Last Saturday I attended the SpoCom Norcal Edition car show held at Club Auto Sport in San Jose, CA. If you do a quick Google search of the word “spocom” you’ll find more images of scantily clad women than actual cars–this may explain why legions of adolescent males paid the relatively high $25 spectator fee, but more on that later. Look harder though and you can find some sweet J-Tin at this show claiming to be aimed at “automotive & pop culture tastemakers alike.”

The Venue

I don’t claim to be a tastemaster of any kind, but here is my review of the show from a Datsun owner’s point of view.  Let’s start with the venue: Club Auto Sport is a large, retail/commercial complex and home to exotic-car rental agency Club Sportiva and Borelli Motorsports:

Inside the main building there were several aisles for show cars to be parked and a main stage for a DJ and wait for it…bikini contest! Club Auto sport offers private garages so naturally I peeked at various man caves…found a Porsche 959 in hiding!

The Cars

Those tall orange “Swords” above are actually the coveted SpoCom Awards. I learned that this was a highly competitive show with “teams” vying for these 4-ft tall trophies. Here is a taste of the cars placed near the main stage area:

There were about 25 cars lining the aisles inside the building…scattered about in random fashion with one aisle having only 3 cars vs 18 in another:

The car scene inside the building was quite different from the cars placed outside, and this is where I found some pretty neat machinery. Let’s begin with my roadster which was staged near this S30 sporting an old-school body kit:

If you are a fan of vintage racing come out to Laguna Seca August 13-16 for the Rolex Monterey Motorsports Reunion. ZCG is hosting a VIP Car Corral for your Nissan/Datsun/Infiniti. To park in the corral you MUST purchase the corral tickets through ZCG! It is only $10, allows you to park with other Datsun owners, and it’s literally footsteps away from the track and venue, unlike general parking. See you there!

On Sunday we attended Cars & Coffee at the Blackhawk Museum in Danville, CA. Hosted every first Sunday of the month since the New Year, turnout continues to be phenomenal with impressive cars. Our dear friend Ken P. has been a regular at this gathering with his supercharged Datsun Roadster but Sunday’s event would be his last one before moving out of state. As one last hurrah to Ken we assembled a bunch of Datsuns to park together.

We left the shop at 6am with a brisk pace headed to Danville. Enjoying the Ride in our eight-car caravan was Rob’s ’67 2000, Kurt’s ’70 Datsun SPL, my ‘67.5 SPL,  Matt’s Datsun 510 wagon, Andy’s 1971 240z, Tom’s APS G35, Kurt I’s C5 Z06, and Lou’s R32 Skyline GT-R:

Arriving in Blackhawk just before 7am was indeed mandatory to secure parking as cars were already lining up at the entrance. Thankfully Ken and Dave P taped off a section just for Datsuns, and the showing was great with more roadsters, Z’s and 510s!

Francis ’67 SPL, Ken’s supercharged SRL, my ’67 SPL and Dave P’ ’67 2000:

Matt D’s 510 wagon and Matt G’s KA-T 510 two-door:

S30’s were in strong attendance, both in our corral and scattered through the lot. From mild to wild flavors it was great to see everything from Z32 TT’s to S130’s.

I spotted even more Z-cars lurking in adjacent lots, but this one really stood out with a freshly restored vibe and pretty white/red color combo:

Even more JDM gems hiding in the lots like this FD RX-7, first and third generation Toyota Celica’s:

Ultra-clean 2JZ powered Toyota SC300 and modded Genesis:

We were blown away at the variety of awesome machinery at Cars & Coffee. From exotics to muscle cars and literally everything in between we had a wonderful time perusing each aisle. Here were a few highlights for me, and don’t forget to cruise our extensive picture gallery below!

A Fiat 850 and 1200 Cabriolet, the latter shares some styling elements with a  Datsun Roadster!

Craziest engine swap: A 1936 Ford Pickup with an insane supercharged 5.4 modular drivetrain:

The Aston Martin club was the featured marque with stunning examples:

We love muscle cars! Simply mouth-watering cars from GM, Ford and Mopar:

Movie cars like this “Bandit” Trans AM and two(!) Deloreans:

Oh, and lots of modern/supercars too, if you’re into that kind of stuff 🙂

Big thanks to CNC Blackhawk and Dave P for arranging parking for our Datsuns.  We want to thank all of our friends who made the trip too, the ride back home was a blast!

Ken, we wish you luck and great Roadster weather in Seattle, “DATSTER” will be missed!

…[read more]

On Sunday we attended a private screening of the new movie “Winning” about actor/driver Paul Newman. The venue for this event was held at Apple’s headquarters in Cupertino, CA.  Our crew of eight cars met at the shop but before we departed a friend offered us a ride in a new Tesla Model S “P85D”.  This is the one with two electric motors, 690hp and the fabled “insane mode”.

The Tesla lived up to its hype. With 4 adults on board Rob launched the car and our heads abruptly hit their headrests. We couldn’t resist weighing this marvel and it tipped the scales at 4,920lbs.  With that experience checked off the bucket list, we proceeded to Apple:

When we arrived the parking lot scene was surprisingly like a Cars & Coffee meet with high-dollar/exotic machinery everywhere, like this $1.6 million Mclaren P1:

An entire section was taped off just for our Nissans/Datsuns! It was great to see enthusiasts appreciating the mix of cars, both vintage and modern. Here a few Datsuns that caught my eye, starting with Dave Stone’s 610 on Watanabe wheels:

This Datsun 240z (S30) also sported Watanabe wheels and a striking red interior. Loved the fender mirrors too!

Before watching the movie we admired some amazing cars from all marques.  There was a large turnout of Ferrari’s, more new than classic like the 458, FF and F12:

This Dino and familiar Lusso of course will always be the pinnacle of Ferrari’s design:

I really dig the interior on the new Mercedes Benz AMG GT S:

Cool muscle cars too like these Mopars and Shelby GT350:

We enjoyed the movie and it gave us Datsun geeks a chance to shine as Paul Newman piloted everything from 510s to 900hp Nissans on famous road racing tracks throughout his career. “Winning” is a must see documentary for every automotive enthusiast. You can catch it in theaters May 22 and on demand through iTunes.  Cheers to Adam Carolla! Please check the picture gallery for even more wonderful cars from the Apple parking lot.

…[read more]

The Blackhawk Museum in Danville, CA has been hosting Cars & Coffee every first Sunday of the month. From what we have seen in the media turnout has been phenomenal with some really impressive cars.

We would like to gather a group of Datsuns/Nissans to show their cars at the event on Sunday, June 7. If we can get a firm number of attendees in advance the nice folks at the show will tape off an area for us to park! Interested in parking with your fellow owners? Please contact alvin AT gmailDotCom or simply reply to our Facebook page or Instagram (#zcargarage) posts. All Nissan/Datsun/Infiniti cars welcome, see you at the show!