Forbidden Fantasy has been throwing a huge one-day show for almost a decade now. This year's was its eighth annual show, and the event just continues to get bigger and better. The official show is on Sunday, but for the regulars, the vendors, and the people just looking for a good time, Saturday night is where it's at. For the fourth year in a row, Ernie Macias, president of No Regrets, hosted a little powwow at his pad. However, Ernie just remodeled his entire house and has a baby on the way, so for the whole month before the show, he made it very clear that there would be no "party"; he was only going to have a "few" friends over. But, with less than a week to go before the show, Ernie already had four of his guys from the Japan Chapter of NR, Jamey Jordan from NC Mississippi, R.J. from Chicago, and a few other out-of-towners fighting for sleeping bags at his house. Of course, we got on the phone to make sure it was cool if we all came out Saturday night, and once we got the thumbs-up, we knew that this "non-party" was going to be jumpin'! After drinking all of the Saki that the Japan dudes brought with them and possibly trashing Ernie's newly remodeled house, we figured it was time to rest up for the show.
Sunday morning, the lines to get into the show were backed up all the way to the main road, but the Forbidden crew kept things moving smoothly. By the time they got everyone through the gates, more than 725 vehicles had entered. Throughout the course of the day, more than 7,000 spectators came through the gates to check out some of Southern California's finest customs. They had tons of events going on to keep the crowds entertained including a DB Drag and the Forbidden Bikini Contest. When the trucks rolled into the DB Drag to measure how loud they're systems could pound, many people gathered to see what all the racket was about. Little did they know that they were actually witnessing history in the making, as a new SPL world record was set.
With more than 45 vendors on hand, more custom mini-truck parts were available than you could possibly load into your ride. And, if you were the lucky winner of the 20-inchers raffled off from Rent-A-Wheel, then you probably had to rent a U-Haul anyways. After walking through row after row of some of West Coast's finest rides, it was about time for the awards ceremony. Keeping the tradition alive, the Lowest Club trophy went to Severed Ties for the eighth year in a row. Club participation went to Local Finesse. Best Of Show Truck went to none other than our Nov. '04 cover truck: Brent's Green VW Toyota. Best Engineered went to our little 'Yota, Project Dragged Daily for the killer rear suspension setup and frame work done by Aaron Iha at Chassis'. This year, mini-trucks took over and completely dominated the show.