Reply to "ItalianCarFest.com is up & ready , '06 applications for entry are available"

What a weekend! Good weather, great cars, lot's of friends and Tom Tjaarda. Who could ask for more.

First of all, let me say that you will never meet a more personable and friendly person than Tom Tjaarda. He wowed the attendees regardless of what kind of car they drove! It was truly an honor to be in his presence.

Besides Tom, Dave Adler of Pantera International and Dennis Quella from Pantera Performance Center in Colorado also attended the show. We had many other Pantera owners from all over Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas including Sean Korb from North Carolina! Thanks for coming.

We had 37 DeTomasos registered for the event; two did not get finished in time, and one additional car showed up the morning of the event. Two cars even showed up without their owners. Gray Gregory and Dave Nichols were not able to make it but they sent their cars anyway. And we had a very rare Longchamp GTS owned by Philip Eckart. All in all, 36 cars ain't bad. Probably the biggest collection of Panteras ouside of California and the Las Vegas Fun Rally - ever! What else needs to be said. We were nicely grouped together to the right of the Tom Tjaarda display tent. A special thanks goes to Mark How, Fred Foreman, and Tim Tytle for reserving tent space that allowed all of us to sit in the shade. The list of cars is shown further on down. Thanks to everyone who attended; you made the event what it is.


Show winners included:

Best Pantera Pat Lobb Gorgeous black 72 with webers
Runner-up Richard Perry Dual turbo, nitrous car in great show condition

Best Race Car Dennis Quella Tube frame race Pantera
Runner-up Gray Gregory Race converted Pantera
We swept all the awards in this category! This was good for the Pantera marque as it showed the world that Panteras are more than just pretty a pretty face. These cars can snarl with the best of them.

Texas Drivers Magazine's Sponsor's Award went to Jerry Quam's beautiful red Mangusta.


As is the tradition at Concorso Italiano, we held our own awards ceremony. And at the end of our awards, we all got in our cars and fired 'em up. Nothing beats the sound of a Pantera!

Chuck Engles and Jim Gray were kind enough to raffle off several T Shirts and posters from their Pantera collection at http://www.italiancarstore.com/. If you haven't taken a look at their collection, they have have some really neat stuff. Thanks guys.

Winners included:

Tom Tjaarda's Favorite Mark How
The car looks great and Tom especially liked the interior, saying that Ford rushed the car into production and so the stock interior was as good as it could have been.

Dave Adler's Favorite Scott Black
Dave gave a 35th Anniversary Medalion signed by Tom Tjaarda

POCA President John Taphorn's Favorite Dennis Coffman

Best Pantera Mark How
Best Small Bumper Car Frank Jerome's recently fuel injected car
Best L bumpered Car Dennis Coffman
Best Unrestored Car Dave Nichols' car "El Foxo"
Best Interior Richard Perry
Best Exterior Frank Jerome
Best Engine Compartment Richard Perry
Most Lived-In Pantera Bob Fett

And there was a write-in category for "Best Flames on a Pantera" which I won, thank you very much. %^))

An interesting comment was made at the awards about how all the cars looked so good. Several years ago, you would have seen a lot of tired, unrestored cars, but now we are seeing more and more really well done cars. A good sign for Pantera drivers!

Dinner was held that night and Tom gave a short talk about design and answered questions. It was informative and educational. It's amazing that he is still so active in the industry. He recently did the Shelby Series II car, and is doing a lot of work in China and Korea. His favorite American car: the Chrysler 300C.

Sunday evening, the Pantera Club took him out to dinner for some Tex Mex. What an engaging person. Special thanks go to Nick and Vanessa Sakulenzki for showing Tom around Dallas. Turns out he is also interested in airplanes so they visited a couple of airplane museums in town. They probably got to know Tom better than most people having spent so much time with him. They told me his favorite meal when he is in the US is a hamburger and a milk shake. He doesn't get that at home apparently.

Pictures are at:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/60386408@N00/sets/72157594280447307/
http://valentine.phanfare.com/album/113571
http://gallery.italiancarclub.com/carshows/icf/icf06/
http://community.webshots.com/user/whitnah100

Well, that's about it. See you at next year's Italian Car Fest.

Jeff Detrich
6559
Pantera Club of North Texas


Todd Reid Pantera - Oklahoma
Johnny Holmes Pantera - DFW
Jeff Detrich Pantera - DFW
Nick Sakulenzki Pantera - DFW
Chuck Engles Pantera - Oklahoma
Jim Gray Pantea - Oklahoma
Tim Tytle Pantera - Oklahoma
Dave Bell Pantera - Houston
Pat Lobb Pantera - DFW - Former Winner
John Taphorn Pantera - Houston
David Tureaud Pantera - Houston
Bill Fraser with Dennis Jones Pantera - Former Winner - Houston
Matt Bradley Pantera - DFW - Former Winner
Bill Eckart Longchamp GTS - Austin
Scott Black Pantera - DFW
Gray Gregory Race Prepped Pantera - Houston
John Neal Pantera - DFW
Mark Pinson Pantera - DFW
Gene Orr Pantera - DFW
Ted Glover Pantera - DFW
John Johnson Pantera - DFW
Richard Perry Pantera - DWF
Dennis Quella Race Pantera - Denver
Bob Fett Pantera - DFW
Mark How Pantera - DFW
Ron Cantu Pantera - DFW
Chuck Keding Pantera - DFW
Frank Jerome Pantera - DFW
Kevin Govett Pantera - DFW - DNF - Did not get finished on time
Doug Lockin Pantera - Houston
Sonny Morgan Pantera - DFW
Dennis Coffman Pantera - Houston
Dave Nichols Pantera - DFW
Ken Davis Pantera - DFW - DNF - Did not get finished in time
Fred Foreman Pantera - Houston
Jerry Quam Mangusta - DFW
John Kuethe Pantera with big block Chevy - DFW