We’re all car enthusiasts for a massive variety of reasons, and I’m not just talking about the genres of vehicles we’re into. Today on Autopian Asks, we’re talking about formative experiences, the places you got your car enthusiasm from, because wow, are there ever so many facets of the hobby to fall in love with or be influenced by.
Some people have cars in their blood, growing up with parents who were always fixing, buying, selling, or even racing cars. Some people saw a sports car, or an off-roader, or a muscle car one day and were smitten. Some people found themselves falling in love with the artful dance of driving. Some people had a really cool aunt or uncle who showed them wheelspin in a Corvette was like. Some people received their first Hot Wheels car as a kid, and it was off to the races.
In my case, I’m genuinely not sure where my love of cars came from. Even my parents aren’t quite sure, to be honest. It’s just always been there, and likely always will. They aren’t elbow-deep car nuts as such, having owned exclusively pragmatic machinery, although my mum can rev-match downshifts and my dad appreciates the look of a fine classic sports car. Perhaps it’s because when I was small, a neighbor had an exceptionally well-specced B5.5 Passat. Now that was a classy family car.
However, that’s not to say I didn’t have moments that furthered my love of the game. The slingshot push to the top of third in a Dinan turbocharged 635CSi. My first auto show. My first roll of film. The first time I went karting. Helping to drop the tank on a New Edge Mustang on a concrete slab, crossing our fingers that the axle stands would give us enough height. Stopping by showrooms both at home and on vacation (pictured above) to see new and old models in the metal. The first time I went to a junkyard. Every trip to Canadian Tire. Life is defined by experiences, as we’re all aggregate beings, molded by moments and memories both solo and shared. All of mine have led up to hitting “save draft” on this blog, just like how all of yours have led up to your current pursuit.
So, how did you end up here? Who or what sparked the flame of car enthusiasm within you? Let’s talk about why we all do what we do in the comments below, because it’s not like any of us are calling it quits on this passion anytime soon.
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From my parents. Both my Father and Mother are huge fans of racing and support heavily my racing endeavors.
watching my Dad ice race on an abandoned airbase.
I get my car enthusiasm from an orange BMW 2002 Matchbox car I had when I was 2 or 3 in the late ’70s.
Save for the first few years of my life, my dad always had at least one project car. By the time I came around, he was firmly into Studebaker Larks. As a result, much of my bonding time with him was spent in and around old cars, at car club meetings, car shows, or taking drives. While other kids my age were watching cartoons on Saturday morning, I was watching all the car shows on TNN and Speed. And whenever I was at the store with my mom, she’d plop my down in the toy section in front of the Hot Wheels cars to keep me occupied and out of her way. If I behaved, I might even get to pick one out.
Later, on my own, car enthusiasm became a way to connect with technology, design, and culture. It became a central tenant of so much media that I consumed. It became a good touchpoint for anything I’d get into. From watching pirated Top Gear clips on early YouTube to playing racing video games, it just permeated my life. .
I am 76 years old, but I still remember sitting on the curb watching my Dad install new brakes and wheel bearings on one of the many Buicks he owned over his 97 years. Dad supported Mom and himself while in College working as an Auto mechanic (he was trained as an airplane mechanic in the Navy during WW II.) I pretty much learned everything from him, including my love of driving. (He once told me that he started driving at age 12, when his family was staying at their Summer home in Virginia.) He also taught me how to “talk like a mechanic” when stuff went wrong. LOL
When I moved him down to Florida, he had given up his license at the insistance of my Sister. The first thing he did was tell me to find a nice Cadillac to buy, because he had trouble gitting in and out of my Grand Cherokee. It was a 3.0 Twin Turbo, all wheel drive. I was engouraged to “put the pedal to the metal” whenever we went out.
I saw “The Love Bug” shortly after it was released when I was almost 4 years old.
And since Dad was in the USAF and worked nights, his single buddies would come over to our house during the day to hang out – and they’d show up in their Cougar XR7s, Torinos, MGBs, etc – and the guys would take me for rides.
Which probably explains my other enthusiasm…
My enthusiasm takes on two forms: First is that I’m fascinated by technology, so hybrids and EVs were always really cool to me, even if they didn’t drive well. Second, I was always into driving and racing, so I also like sports cars.
When I was a kid, I had a model car of a 1997 camaro convertible in green. It was one of my favorite toys and every time I saw a camaro I talked about it, to the point where my dad banned me from talking about them.
I grew up and still enjoyed cars and driving. In college, I had a Saturn SL2 and I was broke as can be. I became obsessed with efficiency and when the Prius came out I thought it was the coolest thing in the world. Even though it was boring to drive, the technical achievements of a hybrid motor was fascinating. The Chevy Volt was my next obsession since it could run on electric (I was too young to know about the EV1 in the 90s). I visualized having solar panels and basically fueling a car for free. The idea of having a battery for driving around town and having a gas engine as a generator was fascinating (I still drive a Volt to this day).
Then Tesla hit the scene and the Model S became my favorite car. Unfortunately Elon turned out to be a douche and that soured my taste for the brand.
I’ve always been into driving. When I was a kid I wanted a GoKart more than anything in the world. Any time we would go on vacation I would insist on going to the GoKart tracks.
I wanted to get into racing as an adult but just never really had the time or money.
But I can afford cool cars now at least. I have a Jaguar XK8 convertible that makes me smile ear to ear every time I drive. I also have that Volt.
I run a small business where I have to own company vehicles so I use that as an excuse to buy all the cars I obsessed with as a kid. I ended up buying one of those Priuses that captivated me so much and I also have a Chevy Bolt now, too. None of those are enthusiast cars, but they’re cars that make sense for someone who is fascinated by technology and alternative sources of powering a vehicle.
I was born with it. Nobody in my family was or is interested besides me. As long as I can remember I was fascinated. Hot Wheels, Aurora Model Motoring slot cars (which I still have set up in my basement), various mini bikes etc…nearly all of my toys did and still do have wheels and motors.
Wrenching. Lots and lots of wrenching. Seeing how parts function together to DO THINGS. Saving money via DIY whenever possible and learning from the professionals when DIY is not.
Appreciating the engineering efforts behind even the most monotonous parts, especially those Herculean efforts to increase quality, NVH and fuel economy while slashing costs. Figuring out why a system isn’t working properly and what the solution is – that is usually fun…eventually.
Debunking the marketing hype bullshit and finding out what the true magic is (hint, pretty much all mechanized transport have some of it, from unicycles to 777s).
Also trying to transport heavy, bulky things by foot. Nothing gives you an appreciation for mechanized transport like moving a big, heavy thing home uphill on a hand cart in the mud and rain. Or a bag of perishables on a scorching hot day.
Plus a special shout out to tractors (including semis) Without them we’d all starve. I have great enthusiasm for tractors.
I definitely inherited it from my dad. I don’t mean that as in the usual “I held the flashlight and he yelled at me for doing it wrong” thing, but as in a genetic predisposition. He had a 914 and a Karmann Ghia when I was born. In Boulder, Colorado, not a place known to lack snow. He gave my mom a Renault LeCar which I came home from the hospital in. He would go on to trade the 914 for a Thing which somehow had grass in the fuel tank. This man was nothing short of a Weird Car King. However, he died when I was 8, long before I could learn anything much about cars from him.
As an adult, when I started getting into cars, it was partly out of chasing a connection with him. I quickly gravitated towards weird cars, particularly Italians, it just felt natural to me. I eventually learned of his car history and used to joke it was genetic. Then I found an old photo album with pics of my ancestors posing with their cars in 1919, so it goes even farther back!
A father who can fabricate and machine anything out of nothing, a brother who is the Mycroft Holmes of automobilia, and a mother who says things like “when you had pneumonia and we were taking the ’67 through the canyon to the hospital, I’d drop a gear right here, floor it, and cut these three corners.”
Small numerous things. Dad refinishing the wood on our ’49 Ford woody wagon every year. Mom, the lead foot. Going to whatever the new car show was there. Growing up in Sacramento there are a lot of vintage, ancient, supercars, high end, modified, and more. Living on a street with new car dealers. Dad taking us to local car shows. Older cousins with nice cars.
Lets see, Dad was a gearhead, but he was a young Dad in his early 20s and didn’t have the patience or temperment to teach us. So we just absorbed as much as possible through Nascar on the TV on the weekends, his lifted truck(s), and of course stayed out of the way when the RV broke down on the side of the highway and it was up to him to get us rolling again.
My first car was my Mom’s old ’89 Chevy Beretta v6 5sp manual, and when the clutch went out my Dad refused to help because it was a new car with computers and crap, which he knew nothing about. I had a friend in high school who said he could do it in his parent’s garage who turned out to be absolutely incapable. Mission failed, barely got the thing sold for like a grand when they got the front end “back together”. I tried to help along the way but was clueless so it was more just going to a friends house after school and a weekend only to end up over our heads. So, that killed the urge to wrench for a long time.
Then I didn’t have a license for over a decade as a result of some bad DUIs when I was 21. There was some tragic loss in the family and I ended up moving back in with my folks to get back on my feet after some noticeable decline. Since I couldn’t get into the family business of structural steel, just don’t have the brain to walk around on steel beams tens to hundreds of feet in the air, the next best thing to learn from Dad was to wrench. So I got an ’89 Mitsubishi Montero with my tax returns 12 years ago, $1,600, 218k miles and needed work but looked fine. 12 years later I’m working on my 2014 BMW 335ix GT, my Wife’s 2024 X3, and am trying to secure a garage to rebuild the Montero which rolled 300k miles.
Now Dad has a ’31 Model A to show off to his new Grandson, and I have an apprentice starting from his first day.
There was some other stuff in there, I lived in an RV for a while, didn’t learn to wrench then either.
Hot Wheels.Specifically the original Twin Mill, Deora, Beatnik Bandit and the Splittin’ Image.
https://onlineredlineguide.com/69/69_splittin_image/Splittin_Blue.jpg
Yup. It was then I realized the lower-profile and lighter cars went faster down the track and held the curves better on the courses that my brother and I made for racing. So, that’s what I wanted in real life. The Lotus, the Brabham Repko, …
The tow truck did give them a run for it, somehow. Maybe it knew they would crash and had to get there ASAP?
I got it from my mother.
My dad was an automotive designer.
But it was my mom who truly appreciated cars and design …
I’m here because I was born in Indianapolis. They say Indiana is basketball crazy. Not in my neighborhood. We were all about racing and learned early that no race is more important than the 500.
I remember my best friend pounding on my screen door telling me I needed to see a Stingray. I thought he was talking about a fish. It turns out that a doctor on a house call a few doors down was driving a ’63 split window Corvette. I couldn’t believe a spaceship like this existed. When the doctor was leaving he let four wide eyed boys take turns sitting in the driver’s seat. What a hero. I went home wondering why anyone would drive a normal car. I was nine and reality wasn’t part of my world yet.
Gran Turismo 1 got me hooked on cars for sure.
My dad, always had the coolest car he could afford. He built two Locosts with race-prepped Fiat 125 engines.
Also my granddad used to race a Model T.