Overdrive Magazine | Trucking Business News & Owner Operator Info
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/455137
February 2015 | Overdrive | 39 half-decade run, he picked up more Best of Show trophies than any other Pride & Polish competitor in the truck beauty contest's fi rst 15 years. And despite pushing the rig to 2.5 million miles pulling reefers na- tionwide, people still often accused Stephens of not working the show truck beauty. "But I did," he says. "Every day." Stephens' response is indicative of Pride & Polish competitors: hard- working truck owners and operators who pour their money, energy and souls into building one-of-a-kind showcases of their creativity and mechanical prowess. As Pride & Polish turns 25 this year, it will announce an inaugural Hall of Fame at the Great American Truck- ing Show in Dallas. Inductees will be added every year at GATS. Beginning this month and through- out the year, Overdrive will cover highlights of Pride & Polish history, including profi les of some of the better-known winners. The fi rst Pride & Polish was held in 1990 at the Mid-America Truck- ing Show in Louisville. It added and dropped venues over the years, but in recent years it has hosted about fi ve shows a year, including stops in Cali- fornia, Florida, Wisconsin, Tennessee, Nevada, North Carolina and Utah. The premier event is at GATS, where competition has drawn up- wards of 80 entrants. Also in recent years, GATS has hosted the Pride & Polish National Championship, choosing champions from fi ve con- tests over the last 12 months of shows. Over the years, a reputation for stiff competition and fair judging, along with the nationwide access to varying events, has made Pride & Polish the gold standard of show truck contests. "Pride & Polish is the best of the best," says Doug Holder, director of the series. "There are a lot of really big truck shows out there that draw in hundreds of trucks. While we welcome everyone, when you come to a Pride & Polish event, you're coming to compete with the best in the business." The series also can be credited with driving the rise of custom truck en- thusiasm over the last 15 years. That has included competing show truck events, TV shows featuring custom truck builds, the expansion of chrome shops and media outlets dedicated to covering show trucks. P ride & Polish's high judging standards are well known among those who compete in the show circuit. It's part of what draws the country's best competitors. "If you're going to show at the top level, you have to be dedicated to your truck," says Bob Brinker, a longtime Pride & Polish competitor and peren- nial winner. "It ain't 'Drive it every day and stop and get it washed and waxed before the competition.' Every minute you have, you're working on your truck, and that's what it takes to compete at the top level." Brinker, who shows his truck with his wife, Shelley, is the reigning Pride & Polish National Champion in the Working Bobtail category. He's also won a bevy of other Best of Show victories at Pride & Polish events in his 14 years of showing his 2000 Freightliner Classic XL. Brinker has about $125,000 in the truck and its custom build. It's not uncommon for him to spend $10,000 a year cleaning and prepping the rig for shows or adding new features. It also takes a never-ending sup- ply of elbow grease, which Brinker readily supplies. "For the last 10 or 12 years, every weekend in the summer, all I do is work on the truck," he says. "Getting it ready or polishing or add- ing. If you want to compete with the big dogs, you better be a big dog." Likewise, the late Bill Hall Jr. – What it takes to win Bob Brinker, who shows his 2000 Freightliner Classic with his wife, Shelley, designed his rig as a memorial to his late daughter, Amy McKnight, who was a fan of the Pirates of the Caribbean film series. The truck, named Legend of the Black Pearl, features a mural of Amy on the truck's hood dressed in pirate regalia. Brinker has been showing the truck for years at Pride & Polish shows across the country, picking up a few Best of Show trophies along the way. In 2014, he took home perhaps his most prestigious trophy yet: A Pride & Polish National Championship. Brian Bourke