Auto Enthusiast Day Preview | iDSC088

Auto Enthusiast Day Preview - Rubber Will Be Burned! The Anaheim Angels (of Los Angeles) parking lot is about to get destroyed!  That is, actually, the plan as the 6th Annual Auto Enthusiast Day preps to descend upon the centrally located Southern California venue.  The Nitto Tires sponsored event brings together car lovers from all genres but includes exhibitions of drifting and off-road (but in this case on-parking-lot) truck jumping.  We had a talk with Nitto Tires, Marketing Manager, Harry Kong about the upcoming event that’s free for you to attend, free to display your vehicle and even free for vendors to participate.  Hear all the details in this iDriveSoCal Podcast. ***Transcript*** Recording date – June 18, 2018 at in Cypress, CA Harry Kong: Once a year, we're going to have to ruin your parking lot, but it's going to be a really bad ass for car show. The whole concept of Auto Enthusiasts Day is really to bring automotive festival to passionate car enthusiasts together. It's very family-friendly event. Whether they drive an import, or a domestic car truck, or muscle car, we wanted to create an avenue where they can all hang out and enjoy what they have to offer. Tom Smith: Welcome to iDriveSoCal, the podcast all about mobility from the automotive capital of the United States, Southern California. Tom Smith here. And today, I am at ... We are, since you're listening ... Thank you for listening as always. We are at Nitto Tires in Cypress, California. And we are joined by Harry Kong, who is the Marketing Manager for Nitto Tires. And today's topic is Nitto Tires Auto Enthusiast Day, which is a big event. It's going to be happening in just a couple of weeks, the sixth annual. And it's going to be happening down at Angel Stadium in the parking lot, right? Harry Kong: Correct. Tom Smith: Harry, thanks for joining me. So, the event is, as I mentioned, looking at the videos online, I think, two things. One, I swear that I can smell burnt rubber because there's a lot of drifting exhibitions and whatnot. And two, I wonder, geez, what premium do you guys have to pay Angel Stadium in order to leave tire tracks all over the parking lot like that? Harry Kong: To your point, the Angel Stadium, we thought, was the ideal location. Tom Smith: Sure. Harry Kong: It's the centro. Tom Smith: Geographically, yeah. Harry Kong: Correct. And also, we do sponsor the team. So- Tom Smith: Oh okay. Harry Kong: As part of that, we're like, hey, you know… Tom Smith: Sure. Harry Kong: ... once a year, we're going to have to ruin your parking lot, but it's going to be a really bad ass for car show. Tom Smith: And they're like, "Just keep that sponsorship coming, guys." Harry Kong: Yeah, correct, correct. Yeah, we basically repave a third or fourth of their parking lot every year. Tom Smith: Is that right? Harry Kong: Yeah. It's a sticky rubber on the northeast side. Tom Smith: Yeah. Yeah, makes sense. So, iDriveSoCal is pretty mainstream from a perspective of, you know, we touch on everything. We're enthusiasts about everything, but not everybody is dialed into the big drifting scene. And I know that's not exclusively what you guys do, but let's talk a little bit about what is happening at the show and what's the big draw. I mean, obviously, you see the drifting, and that's pretty cool to see. But what else is happening there that draws so many people each year? Harry Kong: Sure. Like I said, the whole concept of Auto Enthusiasts Day is really to bring automotive festival to passionate car enthusiasts together. You know, it's very family-friendly event. You know, one big thing for us is that, you know,