San Bernardino 2010 Hop

Although the summer weather has been largely absent this year in California, The San Bernardino Car Show and Hop Competition heated things up a bit in July. The Orange Show played host to the event, which saw contenders arriving at its hallowed grounds as early as 6 a.m. The car owners were on hand early, as they wanted to do all of the last minute preparations before the doors were opened to the crowds. Frazzled drivers spent the morning hours going through their hydraulic setups with a fine toothed comb, in order to ensure that all of the nuts and bolts were tightened, and to see if their batteries were fully charged. The sun broke through the haze around noon, and the spectators started to flow in to the hop pit sitting area, looking to check out the one-of-a- kind hop competition. The hop competition has taken a new shape since last year, as it is now an invite-only event.

The show opened up with a parade of hoppers that were introduced by Kid Jay, and promptly began driving around in circles as if they were going to battle. The first competition was Street Single Pump, here Black Magic Hydraulics hit a total of 47 inches. In the truck category, Ariel Avila hit for a total of 90 inches, four inches more than Black Magic Hydraulics. In the radical hop, Black Magic Hydraulics took home first place by hitting 94 inches with their black '88 Monte Carlo, but they were almost taken by Timothy Flores, who landed in a close second with the 92-inch mark he set with his '63 Impala. At the end of the event, Alex Melendez and Frank Castillo went head-to-head hopping their cars, as the crowd went wild till the two collided, damaging both of the cars' front ends!

At the close of this wild Hop competition, everybody headed back to see the show cars that were on display. For those of you that missed this stellar hop competition, make sure you make it to the Super Show in Vegas, so you can check out the best of the best from all over the land!