Words by Tim Wong

The second 86FEST, boasting the title of “North America’s Largest 86 Gathering,” took place at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana. Since the dawn of the new “86” car, the FRS/BRZ, they have become insanely popular amongst the car enthusiasts. Especially, the younger crowds when they are buying the first cars as these are affordable and the amount of aftermarket support is consistently growing. Even though I was mostly there to see the AE86s rather than the GT86s, the amount of GT86s completely overshadowed the AE86 crowd. For the sake of simplicity, I’m going to call FRS/BRZs as GT86s.

It was definitely a hot day with the sun bearing down. I arrived early in the venue got too crowded like the last Speed and Stance meet as there was 86FEST, Speed Ventures, and the Speed and Stance “pre-meet” all taking place that day. I did have an issue with the organization during the earlier hours as some people had no idea where to send me and then some very vague directions. After some time, I just ignored everyone and drove in.

The event had a layout which wasn’t exactly what i would call optimal because the vendors were placed in a line through the center of the parking lot and all the cars were parking around it. This made the event looked more packed, but this was because the venue looked smaller and there was a lot of wasted space in the back. On the plus side, it did allow for a bit of better traffic flow for the cars in and out of the lot as there were “fun runs” on the autocross course.

HRE Performance Wheels had a big booth up front displaying an AE86 and an FRS both with HRE wheels.

Turn 14 Distribution had three AE86s and three GT86s on display.

The FRS crowd seems to really like having these massive wings on their cars.

The Evasive FRS

Ken Gushi’s Formula Drift Scion FRS

Nice to see an AE86 car built for something out of the ordinary like rally.

Wide would be an understatement on top of the increased length of the car.

Buddy Club P1s, Aventador style tail lights, and ISF style quad exhaust are interesting on this white FRS.

RSR had several cars on display including a Lexus LFA.

I don’t really care that much that it’s an LFA, but rather that it had a Evangelion sunshade with Asuka up.

Over in the hybrid corner, there was a CRV and Prius with matching wheels.

Source Interlink brought out their green Rocket Bunny FRS.

Nice to see the #staycrushing FRS back to its old orange color.

A pleasant surprise to see a LS1 swap

The STI wing is a good look I think.

While I was there covering 86FEST, I did go around checking out some of the other events like the Speed and Stance “pre-meet” and the Speed Ventures track day. While we are on that topic, these “pre-meets” are probably the stupidest things that have hit the car scene. A meet before the actual meet/show just so you can go to the actual and see the same stuff except at the meet the cars are not as good. With the massive social media connections in the car scene nowadays, there’s not really a point of a “pre meet” to get the word out for events. This “pre-meet” specifically was more of a couple cars in a specified area and the rest of the lot was pretty much just a parking lot for the 86 event.

Going to wrap up this post with some cars in the garages at the Speed Ventures event.

Not really sure what’s going on here with this BMW E30 with some hand painted art all around the car.

As usual, R’s Tuning was out there running the track with Speed Ventures.

Mercedes-Benz SLR Mclaren

Blackbird Fabworx with their latest addition to their Miata. That is a serious aerodynamic addition to the rear end.