How to fulfill a Lifetime Dream – twice: Supras in Vegas 2017 (Part 1)
Anyone who has been born in the 80s, like I do, who became a fan of Toyota Supras at the age of 6 and who sourced the internet for Supra content, couldn’t get pass the Redline videos.
I watched these videos endless times in my teenage years and dreamed of driving a Supra in the States. The North-American scene is something truly special. It’s not only the high quality and cleanliness of the cars, it’s also the US-American great taste in modifying cars. It seemed unreachable as a teenage boy and even not too long ago, but the urge to visit the world’s greatest Supra meet was huge: Supras in Vegas!
In the following years I got to meet someone living very distant from my place, nevertheless sharing the same biography when it comes to 90s taste in music, video games and of course, taste in cars. And he also dreamed the dream of one time meeting the US Supra scene. We became older, we earned our money, bought our dream Supras and both of us were certain that lifetime goals need to be achieved as long as you have the possibilities and especially the physical capabilities. Eventually we flew out to the US in 2016 with one aim in mind: Getting to know the US scene during the infamous Supras In Vegas event. Of course we couldn’t explain to anyone we were flying out to the States only for the sake of seeing some 20 year old Toyotas, hence we combined it with a 2 week holiday in California.
And the US was already waiting for us as we announced our trip loudly: The welcome was more than warm-hearted and we got to know some 300 people within only 3 days. Strangers became friends and we found ourself embraced by the US Scene. But one thing became clear pretty fast: This clearly won’t stay an once in a life time opportunity, everyone obliged us to come back next year.
Due to the financial aspect we actually planned to redo this trip in of the years to follow. But while having some drinks in May 2017 we decided to come back already this very year and again combine it with a vacation. Drunk plans are always the best plans, right?
After the arrival in California on Saturday we headed out to Vegas on Wednesday traditionally with the SoCal convoy. We met some friends from the Supra scene already in L.A. and made new friends on our way northbound to Nevada. I don’t think I need to explain the feeling to anyone while driving an Interstate with a pack of Supras following us, I mean, we followed them. And this feeling gets even better when out of the dark in the middle of desert the sky is getting brighter and brighter: Ahead of you lays the world’s biggest playground: Las Vegas.
The Hotel offers a guarded parking area, this year the top level of the parking structure. Good lighting and a great foto location were obviously available, and directly next to it a new 8-story parking structure that offered great views over “our area”.
Thursday is always the day of the Scenic Drive, which this year was headed towards the Hoover Dam, the US’ largest dam. We were lucky being offered a ride in one of 200 registered Supras, I took a seat in Matt’s 600hp single turbo beast, who travelled all the way from New York City with his father and their two Supras – that’s true enthusiasm!
The ride consisted from many “oh my god that’s a shitload of Supras”, “oh man, the scenery is breathtaking” and “Dude, this car pulls”. From time to time we were going “slightly” faster than US driving rules allow. “We don’t have that nice driving roads back in New York, I need to take advantage of it”, Matt’s words while driving through the Desert at “slightly” higher speeds than allowed and with the brutal sound of a 2JZ around us.
Coordination of 150 cars can become a little bit complicated sometimes.
The sight I had consisted from my wet dreams 2 years ago, I was part of my own wet dreams! I think this is self-explanatory.
Stay tuned for part 2 of our travel report, how I lost my innocence in Vegas and the event at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
