A BIG THANK YOU to all of our sponsors as it would not have been possible without them.

A BIG PERSONAL THANK YOU to Sam, Jackie, Jon, Chad, Amber, Chris, Richard, Tre, Brian and Scott for stepping up and stepping in to help me out - without me asking you to. Without you all, the BBQ could not have been such a success.

A REALLY REALLY BIG PERSONAL THANK YOU to Shari and Miguel. Where do I begin? For months I have been bouncing ideas off of you two and making sure that nothing was forgotten. You guys made sure that everything was covered and that every attendee would leave with a big smile on their face. This thing would not have gotten off the ground if it weren't for you two. THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU

I'm very happy to hear that everyone had a good time and I look forward to seeing how the pics turned out. Amber is doing an online photo album of the local RX8ers so please email her the link to the sites or the pics themselves: Amber@jenkins-crew.com

For the first BBQ that we've hosted, I think it was a huge success. I've already begun a list of "lessons learned" so next year's, yes - I said next year's, BBQ will be that much bigger and better.

I don't know how may know this, but Brian Wann from Mazda was one of our attendees earlier in the day. Our group is officially registered as a "Mazda Enthusiast" which entitles us to future sponsorship by Mazda. Brain wants to submit an article about the group and the BBQ to MazdaSport Magazine, along with some good pics, so......

I NEED TESTIMONIALS!!!! Please send me a little write-up, no specific length required, of the BBQ. I want to know what you liked, how you felt, what you took away from the BBQ, what you learned, etc. (I also want to know what you thought could be done better and I'll add that to the lessons learned.) I'll compile these write-ups, giving credit to your own words if they're chosen, and submit it to Brian. I will also submit this to RXTuner so they can publish our success as well.

For those who are wondering about t-shirts... I will call the t-shirt making place and see how much the shirts are. Those provided at the BBQ were ENTIRELY sponsored by Rotary Performance and the $10 you paid directly benefited the BBQ. I would assume that they are more than $10, but I'll post a price as soon as I know.

I also plan on going through the left over t-shirts this week and mailing them out to those who weren't able to attend and our sponsors. I really don't think there are any extras, but I'll post if there are.

Side note: there has been mention of a Spring BBQ so we're not "competing" with Sevenstock. Are you guys trying to kill me? :p The idea for a fall BBQ was spawned by Tulsa's OK BBQ, held this past May. The plan is for them to host a Spring BBQ in OK and we host a Fall BBQ in DFW. Although DFW will have more members from the south (due to the closer location), we're hoping to draw more owners from other neighboring OK states, not just TX and AR. I don't think that our BBQ is "competing" with Sevenstock and that was never the plan. I chose this weekend out of sheer convienence and it's worked. I only hope that our event grows like Sevenstock did and that one day our event will have over 200+ cars and 2000+ people. Brian Wann did mention possibly hosting it at Texas Motor Speedway......

 

HERE ARE SOME PHOTOS WE TOOK.


Here's us at the raffle. It was a great time. I think everyone walked away with a full stomach, a big smile, and some sort of free goodies...Good Job Tiffany and Crew!

 

Hey Damon!
I spotted you during the last raffle and trophies, but you disappeared before I could say hi!

krw

 

DamonB was actually there?! Didn't even get to meet you. Which car was yours in the masses?

 

My wife and I rolled in about 3 I think it was. I ended up parked in the only available spot down by the FC's. The raffle started shortly after we got there so we never even checked in. Then as soon as the goodies were passed out all you schmoes tore out of there like the park was on fire

 

Houston survived. I'm back. Hope ya'll had fun.
I drove 12+ hours in two days and it wasn't in a nice vehicle either.

I have a few bad pics of the trip if ya'll want them.

 

No that was because I yelled Cops! Cops! Cops!!!

or was that Free Beer?????

 

Free beer? WHAT?!?! I could have used one right about then...

 

It was nice to see that old dawg Scalliwag again with his XP-enhanced RX-8...Mike, thanks for letting my boy sit in the back seat and play "race-car"...

 

Who has copies of the group shots? I have to prove I was actually there

 

Check the pics linked in the other thread.