When you go to a brand-new, "first time" car show, you never know what you're in for, but when Goodguys told us that the 1st Nashville Nationals was going to be great, they sounded pretty confident. It turns out they were right. The Tennessee Titan Stadium is a perfect venue for a national hot rod event like this one. There is plenty of grass and shade for parking your ride and setting up your lawn chair. There are also numerous spots just right for "power parking," if that's your thing. And the Nashville skyline right across the river presented a great backdrop for all the up-close scenery provided by approximately 2,000 of the mid-South's nicest rods and customs.
We were there, along with our sister magazine Classic Trucks, to fill a couple corrals with our Top 10 picks. In addition, Goodguys had their usual assortment of special parking areas set aside for pickup trucks, musclecars, whitewalled customs, drivers, and homebuilt hot rods-not to mention the swap meet area. Air Ride Technologies set up some cones and timing equipment at the north end of the stadium to sponsor the Street Challenge Autocross-a chance for participants to actually drive their cars during the show.
One thing we noticed in Nashville was a high percentage of really well-done custom cars, and especially a large number of station wagons. With the exception of woodies, or the occasional Nomad, we didn't see many wagons at shows a few years ago. That's changing fast.
The question people kept asking all weekend was, "Is Goodguys coming back here next year?" In response to the success of this show, and the flood of messages overloading their e-mail inbox afterward, Goodguys says, "We'll be back for many years to come!"