The Whole Ensenada

Cruisin' down Mexico way for a Classicos seaside show.

By Nathan Trujillo

The Classicos Car Club of Ensenada, Mexico, are our beloved hermanos to the south who love custom cars and all that comes with them just as much as the next dude, and these wise old guys seem to stay tuned into the more restored, slightly lowered and traditional lowriders like any other fix 'em up car nut. Nonetheless, they are an organized bunch with club presidente Petronilo Gonzalez Valdos at the helm and they had much to show and tell LRM.

Last August, the Classicos promoted their 10th Annual event, which was held by the city's breezy tourist harbor and beach area. It was the same day as Lowrider Magazine's San Diego, California, Tour show. The long-awaited Ensenada show was funded by sponsors Corona Extra, Pacific Madereria, SOS balas y extintores, Rancho Quinonez, La Cochinita and Auto Partes y Maquinado Olivares.

Lowriding cars don't go too much further south than Ensenada (although it might be cool to take a way-long sabbatical trip (with a sexy senorita to boot) all the way down to Cabo San Lucas for the cool adventure of it all) or at least we haven't been called out to deep Aztlan too often to cover glossy desert lowrides, but you never know. Whatever, this show included some 3,500 excited and curious car buffs, and exactly 287 custom cars, vans, sport utility vehicles, lowrider bikes and insane hydraulic hoppers with a hopping stick that topped out at 50 inches. Anything higher is a damn good guess.

After looking at cars and snacking on fruit cups in the warm sun for a few hours, things can go at a snail's pace, so to liven things up, the club lined up some TJ-style rappers, held a raffle and gave 50-percent of the proceeds to charity. In the afternoon on a dusty part of the event grounds, judges and switch-masters clashed and witnessed rides jumping and tossing their stuff from side-to-side. The big winners for the day were the SouthSide Car Club hoppers from Tijuana who campaigned more than one lowrider hopper. There were six registered hoppers in all.

If you like traveling down the Mexican Baja coast to Ensenada, it's a cool ride and you might find some friends getting bombed on the beach and if we ever do get to Cabo San Lucas, you'll know why our story was turned in late.