By Jeff Glucker
Last year marked ten straight years of crowning some crap-heap amazing machine with the title of Hooniverse Car of the Year. In fact, we topped all of that off with a Hooniverse Car of the Decade as well. This year though… is different. The world has spiraled for 2020. Best laid plans were put to pasture. Jobs were lost. Friends and family may have been lost. It does not feel right to single out one vehicle as “the best” of the year.
So instead we’re going to try and spread more cheer and talk about a whole bunch of great builds. I’ll get the conversation started with some of them, and I want you all to try and keep the momentum going with some of your favorite builds, stories, projects, whatever that have risen from the hellscape that has been 2020.
Right off the bat, I can say that one of the builds I’ve been most focused on has been Ryan Tuerck’s Formula Supra. He’s taking a new A90 Supra, ditching the BMW powerplant, and stuffing an amazing Judd V10 in its place. This one is ambitious but the project is moving along nicely. I can’t wait to see and hear this one rev its brains out in 2021.
Riley Stair’s wicked Firebird sits high on my list of HCOTY deserving machines. It’s just… awesome. The stance is perfect. It looks evil and great at the same time. And to have Hot Wheels recognize your car as a top build is one hell of an achievement. This car rules.
Subaru and Vermont Sports Car built Travis Pastrana a rally car with no rules. Pastrana then took that car through the streets of his beloved Maryland, driving the absolute crap out of it. That includes a casual road jump at 150 mph, no big deal. This is one insane Subaru.
Some more honorable mentions include:
- Hoonigan’s Donk build, which has been a blast to watch come together.
- Ant Anstead’s just announced Tipo 184 Alfa Romeo kit car.
- The fact that you can choose between three different fast German wagons; a Porsche, a Mercedes-Benz, and an Audi.
And there are so many more that I’m forgetting because I’m old. I’m tired. And this has been a weird year. But let’s keep the awesome going in the comment section below. Chime in. Share videos and pictures and links, and let’s get this party started.
Thanks for being with us through 2020, and further back if you’ve been around longer.
Ross Ballot
There was a post a while back that is a good start –
Since 2020 has been a year of staying home, how about HCOTY 2020 being a car that hasn’t moved all year?
It’s a nice thought but my candidates keep getting rejected.
When I came up with that idea, I envisioned you losing out to the Wombat. Jeff has strong home field advantage and a small fleet without other driveway ornaments to divide his own voters.
Wombat gets the title 7 years running now… I’m not crying. I’m not crying.
“running” oh god, why
On “a car” grounds?
This is the other end of the excitement spectrum, but this year, I’ve been following a few EV threads of different flavours. What I like the most is the simplest job: Replacing old Leaf batteries that originally had 24 kWh with better ones from the scrapper. EV owners crash much more than other car drivers, according to insurances, so the supply exists. 40 and 62 kWh batteries almost bolt right in, despite being 2.5 cm taller, and only need a dash of fresh software.
Why is this at all HCOTY-worthy, you might wonder? Imho, this is sticking it to OEMs, which, especially in the case of Nissan, have left-hand-designed their cars with solid chunks of planned obsolescence bolted in everywhere you look. Small, expected repairs cost fortunes unless you do them yourself. Regulators are on the fence if allowing battery swaps is the right thing to do.
But…of course it is! Eternal life for well-kept cars? Garage-tinkering and reverse-engineering? Or outright buying in to this via companies like https://muxsan.com/ ? Car guys are changing how the industry can work, to their own benefit, often at low cost.
“Camaro”?!
u trollin’?
Technically speaking, a TransAm IS a kind of more wicked Camaro…. so there’s that.
Whoops. I wrote this at around 12:30 last night… in between doing other work.
heh, “work”?!
😉
Trolling would have been written as “Camero.”
trew…
Technically speaking, a TransAm IS a kind of more wicked Camaro…. so there’s that.
yah, and it’s LS-powered, so splitting hairs a bit, but if Burt Reynolds or James Garner saw it, what would they call it??
I imagine they’d say something like “BRAAAAIIIIINS”
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/60d045741419271c9b2d67406c63012464dc33a6f74feba8dc1289f07c4d29e9.jpg
🤣
Hey, now. The stalwarts in the marketing department at GM selflessly imbibed thousands of three-martini lunches in their tireless effort to preserve the dignity of the noble Pontiac brand. Are you going to take a giant shit on their sacrifices, the countless marriages ruined by alcoholism, intra- office infidelity and the quixotic devotion to Brand Loyalty by calling a Pontiac Firebird Trans-Am a Camaro?
My mother owned a Camaro. If you want to stand face to face with a tattooed biker chick that once stole a police car and tell her that her Camaro was just a weenie sort of Firebird, I’d suggest you bring an ambulance to the meeting. (No, really; she’s 85 years old. If you get her Irish up there’s no telling what might rupture.)
Alright: which one of you Ponchos spray-painted “Pontiac Rulez!” On my garage door last night?
Alright: which one of you Ponchos spray-painted “Pontiac Rulez!” On my garage door last night?
Get her Irish up?
She’ll offer you a cup of tea and tell you it’s grand like?