SW Meet Happenings...with some pics

[Gypsy me]

As many of you know we toured the Ford Proving Grounds on Friday, Aug 5. That was totally AWESOME! I for one was in awe! I don't think any of us will ever forget that!



Bob Howard, was so kind in working with me for this tour and came thru to make it happen for us! He greeted us once we checked into security. We were all able to tour together in a 15 passenger van. We saw soo much I don't know where to begin! Mr Howard answered any questions he was allowed to answer!

(and you betcha we ask about the 07 of course he could not tell us )



Lemme tell ya trucks are put to the test at this facility! We saw pretty much every kind of testing they do here We followed along side an F150 (no camo needed was marked on it) and watched as Judy, the driver took it over some ROUGH terraine! The suspension was taking a pounding while Judy looked uneffected by the road conditon! We went on the frame twist test road in the van after watching Judy in the f150. Pretty neat to see how frames are tested. Trucks including the Sport trac are put through more of a stress test, cars are put through more of a speed testing. Every test imagionable is done there 24/7.



I can tell you personally I LOVED being on that high speed test track! Being sideways on a 33 degree bank in a 15 passenger van was quite a rush! :lol: I think a few of us were taken by surprise. Mr Howard is a very qualified competent driver, he could not take us on this track w/out passing the grounds test to do so! We were in good hands! Since I love racing so much I guess that was my favorite part of the tour. Other than seeing vehicles that are not yet released, that was cool too!





The others will post and share their experiences, feelings about the tour soon!



Here are the two pics from the proving ground tour.





Here is the group picture

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Here is a pic when we presented Mr Merle Ward, Manager of Arizona Ford Proving Grounds

an etched plaque in appreciation for allowing us to tour the grounds. After this picture he stood in the heat with us and answer our questions and not only that, he ASK us what we we'd like to see in the Sport trac and what would we change. The transmission will be better and different in the 07 for those interested in that.



the plaque read





Arizona Ford Proving Grounds



Thank you for your support



SW Regional Sport Trac Meet

2005

mysporttrac.com AZ event



(Mr Stern hope that was ok, but I felt it proper since we were representing the site)



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[Teddy GreeneII]

Wish I was there, things blew up here, shoulda gone! Have fun guys. Everyone drive home safe and takes lots of Pics for us!

 

[Gypsy me]

Teddy, hope the water is calmer now, And You really should have come! Everyone from CA that came on this tour said...the tour was well worth the drive!





alot of the members and their family/friends were shutter bugs for us THERE ARE TONS of photos of the meet at Colorado River Ford!

 

[LoriMaury Kimbrough]

As soon as I get mine re-sized, I will post them. The tour was awesome. I had just commented to the hubby that I was glad we wouldn't be going up on the bank....when we did. Bob was explaining how the banks were engineered to where you could literally drive with no hand on the wheel when your speed was right. He demonstrated that as well. It was one of those scary/cool things. We've been driving past the proving grounds for 8 years and always wondered what was there. The tour proved to be much more than we expected.



Seeing the Falcon from Australia was pretty awesome as well. But the best of all was that 'zebra' sighting.



I think the best part of the entire meet, was meeting fellow ST’ers and talking about the trucks. For those of you that have never been to a meet, I encourage you to attend one. It’s amazing how much fun you can have with complete strangers.



I also want to thank GM again for the wonderful job that she did in coordinating all of this. It was alot of hard work and was a huge success. I don't know how it could have been better. Except of course to have more ST's there!!

 

[Gypsy me]

Thank You for your help as well Kimbo, yours Jerry & Chase, & EVERYONE that participated in the meet and tour. Could not have done it without any of you!



I want to Thank the Sponsers as well! They ALL really did help to make it FUN and special!





mysporttrac.com

WebExtremes.com

Arizona Ford Proving Grounds

Colorado River Ford-Kingman

4 Wheel Parts of Compton CA

Meguires Wax Products

Elite Fab Kingman

NAPA Auto Parts of Kingman

Jerry of Vegas & AK

Mothers

AZ Sport Trac Events



Thanks to the members that took it upon themselves to add to the shade You know who you are! We all appreciated that!



OH, maybe I should tell you all who won the Show n Shine?!



1st Place went to Kimbro ! she won a line of Meguires Wax Products



2nd Place went to Mookie ! He won a 80 piece road emergency kit



3rd Place went to TRACetPaul! He won a tool box



We had some other prizes



For the "I Made it!" award, that went to Paul, He won a mysporttrac.com Tee and some travel items!



Best Performance award, Went to Paul, it was close between him and Nasty Nate



Best Artist! *this was for creativeness and different* This went to Rodger (& Georgia) for that nice suspension job, plus their trac was the only Trac with a cap on it,



Things others left with



Jeff was really excited to be at the meet, Lydia likes to win stuff! lol



Mookie won 2 myst.com shirts!



Who won the other one?



lol Mookie's buddy Lou won Sport Trac tie down replacements donated by Jerry!

Guess what!? He has to buy a Sport Trac to put them on! :lol:



I am sure everyone walk away with something from our sponsers! Lots of smiles and laughter!



River Ford not only fed us and made sure we had drinks, Bonnie came out with hats and tshirts for everyone, also made sure Amber, Jerry's little doll had a pink tee just for her! (She got bubbles and crayons and book from DP and myself) She was such a cutie and actually helped draw tickets for the raffle, until she got the paper cut. (hope it's better now Amber)



Special mention: Nasty Nate came as member of the site as well as Representative of 4 Wheel Parts and brought each member goodie bags!



Thanks for coming Nate and the Goodies!



Jerry! man YOUR TRUCK IS HOT! and I KNOW all of us agree with that statement! The pictures don't even do it justice! It's the ONLY RED truck I really LOVE! Congrats on getting that and the mods you have already done!



Thank you Bonnie Moore at River Ford of Kingman, who btw folks, drives a Sport Trac herself! "You know we carded her!" OH and Mr Miller of River Ford, he also drives a Trac! "we carded him too!" lol



I hope each and every person at the meet and enjoyed themselves, and made it back home safe and sound and will come back with a trac buddy next year! River Ford has already ask me if we will do it there next year and they WILL make it Bigger and Better!



as I stated in a previou thread, The meet was surely a group of GREAT COMPANY! I sincerely thank YOU and Everyone that was part of this event!



Attendees, please put your photos in your libraries and I will email Tipster and see about getting them gathered on the Meet page of the site!



Thanks to all that took pics! My hands were a bit full :lol:

 

[LoriMaury Kimbrough]

OK...my pictures are posted in my library for all to enjoy!!

 

[Gypsy me]

Great pics Kimbro!





Keep'em coming folks!

 

[FlipTrac_511]

Congratulations GM! Sounds like you (and posse) put together a very successful meet. Plaque was a nice touch I might add. Thanks for the updates and I'm lookin forward to the pics.



P.S. Don't forget to update your sig, unless that's still good for next year!

 

[Rodger Tellefson]

GM & Kimbro, Thanks so very much for a Great meet. GM, you have email. Those that could not attend the meet this past weekend; well, all I can say is we would do it again. We can also attest to being on that test track sideways at 85 mph was quite interesting. Good food, and good people; who could ask for anything more.



We left Kingman @ approx. 8:30 am this morning, and arrived back here in Sacramento, CA. about 7 pm this evening with no problems. We drove up Hwy 99 instead of I-5 which, im our opinion is a more scenic route; mostly farm land though.

 

[Gypsy me]

Flip, it really was the ENTIRE group of folks that made it so Great! btw sig changed LOL





Rodger (& Georgia),Glad you folks made it home safe! * replied to your email.*



And Thank you again for coming out!, Yes, the van was going 85mph , amazing that vehicle could take a lean on that bank with all of us in it! What a Rush! lol Too bad we couldn't have been in that car they were testing!



I might mention to the folks on the site, The grounds are testing things up to 2008! and they also have other companies that rent testing areas for their tests as well. As mentioned the Australian Falcon was spotted, Very cool!



I did ask if we all could tell the site folks what we saw on the grounds, the answer was "I cannot tell you all what you can say" lol a Couple of questions I ask were, "Will the 07 ST have a V8?" and "Will it come with manual transmisson?" and "Will we have choices?" My favorite answers were, the ones with the (grins and the words "I can't tell you that")

 

[LoriMaury Kimbrough]

Glad you, (Georgia) and Syndey made it home safe. Thanks for coming. Now that you've said you would do it again, we will expect to see you next year!!

 

[Teddy GreeneII]

Hope to meet you all next time. Glad it was such a good time! Really would have loved to be there to meet everyone and asked the Ford guys questions!

 

[Rodger Tellefson]

Kimbro, We'll see what next year brings, but at this point in time I can't see any reason we cannot be there. You guys are great.

 

[Chase Straw]

Well my fav pics are in my gallery so anyone who wants to take a gander feel free

 

[Gypsy me]

Chase man! Good job of the entrance pic! Liked the others too!

 

[Rich Stern]

Gypsy, glad it was such a good event! Nice job.

 

[Gypsy me]

Thank you Mr Stern, we all really had a great time!



Let me know what I can do to help with the Dallas meet, I replied to your email.

 

[Gypsy me]

Oh, just a few pics so far from me in library, I still have some in camera, the breakfast meeting at Golden Corral are in there, The one of the front end is of a fx400 that was on the River Ford lot, I wish I had gotten one of the wheels pretty kewl looking truck!