NOT AGAIN, PLEASE... It’s always a bit of a concern when you can drive straight into a show venue, without sight nor sound of a queue, car horn nor flustered marshal. So when we rocked on into Santa Pod, past a seated marshal and straight over to the strip, we were beginning to feel cursed. Lately, it seems to be a case of us either turning up on the wrong day, turning up to a show filled with tumble-weeds or not being able to get in at all.

    Last year we ended up missing the Retro Show because the Cosmic Bus, Dep-O’s beloved Landcrab, was feeling a bit off colour and couldn’t be bothered completing the two hour journey. Come 2010, we were so damn keen to get to the show, we turned up on the wrong day – maintaining a trend we establishing with a recent show at Silverstone.

    So it’s quiet, it’s blustery and there’s something big and black in the sky scudding in our direction with intent. Just as long as it doesn’t... Oh bloody great – it is – and the next thing we know we’re sheltering under the strip’s seats whilst Mother Nature wets her knickers all over the site, halting the Run What Ya Brung. Double buggery with some chips on the side. I gave up my Saturday lie-in for this? Looking at Ebay cars on Gez’s phone, whilst we waited for the rain to sod off back where it came from...

    Cold and damp we were, but we kept the retro faith and as morning turned into afternoon, the sun returned wearing his happy hat; more lovely retro machinery started to fill up the place and the Strip started frightening small children again. Victory was snatched from the jaws of defeat – the great 2010 Dep-O show curse was broken.

    Alright the monster trucks hadn’t arrived yet and the dodgems were as busy as the Gordon Brown Smiling School, but in a way it meant that we had more time to really take in the cars which had arrived.

    Although the organisers promised an event free from chooned up contemporary Japs, a few did turn up to the RWYB, and promptly wished they hadn’t bothered. It’s one thing turning up in your Skyline and getting spanked by a MkI Escort, it’s something else when your Skyline gets done over by a newish Audi S4 cabrio. Unsurprisingly some were sent home crying for their mothers with their trousers around their ankles.

    Favourites? Well, a lot of the clubs and forums hadn’t yet made it yet – but the guys and gals from Rat-look.com surprised and delighted us so much that we just had to feature them separately. They weren’t just friendly and full of enthusiasm, but their ideas really are turning the whole modified car world on its head – and it’s about time that someone filled the void left when the fast ’n’ furious scene disappeared up its own bespoilered chuff.