And by bang, I mean the noise you'll hear as this first car off the finish line sputters and backfires. Our Prince of Darkness Ozzy Osbourne once again reaches for his trusty circa 1993 white bricks to construct this...um...basic dragster for Reggie Spader. I wonder what the rigging is for? Apparently it helps boost the horsepower up to a beefy 900. Yup.
Then Ozzy builds another car but this time for "Old Pops" McGraw in predictable white...(gasp!) no, wait...RED! He has red pieces! And this one is a...um...Charger-Challenger-Nova-GTO type thingy. Crammed into that tiny little frame is a 427 Hemi Big Block. Who woulda thunk it?!
Tommy N also shows some respect for the old racing legend by building him a Porsche 917 Kurzheck. According to Tommy, Old pops talks like an 1820's gold prospector and just like all crusty old codgers...he hates youngsters! You kids get off my lawn!
MetalGearAddict gives the mysterious El Espiritu a name (Edward Nix) and a custom Mercedes with bulletproof glass,(because The Scorpion and Lady Venom never play fair) steel frame and a suspension that can handle any terrain. I think his version of El Espiritu used to be in The Village People.
MetalGear's second entry looks suspiciously like his first...except with a roof. Its KIT, but not the KITT of Knight Rider fame. This one is white and vaguely modeled after a 50's era police car...sort of. According to MetalGear, what the commentators thought was racing legend "Old Pops" McGraw was actually a remote control receiver. The car drives on its own!
J4ke proves that cute little Japanese girls like Yuki Nakamura would drive none other than the cute little Toyota Aygo Crazy concept car. It makes perfect sense, really. jake says the awesome Space Skulls set helped generate enough 1x3 curved pieces to give this car just the right shape. Domo Arigato, Mark Sandlin! You kids research that and get back to me on it.
What would Lugnuts be without Raphy? Quieter, perhaps...but you'd miss out on that 4-wide goodness and drama. Here he taunts Tommy Nunez to sue him with this first sunny yellow car called Sliced Citrus built for everyone's fave underdog, Reggie Spader. This car sucks big time! No, really it does...the hood scoop sucks more air in than the Bugati Veyron...and we all know the sucking capacity of that car! This also proves that rivals on the race track can be friends. Legendary Ace "Old Pops" McGraw helped Reggie design this winning racer.
Then Raphy builds outside of his comfort levels with this decidedly cool bar stool racer. At first it was for no racer in particular, but then I asked him what driver did he build this for. That was followed by a week of Who? What? What are you talking about? Huh? Then finally Raphy saw the light and determined this barstool racer was built for Sgt. Rage...for irony, yanno. Sigh...other people's kids...what can you do?
Then Raphy slips right back into his comfort zones with this classy white coupe for El Espiritu and a souped-up blue muscle car for the handsome and charismatic Billy Angel.
Next on Raphy's to-do list is to bring back the "Ace of Spades" friendship/rivalry with Ace McGraw's white racing truck and Reggie Spader's Minigarage Road Maintenance Vehicle 4x4. Reggie sure likes yellow!
For those whose ever wondered what Raphy looks like, it turns out he's been a dark haired minifig all this time. Here he is posed next to his Fiat 126p "Maluch"...a decidedly cool hatchback sporting the colors of the Polish flag. For those of us who thought Poland was either on Mars or Asia, you'd be wrong on both counts! Darn...I soooo had Raphy pegged for a Martian!
"Rura do dechy", Raphy tells us in his crazy Martian moon language. It probably means...take me to your leader. This time he builds Francesca, who is an Italian fan of "made-up, copied-from-lego, 3-inch lego cars from supposedly Poland" (Who isn't, right?);)Raphy tells us he spared no expense in building this car...$4.99! Girl not included. Hard to find, he says. Well duh...dontcha know, Raphy is from Mars, and girls are from Venus! :D
But wait, there's more! Raphy submits this black rat rod called "Vile Varmit" for Australian racer Peter Wildfire. He has a dog named Mikey whom Peter nursed back to health when he found him under a pile of heavy metal. Speaking of Heavy Metal, that movie was a teenage fantasy like no other! Wow, the thought that a skinny nerd can grow super huge(Den of Earth)and have hot naked chicks lust after him! And you can fly home from space in a 50's era Corvette!I'm totally putting that movie on my netflix!Totally awesome boobage, man! Anyway...Mikey is the fastest dog in the world.
Fe2cruz proves that sometimes good things come in very small packages. If Raphy's cars are tiny turbos, these great MOCs are micro turbos! Its no surprise that the smallest racer Yuki Nakamura, will have the smallest MOCs, in this case a pair of Suzuki bikes and a trailer truck to haul bikes and equipment to the races. Mr. cruz takes inspiration from the incomparable Monsterbrick. Great job!
LegoMonster knows the way to my heart! First you take a stunning SAAB S3X in patriotic (to Swedes anyway) yellow and blue. Then you throw in The Swedish Ice Queen Erika Melberg...also in patriotic blue and yellow. Just look at those beautiful round...um...eyes! I heard in Sweden its a national felony to badmouth Abba. Its true, I saw on this show No Reservations, this American journalist Anthony Bourdain badmouthed Abba incessantly for like 45 minutes while everyone around him tried to get him to hush about it. Then he spent a night in jail. As he's a snarky loud mouthed American he probably would have landed in jail anyway, but just in case...Abba is awesome and so is LegoMonster! :)
J0n4th4n D3rk53n likes mixing numbers and letters together. That's why he built the Porsche 550. See what I did there? ;) Anyway, its a sleek red Porsche with nice details. He must have missed the challenge rules as it doesn't have mention of a driver. Still, its a pretty cool car.
I don't know when it happened, but somewhere along the line, Matt "Monsterbrick" Armstrong has lost his sanity...in a good way. he creates a concoction that only he can dream of...it turns out Humpty Dumpty drives a brick wall! Really, it makes sense after a few beers. His write up features an all-star cast, including Linus M, who is probably my evil twin brother (oh wait...I'M the evil twin!)as the voice of Humpty and this wild ride has more glitz and shine than a Las Vegas casino. The brick and mortar racer comes with a pit crew of three pigs and all the King's men...are embedded behind the grille. Matt proves without a doubt he is one-of-a-kind!
Tim "Gambort" Gould builds us a sleek white racer for little Yuki Nakamura. And what self respecting Japanese girl would be complete without a robot friend and mascot? Yeah, Yuki bought the robot earlier this month but as the Japanese are so tech savvy he's already outdated and in need of upgrading. The new upgrade can to all the same 10 million tasks her current robot can do but is the size of a cell phone!
Steve "kwycstix" Walker finds a way to cross the finish line without even leaving the bar stool. Enter the bar stool racers! He masterfully brewed up all ten racers plus two commentators. Sgt. Rage's blood alcohol content must have topped the charts as his little stunt seen on World's Craziest Drivers caused a ten stool pile up (insert your own medical joke here) and ended the bar stool racing circuit forever!
Tim "Rabidnovaracer" Inman's policy is go big or go home! He proves this with his massive 22 stud wide 1994 Alfa Romeo 155 V6 TI built for the popular Ace "Old Pops" McGraw. The stickers are mostly hand made. The high output V6 engine is a sight to behold. Awesome!
Somehow I knew Gold2 would build a vehicle for Sgt. Rage. I don't know, call it military intuition. But I didn't know it would be a totally badass MMW (Martian Motor Works) Ursa-6 in the iconic lime green and orange Power Miners colors. It turns out Sgt. Rage can safely channel his excessive aggression on the ice roads of Mars. Gold says being the biggest, most badass racer on the road is all the thrill he needs! And cracking lame jokes about it is all the thrill I need. See, everyone's a winner!
new guy kin.lego produces a surprisingly realistic Ferrari F512M. There are lots of sleek details not to be missed on this one. What is missing though is the name of the driver that this car goes with. Therefore we can only assume the driver is the red hat in the photo. ;)
The incomparable Firas Abu-Jaber says he's just no good at stories at all so didn't include the name of a driver. But what he lacks in story telling ability he more than makes up for it in raw talent. He graces us with the legendary Ford GT LM Race Car. Firas is one of those rare builders who can fool even the most astute of us into thinking his models are not Lego. I don't know...I don't have any lame jokes for this one. Just enjoy.
Speaking of lame jokes, Lino builds an old gasser. I'm talking about the car, not the old man.The car is a '55 Ford Crown Vic. The old man is Ace "Old Pops" McGraw and when he's not shaking his cane at youngsters and telling them to get the hell off his lawn he's winning against them on the drag strip. Some questioned if Old Pops fig depicts me in my advanced years. Well, I tend to walk like that when I first get up off a chair and my goatee is already showing some strands of white. But I can only hope to have as much hair as "Old Pops" when I reach his age...as it seems my own locks may eventually go the way of the dodo. Damn it all!
Ralph "Mad Physicist" Savelsberg almost didn't build this great Mitsubishi Evo X. Work, real life, and sometimes just a lack of motivation gets in the way of even the most astute of builders. (Boy, don't I know it!) But his friend Ed built the sexy Yuki fig that goes with his Swedish Erica Melberg and a couple scrapped car and bike ideas later, Ralph finds motivation anew with the sleek Evo X. Every detail came out phenomenal. Let us all bask in the glory of the great car that almost wasn't.
Nathan Proudlove figured that my write up for the challenge read like a soap opera so naturally he built...soap box racers! He used my over the top script in his write up, complete with heroes, villains, legends, rivals and drama. It admittedly turned out hilarious when pitted in conjunction against his silly soap box racers. He teamed up with his friend Hatgurl to build all ten soap box racers, he did the cars, she built the figs to go with them. She may be new to the Lego scene, but is already constructing some of the coolest miniland figs around. Lets take a look:
Billy Angel has the coolest hair in the history of miniland figs ever. That's why the girls love him!
Next is the beautiful Natasha Molotov. Can you say Russian mail order bride?
Everyone's fave underdog is Reggie Spader. Hang in there, kiddo!
next is the wildly unpredictable Kyle Armstrong. What a colorful character!
Even soap box races isn't without their evil cheaters, as evidenced by The Scorpion.
Next comes the legendary Ace "Old Pops" McGraw. Old gray mare she ain't what she used to be, ain't what she used to be!
Followed by the young Yuki Nakamura...she probably loves Hello Kitty dolls.
Next up is Lady Venom...she's a bad girl in a pretty blue soap box racer!
Next comes Sgt.Rage. He's so angry all the time...maybe he just needs a hug!
Followed by El Espiritu...he's a masked white ninja racer for some reason!
Its easy to miss as he didn't provide a pic, but newbie ricecracker entered a Toyota Fj Cruiser Race Truck for The Scorpion. His version of The Scorpion has really intense eyes...like the guy on all the wanted posters at the post office. The one wanted for aggravated arson. Maybe its him!
new guy Cole Blaq provided an awesome trio of concept racers each with strange new spherical tires. First up is Lady Venom and her toxic lime green Anaconda racer. Her glasses were sent from the future to find and kill Sara Conner!
Followed by Reggie Spader and his deep blue Mantis. Who woulda thunk that Reggie was a super ripped bald guy in wrestling tights!
Then comes Billy Angel and his fiery red and silver Ray of Light. He's so dreamy! Looks like Cole Blaq is gonna be a great addition to our LUGNuts team.
ZitoVince shows us a sleek little orange and black RC racer. Six days ago I asked him to provide a name for a driver to go with it. My request still remains unanswered. I guess we're just going to have to keep guessing. Sigh...
BloodRedDragon says to always save the best for last...which is probably why two top notch builders came after him.;)But before we get to them, BloodRed shows us The Scorpion fig with his Scarlet Supernova vehicle. According to BloodRed, Scorpion was raised by animals in Australia...which somehow gave him astute knowledge of cars. Oh and his reflexes are so fast he sneezes at the speed of light. Probably the animals in the Australian outback taught him that too. Hah...sometimes these jokes just write themselves! Really, they do.
Dylan Denton keeps it real with this very cool 1967 Dodge Charger built for Lady Venom. There are badass spider details through the whole vehicle not to be missed...like the web design in the trunk, the spider on the steering wheel and the black widow pattern on the seats! While no slouch, Dylan has certainly stepped up his game for this challenge. He says it took all month to build and was more difficult than it looks. I believe him entirely...I see some very advanced solutions to difficult problems here. Dylan, we salute you, buddy!
Then Dylan nods and cracks jokes in Thomas Nunez direction with this slick red and silver So-Cal Cruiser Amphicar. He says this car is bigger than Thomas' fist. Ok! Be sure not to miss the funny pic of the amphicar floating with its engine on fire and the Thomas figure having to paddle ashore. Funny stuff! But why so many jokes about Tommy N this month? Was he raised by animals in the Australian outback?
Speaking of animals in the Australian outback...I saved this one for last. Lets see...how do we begin? Some people are crazy. That's just how it is. Insanity manifests itself in many different ways. Some people hear voices that aren't there...others shout obscenities about smelling waffles...others show up pantsless on the bus. Peter lego911 builds 47 cars in a month. Let me repeat that in case you missed it...47 cars! In one month! Holy Crap!! lego911 has got to be a Lego car building world record holder. I haven't the slightest clue how he pulls it off or how his Mrs. tolerates him...but 47 cars this month. I can't crack jokes about each one. I just can't...but I urge you to check them all out. Wow...my head is just spinning. 47 cars!
Alrighty then, we bring At The Races to a close and this month we bring you Junkers and Clunkers...the only build challenge so far that demands you leave your shiny new show rods at the door in favor of rusted broken down old crap. Maybe someone will build my dad's Aries K wagon...and you thought we'd go this whole round up without a Aries K joke! Stay tuned to see how this all unfolds. I'm sure nothing will be predictable!
