT3 we sort of stopped cleaning. We had the oldest car entered in the Parade. We were going against the newest car at the Parade. We had been told by other Concours participants that no one has ever been able to win overall against a brand new car in the Preparation Group as of yet. We were just happy to have made it so far in a Porsche Parade Concours. We still can’t believe it. 1st in Class and then to top it off with the Division win? Wow. Was it worth all the time and effort in getting a car so clean that you can eat off of it? I don’t know. Almost everyone who is anyone in PCA says we really shouldn’t mess it up now by vintage racing it (which was our original long term plan for Max) since it’s a Parade Full Concours winner. So, I really don’t know what we’ll do. What I do know is that many, many people enjoyed looking at Max and he brought a smile to their faces. THAT is what makes us feel great. Smiles. That is what owning an old Porsche is all about. All in all it turned out to be a great, happy day!
Figure 8 Porsche Tractor all decked out and on Displ ay.
Figure 9 356 Max at the 959 Ranch......
Figure 10 Josep and Ricard Requena's 914 in the 914 S.I.G. Dis play.