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hotels for the first evening.
The following morning most of us
missed the impromptu Hertz photo op-
portunity, but Doug and Steve were
there along with me and my GT-H. I
literally was just rolling into the track
when I saw a black and gold line of
cars going somewhere together and I
hopped in line to join the commotion.
After the group photo, I assembled a
threesome of ‘66, ‘06 and ‘16 anniver-
sary cars for another photo opportu-
nity.
The rest of Thursday was mostly a
blur as things were happening so
quickly, and then suddenly we were all
getting in line for our parade laps
around Mid-Ohio’s road course. This
turned out to be my favorite part of
the whole convention. Sitting in line
with nearly thirty black-and-gold
Hertz cars was simply incredible.
Never before, and likely never again,
will there be such an amazing gather-
ing of my favorite cars and I was excit-
ing to be part of it. As fired up as I was
to be on the track with my black-and-
gold family, I also wished I could be on
the sidelines to watch and take it all
in. Hopefully somebody was taking
some good video and photos. I enjoyed
the rest of the day at what seemed like
a blistering pace as the hours ticked
off and my sunburn grew worse.
One of the vintage racers from
Minnesota asked me to provide him a
ride to the dinner after the final race,
and I enjoyed the opportunity to get a
close look at what goes on in the pits.
He also showed me the ins and outs of
his race car and other cars paddocked
around him. After a shower and
change of clothes, he was very excited
to be in my Shelby and after deciding
to go whichever way the trailer in
The SHELBY AMERICAN
Summer 2016 68