Why spend months developing a car for a motorsports event when you can just do it all the night before–and for less than $2000? That’s the idea behind the unofficial “parking lot build” that always seems to return to the Grassroots Motorsports $2000 Challenge Presented by Tire Rack.
The idea is simple: Show up with an unprepared car at the host hotel a day or two before the $2000 Challenge, and then thrash to get the car running–and at least somewhat competitive–before the competition starts.
Is this the most effective way to build a car for a competition? Absolutely not. Is it the most fun? It must be, because these teams willingly partake in the parking lot build every year. After all, what could be more entertaining than rushing to build a race car with some of your closest friends?
Previous years have seen the attempted revival of a supercharged MR2, a hasty respray of a Honda Civic with a nasty interior, and even the haphazard conversion of a Toyota Avalon into a convertible.
The plan for 2023's parking lot build? Turning a Miata into a Manx-inspired dune buggy/kart.
The Grassroots Motorsports $2000 Challenge Presented by Tire Rack is our annual automotive celebration where penny-pinching and extreme speed meet. For 2023, the low-buck thrills return to Gainesville Raceway in Gainesville, Florida, on a new date: May 27-28. (Yes, that’s next weekend.)
Check out the progress of this year’s parking lot build at the 2023 Parking lot build, let's do one! thread. Learn more about the $2000 Challenge by visiting 2000challenge.com.
Note that the MR2 was not a revival of a supercharged model. It started as an NA car, and the parking lot build (first time) included a full motor swap to a supercharged motor.
The Avalon may have been completed in the parking lot, but I don't believe it was a parking lot build. It was a last minute build, built in Atlanta the week before the event (I helped). It most certainly was "haphazard"!
$2016 is probably the high water mark of Parking Lot Builds with 5th overall
Before:
In reply to SV reX :
Thank you for the clarification. There's always something exciting happening in the parking lot!
The full epic tale of the PLB AW11 can be found here, starting in 2018 and ending (so far 
) in 2022:
In reply to John Welsh :
Yep, and my 2019 plb mercedes managed 7th in dynamic with a misfire. Good times.
Indeed, Roll-Ovalon was a "Last Chance" build but not really a parking lot build. Although we did fit the borrowed 18" wheels and started cutting the fenders in the lot. It placed okay, 12th out of 32 overall, 8th dynamic, and shockingly was 5th in autocross and fastest on 200TW tires, equaling the time of one C4 Vette cart and beating the other.
In a weekend it went from this:
To this:
John Welsh said:$2016 is probably the high water mark of Parking Lot Builds with 5th overall
Before:
That was pretty epic! The 1st year we did a PLB with the fiero was pretty awesome as well.
Displaying 1-7 of 7 commentsView all comments on the GRM forums
You'll need to log in to post.
