Gold Eagle has been supporting this wonderful event for several years now but this was my first year going to the Nostalgia Days Cruise & Show. It was also my first time seeing a USLMRA race in person. I was definitely impressed with both the show and the races!

Nostalgia Days was the brainchild of Chris Szymanski. Several years ago, when he was affiliated with the old Zion Business Association, he suggested that in conjunction with the then Annual Gypsy Days Sidewalk Sale, an antique and classic car show be held along with various activities relating to nostalgia. In 1987, after ONLY six weeks of planning, 80 cars registered and participated in the car show. Since then, Nostalgia Days has had as many as 500 antique and custom automobiles participate in any given year. A few years ago, George Dukas contacted Bruce Kaufman from the USLMRA and the rest is history!

 

I drove up to Zion, IL from Chicago with my wife Seiko on Friday afternoon and after checking into the hotel we headed to Shiloh Park for a night of lawn mower racing! On the way to the track we met up with Tyler Rossdeutscher and Bobby Cleveland. Tyler is a summer intern (Sales) at the company and of course Bobby Cleveland (The Engine Answerman) is our resident spokesperson/daredevil!

 

The races were a lot more exciting than I expected. (To read about all the racing classes and rules, CLICK HERE) I was also surprised by the size of the crowd that the races drew, it was a big crowd! At first I was a little skeptical because they seemed to just be cruising very leisurely but then I realized they were only warming up the engines and getting a “feel” for the track. Once the qualifiers started it got good and the points races were incredible. Not only did they go fast, but you could see the strategy behind every turn and I started noticing who my favorite racers were based on their racing styles. I mostly like the aggressive racers that constantly challenged the folks in front of them. 

We met Jon “Rooster” Lewman (on the Cool Rides Online mower) in the pits working under the mower. He was trying to fix a bent pulley and the transmission belt kept getting loose. It was great to see that the same people he was competing against were helping him trying to fix the mower and even giving him spare parts. That drove the point home that this is a family sport above all and all of the racers genuinely look out for one another.

 

It was good to see the local media come out with with a reporter from Chicago Channel 7 (ABC) interviewing Bobby Cleveland and a few other racers. At the end of the night, Rooster was kind-enough (or dumb enough lol) to let me take the CRO Mower out for a few laps. I only rode it in 2^nd gear (has 3 speeds) but IT SCARED THE HECK out of me! I loved it for the three laps I did… until I slammed on the clutch instead of the brakes and popped the tranny belt (sorry Jon)!

 

That night we headed out to Applebee’s with the crew and then headed back to the Big Blue Truck for a few drinks and some blues music.

 

Saturday was Car Show day so we started setting up the truck/booth at 8am sharp! We set up next to the registration tables and we had all of the cars getting voted on to the left and all of the same-day registration cars to our right. George Dukas, Chris Szymanski and the other event coordinators have done a real great job with Nostalgia Days. By 10am there were easily over 500 cars parked along Sheridan Road. There must have also been at the very least 10,000 people walking around checking out the cars.

 

Some time around mid-day, the B/P class USLMRA racers showed up revving their engines and parked in front of the truck to promote Saturday night’s races. It’s amazing how much drawing power these mowers have! It was about that time that Seiko and I sneaked out to check out all the Cool Rides that came to the show. We took many pictures and talked to a lot of great folks! We must have walked for over an hour and only got to see the cars that were parked to our left.

On the bright side, after 4pm all the cars cruised up & down Sheridan Rd. so we got to see most of the cars we missed on our walk. Also, since we were parked next to the registration table we got to see the cars to the right as they registered for the cruise.

 

We closed shop around 6pm and headed down to the track at Shiloh Park for round two of the USLMRA. Having two big dogs (Labrador mix & Newfoundland) at home with no dog-sitter for Saturday night, we had to leave a little early and only caught a couple of the qualifiers that night. We said our farewells to everyone we met and left with some great memories of Nostalgia Days!

 

If you have any questions about our weekend or if you want to leave a comment about my attempt at an event-report, please post them HERE.