Antique & Classic Cars Blog

I told ya… Right here, I plugged the Wheels of Italy at Lake Calhoun last Sunday. If you made it, you saw millions of dollars worth of seductively curved fenders and tanks and fairings and a lot of fans of Italy’s recklessly sexy machinery. There are people in the world who choose careers driven by their motivation to own vehicles like these. While there are beautiful cars and bikes from many countries, none surpasses Italy’s for sheer allure.

The show started at 10 AM and ran till 4 PM, with snarling overhead cam sports cars and thundering or shrieking superbikes rolling in throughout the morning to infuse the scene with fresh energy.

Not everything on hand hailed from the Mediterranean boot–there was a Ford GT, various BMWs, several Porsches, a TR6, Lotus Super Seven and other summer playthings, but the bulk of the bikes and cars were Italian, including a couple Ferrari Dinos, Ferrari 400, various ’60s fast coupes, many new models, and my favorite—a 250 SWB. Wow! Swoopy offerings from Lamborghini, Maserati, Alfa Romeo, De Tomaso and others rounded out the scenery.

On the bike front, a long and drool-worthy row of classic and modern roadburners from Ducati, Moto Guzzi, Benelli, Aprilia and rarer makes like Moto Morini beckoned the two-wheel crowd. My personal dream bike is an MV Agusta F4.

Only one pulled up, driven by Anna S. She’d searched the country for a used ‘02-’04 750 and found one in Portland. She gave them a credit card number and booked a flight, then rode the bike south to California before shipping it here. Like many–but not all–of those in attendance, she has professional ties to the motoring world, selling Saabs and Cadillacs for Morries. Her love of horsepower extends right down to the one-horse level; she enjoyed talking with my wife about our morgan mare and looks to work a horse trip in among the faster two-wheeled jaunts.

The car and bike set is a good crowd. There’s always cool stuff to see and interesting folks to talk to. If you missed it this year, put it on your calendar sooner in ‘08.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 29th, 2007 at 11:20 am and is filed under Car stories. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.