'Its In My Blood

Hello everybody, my name is John Zachary I live in Cortland,NY. I have always been a car guy. I grew up watching my dad (Ron Zachary a founding member of Seven Valley Streetrods) chopping tops, and spraying Candy Colors on friends cars in our garage in Scott, NY. Dave Johnson Sr. and dad painted a lot of show cars in that garage, I remember most of them winning awards at most of the shows in the 70's. During the summer we would travel all over the east going to car shows. Like the Hickoy Rod Run, Norwich, Little York, the East coast Nationals in Maryland, and  Carlisle, PA.  It was a great way to grow up. In the winter dad would go to the indoor shows NY.  The Club would always win best club display, and most of the cars in the club would bring home some tropheys. When I was 18 I bought a 76 Monte Carlo from St Petersburg Fla. My dad painted it black and I polished and cleaned that car all the time. I drove it for 8-9 years storing it in the winter, it only had 78000 miles on it the last time I drove it. After a divorce it sat in a garage for 12 years, just sitting there. My sons said that they wanted to get it back on the road but never really had the chance to get it running again. Just last year I sold it. I really didn't have any kind of cool car while I was raising four children, but now they are all adults, so this past summer I bought a 2010 Camaro.  It feels great to have a car to clean and polish every weekend, and to have people say nice car when ever I pull into a gas satiation or store. I had forgot what that felt like, It's really cool. My son Cruz and I went drag racing with it this past summer 5-6 times. We had a blast doing it.  I made it to two semifinal rounds,and Cruz won the whole thing at ESTA in the street trophy class. After that we were hooked. So now I am back into the whole car scene full bore, with my Camaro, and writing and taking pictures for Hot Rods & Harley's Magizine.  I don't own a cool Street Rod, but covering car shows and writing about them lets me enjoy the hobby as much as the next guy.  I love seeing what guys are doing these days to their rides, and how some of that old school  stuff is creeping back into the cars being built today.  I hope that we can get some young blood interested in the industry, that is the future of the Club, and the future of Hotrodding.