Other than our own show, eEuroFest, the Carlisle Import and Kit Nationals is the show that we always worth looking forward to the most. Euro enthusiasts put hundreds of miles on to get there, making it an annual pilgrimage for the faithful. Faithful Saab owners in particular, as the Saabs@Carlisle “Show Within A Show” takes up the largest part of the fairground. For many of the cars, this will be one of the few excursions they will make during the year. The Saabs@Carlisle circus tent spreads over a massive area near the entrance to the fairground, giving many of those rare old Saab’s a brief, albeit bright spotlight for the weekend.
The tent is especially important due to the weather. Just like the New England Dustoff, the Carlisle Import and Performance Nationals always seems to attract a cold wind and a rain cloud. This was the first year we decided not to try and camp through it, and that was the best decision we’ve ever made. There’s nothing like waking up to a tent flooded with 50 degree water to dampen your outlook on one of the biggest shows of the year. Not this time, we were able to take full advantage of everything there was to offer this time around for the big show.
Underneath the Saabs@Carlisle tent we were able to put on some jams from our portable boom box and sign people up to our Loyalty Program. Every signup was an entry into a special contest that was a big hit last year (for obvious reasons), which was for a set of free Nokian tires. It was great to talk to all of the familiar faces, meet some new ones, and catch some people wandering over from the rest of the show. This is a great opportunity for people to ask us questions about the parts industry, parts availability, and especially tire tech with regards to the Nokians on display.
Special congrats to the winner Chris B, who went back and forth for weeks before finally choosing the brand new Nokian Hakkapeliitta R3’s for his 9-3, a daily driver that sees a lot of snow action. This will be his first winter on dedicated snow tires, we can’t wait to see how he likes them. Thanks also need to go out to the Pennsylvania Saab Club for putting this all on!
The Saabs@Carlisle tent had a lot to offer for those show goers that don’t get the yearly dose of Saab that we do, including some extremely unique and special cars. It’s not too often that your conversation gets divided by a roaring two stroke 96, subsequently followed by a thin blue smoke cloud. As they say, if you’re not mixing gas, you’re not kicking ass, and the two stroke Saab’s never cease to turn heads.
Neither do some of the tuners freshly unveiled for the show. One of the stars of the show was Tom Ledwell’s Saab 9-5, with a highly modified 9-3 hybrid front end it was something no body has ever seen before (unless you have an Instagram account). He joined the large group of road tripping Saabs as part of the New England Saab Club convoy.
Even though we spent a lot of time in the Saab section, we did get to occasionally make it out and see some other parts of the show, which were equally impressive in their own right. Some things completely blew us away, such as a real live Renault R5 Maxi Turbo Rally Car. Not easily overlooked, this car should have had a crowd around it the entire weekend. It didn’t, however, so we got to get up close and personal to this iconic machine. If anyone has any more information on this particular car with the tag HBA5 94Y (it looked real, down to the fully built rally nav system) comment below!
Other outstanding vehicles included a full blown military Mercedes Unimog (complete with machine gun), an Audi Quattro with an enormous amount of custom engine work, and a Datsun with one of the most off-the-wall custom body kits we’ve ever seen. This was only scratching the surface, as amazing cars like this spread as far as the eye could see. Carlisle is a show that is so expansive, you’ll never be able to see everything. However, giving it a shot is worth as long as you bring your rain gear. You’ll see things that you will never in your life come across in a normal parking lot. Well….almost never.
