[DeTomaso] Kudos to Charlie, Patrick and Tomas.....

[MikeLDrew at aol.com]

Hi guys,

There has been some talk and a few photos and a video or two (and some 
good-natured trash-talking of the Swedes!) about the SpaItalia week.   But 
getting serious for a moment, I really think it's time to recognize the people 
who made this spectacular event come together.

The first is Patrick Hals.   He worked with the organizers of this 
longstanding event (this was the 10th year) to ensure that if they made De Tomaso 
the featured marque, that we would support the event like never before and 
really make it worth their while.   Once they had agreed to choose De Tomaso as 
the marque, he beat the bushes from one end of Europe to the other, in an 
effort to get every possible De Tomaso out of its garage and driven (or 
trailered) to Spa for the event.   His boundless enthusiasm was contagious and 
the results spoke for themselves; this was by FAR the largest De Tomaso 
gathering in the history of Europe, and that's saying quite a lot.

Next up is Charlie McCall.   Once it became clear that SpaItalia would be a 
worthwhile destination, he was determined to attend with his Pantera, even 
though it meant driving some 1000 miles or so, each way.   That alone is 
worthy of recognition, but then he took the HUGE step of working to organize a 
tour along the way, so that anybody who was thinking of attending the affair 
could have additional justification for doing so.

He worked tirelessly through the winter, building a plan that would appeal 
both to the hard-core drivers, and the not-so-hard-core passengers.   The 
resultant tour was just terrific, encompassing some nice roads, hotels which 
ranged from very good to really great (and all of them quite affordable), and 
some very interesting and varied attractions along the way, including a 
trappist monastary, a spectacular cave complex, and a wild animal safari.

He served as the liason between upwards of 60 people and the various hotels 
etc., cheerfully adding rooms as more and more people committed to 
attending.   The amount of work that he put into the operation is difficult to 
imagine.   What's more, the entire week went off without a hitch—his 
professionalism was on display from start to finish.

Finally, Tomas Gunnersson served as the cat-herder for the Swedish 
contingent and various hangars-on from Denmark etc.   Not everybody had the luxury 
of being able to take a full week off prior to the event, so he took it upon 
himself to organize a secondary tour.   Like Charlie, he came up with a 
viable travel plan, sought out suitable accomodations, and served as the point 
of contact for his group, which I guess numbered some 25-30 cars or so.   
Without Tomas' help, perhaps a lot of those people would have chosen to stay 
home and thus would have missed out on a truly spectacular event.

I know Lori and I had a terrific time from the moment we stepped out of the 
airplane in Paris.   So I wanted to be sure that the people who were 
responsible for that are duly recognized.   Thanks guys!

I've done my laundry and packed my suitcase; tomorrow we're flying back 
home (bringing a couple of fast Swedes with us!), and after a late night 
arrival, we'll be up early the next morning for the run to Reno to do it all over 
again, American-style!

Mike