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Last week I fired up my Mini Cooper and headed to Las Vegas for the Barrett-Jackson collector car auction. It’s a five-hour drive from my home in Phoenix to Las Vegas and in the ensuing three auction days I ended up walking 14.92 miles around the Las Vegas Convention Center. It was a funky adventure filled with awesome cars, good people and a couple of celebrities. 

I love my job. I get to write about cars for a living and occasionally travel to auctions outside of the Valley of the Sun. Covering an auction is a whirlwind; so many cars to see, lots of good people and fellow collector car fans, and it’s like Disneyland for gearheads. If you have the opportunity go to a Barrett-Jackson auction, you won’t regret it. 

After arriving in Las Vegas on Wednesday, and checking in to the hotel, the Classic Car Network headed to the Shelby American Heritage Center for a tour. I recommend checking out it out if you are in Las Vegas. It’s a proper celebration of Carroll Shelby and his legacy of incredible racecars and high performance street cars. We were granted access to the factory and the upcoming video series by AutoHunter’s Jeff Sutton will give you a behind the scenes perspective of the legendary performance company. Also, the gift shop is awesome.

The auction started the next morning. A bit tired from the drive to Las Vegas and a lack of sleep, I needed a couple of extra cups of coffee to get my mind right. After perking I headed to the auction. 

We had an early morning appointment with Toyota for a Thrill Ride in a Supra at the Convention Center’s temporary track. I sat this one out and watched as professional driver showed off her impressive skills to make that Supra dance and drift. The folks at Toyota were incredibly gracious with their time and we’ll have a video of the Thrill Ride shortly. Even at 8 in the morning the temperature was pushing a 100 degrees, but we had a great time and my respect for those that can make a car drift so smoothly grew exponentially. 

My typical day covering an auction is 12-hours or more and when I’m not trying to get an interview or dropping proppa’ coverage at a Thrill Ride, I am writing recaps of the auction. On Thursday I retired to my hotel room around 8 p.m. for some down time. It’s not an exciting life but some Door Dash and a Mission Impossible movie is a great way to unwind after a great day.  

Up at 5:30 a.m. to get ready for Day Two of the auction. I’m at the Las Vegas Convention Center by 7 and in the Media Center to get some work done. By 8 a.m. the team was back at the track for a Thrill Ride in a Dodge Challenger Hellcat Redeye.

Jeff Sutton rode shotgun in the 797 horsepower muscle car and before his ride started he made the insightful comment that you can hear the Mopar’s supercharger whine before the car arrives. I guess it’s like the muscle car version of the Doppler effect.