Hopefully all of you enjoyed the photos from the Ford GT night of Cars and Coffee! It seems like Mother Nature is determined to rain on our parade – almost literally; it would be if FCA Alberta added a parade to the festivities – as tonight’s Cars and Coffee has become another one called off due to the weather. Le sigh. I say this just as a way to express how happy I was that the skies were clear and the night warm for that GT event as it was a ton of fun and one I won’t forget soon.

That said, for tonight we return to our Driven coverage as promised, with Part 3. Back to the Oval we go!

Today we start off with Vex’s booth; it’s always worth a visit at any show they participate in. The LS-S13 was looking clean as always; I like how the red of the manifold tied in to the seats for a subtle break from the white/black scheme.

Nearby Jimmy had his new 328 wagon – I was happy to get to see this in person. There are two kinds of people in this world; those who think wagons are awesome, and those who are wrong. Had the Mk3 Focus wagons been sold here, that’s the route I would have taken; the general bodystyle of a wagon works so well when accompanied by a drop and some well-sized wheels (It would also look great with an M3 conversion, Jimmy. Just an idea…).

Over in the far row sat Makemeasandwich’s S15. I’m loving the new Garage Mak hood; it adds a nice bit of aggression but doesn’t overpower the still OE+ look the car has going on (relatively speaking of course as there’s no missing the GT wing or canards, but we know how wild Silvias can get).

Also showing with Vex, naturally, was Giuseppe with his S15. I had praised his retention of the OEM bumper in my World of Wheels post, but I understand he has some new aero coming in now so this should be looking a little different later on in the season – and I cannot wait!

RB under the hood, RB kit outside. C&S had their S15 at the show again, turning many heads as always. When it comes to chassis mount wings I’m not a universal love-or-hate kind of guy, rather I feel it depends on the car (as it does with most mods) and this one I say pulls it off fairly well. There’s definitely enough work everywhere else to balance out such an in-your-face wing. The carbon-lipped wheels remain as one of my favourite details.

You may recognize David’s S15 from event coverage last year, as well as the Top Local Builds of 2017 list. Well, one day earlier this year I was browsing the new magazines at a local store and to my surprise, saw it on the cover of DSPORT! A huge congratulations goes to him on that achievement (you can see the magazine displayed behind the car here), and in case you haven’t read the article yet, you really should. The build has a rather special and significant meaning behind it as it turns out.

Pontiac Squad! It was awesome to see this G8 at the show; there definitely aren’t enough of these around, in general. Going back a few years, I even considered picking one up to go alongside my Grand Prix.

Proof of less is more, appropriately with a chassis that has so many aero options available for it – a subtle splitter and side diffusers, perfectly-fitted set of wheels and tires, and the subtle carryover of white into the bay via the strut bar. So good.

No, the number of S15s in this post is not lost on me…or intentional. Haha

A tidy, B-series powered CRX that was lurking in the corner. We don’t really see too many of these up here; surely the winters and chemicals have had a hand in that.

I believe this FR-S was rocking Levi’s old RB V2 kit, and it would appear wheels too; he of course had switched things up a little while ago by grabbing Reggie’s Varis kit. The dual-finish bronze wheels suited the white nicely, and sans livery the whole car actually looked relatively low-key, if you can even use that in the same sentence as “Rocket Bunny”. Spy the forced induction too…

This was cool; I didn’t even notice the conversion until I was walking behind this row of cars and when I saw the R33 tail lights I thought to myself “wait, wasn’t it an R34 next in line?”. I walked back around to the front and boom – R334. It’s rare enough to see an R33 sedan so to see one with the front-end conversion was cool; I’ll leave it up to you all to decide if the 33’s more rounded and 34’s more angular lines work together well, but of the few R334s I’ve seen this was the first sedan and dare I say, it works better on the four-doors.

This Evo 9 was quite a head-turner. The red time attack stripe on the ZE40s made for a nice accent as did the unpainted CF peeking through on the hood, which also served to tie in to the other CF around the exterior. That said, I’d constantly be losing my mind if I had to drive that around with our roads – air or a cup kit would be a requirement, otherwise I could see that splitter being gone within about 3 minutes.

This one, maybe 3 feet. Haha

I thought it’d be hard to beat the teal wrap he ran last year, but the new gunmetal-y colour on Jason’s Aimgain/Varis FR-S was spot-on. As a side note, I think the Aimgain flares could be my current favourites for the chassis; the Varis front bumper will always be my favourite there, mind. This thing just needs a rear bumper/valance/diffuser now to finish it all off.

Some more facelift 86s are starting to pop up here and there, including this red example; the new styling looks amazing and really just needs a lip kit to finish it off. ZE40s, meanwhile, still look good on everything.

I made sure to get another photo of Kanji’s BRZ following the dimly-lit shot from setup the night before. I like that despite all of the changes over the years, the yellow tinted headlights (which we first did waaaay back when) have stayed as one constant.

This S2K looked menacing, finished in satin black with the super-aggressive Sorcery front bumper. You can see a bit of the setup here, but in case you missed it; it was turbocharged, and as a nice detail the turbo housing had been finished to match the valve cover. The little rear flares looked great too.

Ryan’s EP3 – a familiar but always-welcome sight at events.

Simon’s FR-S; I like the C-West bumper more and more each time I see it, but I especially like how it’s such a distinctive part of his build; I don’t believe I’ve seen another C-West/RB V1 combo yet.

The owner of this F80 must live near me because I see it every other day it seems, and as good as it looks static, it’s 10 times better in motion. The blue/yellow combo looked great and there were some nice little details scattered around, plus no shortage of carbon. Also, M3 > M4. Just sayin’.

Showing with Lakeview this year was James’ RS, posed up on a dyno which made for a very hard-to-miss display. I don’t believe it has been shared on the site before with its new wheels, but as you can see he joined the white Turbomac camp this year! Since the show he has also gone ahead and swapped out the OE Recaros for Brides; well played sir, well played. It would seem a couple of people in the Focus world can’t grasp why someone would replace Recaros, but the rest of us get it.

While on the topic of Foci, Yolanda’s ST wasn’t far from us and was sporting a few more new additions for the ’18 season as well. Among other updates, new since its last appearance on the site were side diffusers, rear spats, canards, rally vents, and more.

This thing was parked in the back, tucked away and almost out of sight which was a crying shame, but even given the poor location and clutter all around it I was not passing up a photo.

Jesse’s Supra looked amazing with the surprise addition of a new hood; it’s a great example of a few well-chosen mods really accenting an already great design. It has since been tuned as well to make the most of its big single and it seems to be quite an animal…

Calvin’s Root Beer S15, showing for 403 Media. I believe the wrap was debuted at last year’s Driven – regardless, it’s a cool look for the Silvia and the chrome accents pop nicely against it.

And then there was this – a Varis Kamikaze R35. The Advan GTs had the single exposed carbon spoke and were held on with freaking titanium Amuse lug nuts (if you know what those cost…), out back was a swan neck wing, it had titanium and carbon everywhere, and just the absolute best of the best in terms of brands and parts; a jaw dropper.

I spent some time checking it out, grabbed this one photo, and then my camera flashed the low battery warning so I headed back to the Focus to grab another battery…and proceeded to forget to grab more photos of it afterwards. Derp award goes to…

Anyway, that’s a wrap for today’s post. Part 4 is still to come with a better look at the RWBs, that incredible Mazda R100 (as teased in Part 1), and some detail shots too which I had a lot of fun playing around with. Stay tuned!

-Bill