CdA hot rod weekend revs up

Cool cars of the past will hot rod it downtown Friday and Saturday during the 16th annual Car d’Lane Classic Car Weekend.

Directing his seventh year of the show, Mark Porath said he has seen it double in size since he began. About 35,000 people are expected to attend the event this weekend.

From 6 to 10 p.m. Friday, between 1,200 and 1,400 cars from 1978 and earlier will cruise downtown, vying for awards that include the best sounding muffler pipes, the best flames and more.

“Friday is really the energy day,” Porath said.

From 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, about 600 cars will sport shine as onlookers ogle their looks in the car show. At 4 p.m., awards will be announced in front of Crickets on Sherman Avenue.

A street dance on Sherman begins at 8 p.m. and lasts until midnight.

Several new car clubs join the fun this year. Two clubs from California and one from British Columbia will attend to show off their rides.

But the most important part of the show, Porath said, is the family aspect.

“It’s the families, it’s the dad and his son downtown looking at the cars and talking about memories,” he said.

Not that women don’t participate. The North Idaho Classics group has about 175 members, Porath said, and many are women.

“A lot of those are couples. The women are just as involved in the club and the show,” he said.

To Car d’Lane founder Dennis LeKander, the show is just a fun time to relax and show off a favorite car.

LeKander and others participated in an early version of the show in 1990 during the Idaho centennial celebration.

When the cruise aspect of the show was incorporated several years later, the event took off.

LeKander spent 10 years helping stage it before the North Idaho Classics organization took over.

LeKander will drive a 1923 Ford rat rod in the cruise Friday, he said. The car was being rebuilt by a father and son in the 1950s in California, but they abandoned the project in 1958.

“It was discovered again in 1999,” found in an old booth in a barn, LeKander said. “Just that it sat untouched for 40 years is kind of neat.”