This is the first draft of what I hope to be many …

I wont be alone, along the way (Maybe even the first “Official” POST) will be a guest feature. Im writing this to test out the feature and get some words down.

Low Class Springfest

Podium is based out of El Paso Texas, a beautiful midsize city filled with tons of hidden gems in the car community.

I highlight that it’s a mid size city because I truly feel that as a city we punch above our weight class when it comes to the automotive community. We have some amazing builds that highlight what we’re about. From low riders, classics, to my personal favorite race cars and JDM builds. My ultimate goal with this blog is to feature many of these builds, as much as I can get access to and really put the sun city of the map. Granted as a car community as a whole we got a long way to go compared to other city’s but we got some people that lead the way in trying to make that change and bridge the gap from small town bits to marquee builds.

One of these trailblazers is Diego Berrios who’s put on one of the best shows in El Paso and over the last few years has worked to take his show on a tour of the US doing what he started here in other cities! It’s always exciting to be a part of these shows and to see the evolution of the builds.

This year was super hectic for me given all that I had going on at my restaurant and added in how busy of a day it was. To top it off the weather wasn’t great so I had the added stress of figuring out how we’d secure all our tents and merch to make sure nothing flew away. Luckily I have some amazing friends and a wife lean on and they made sure everything started off without a hitch. Leading up to it I wasn’t sure if I’d even make the show but I worked my way there and got to enjoy the show.

This years show seemed a little smaller than previous ones but the vibes were high and attendance was good, plus when your with good company it’s always a blast.

As many of you know I setup along side my partner and ride or die in all this Underdogz and we curated a group of cars to help highlight our brand.

Right next to the booth we had Edgar’s 96 civic that just went through a complete change of theme. He had the whole hatch resprayed and went with a full spoon sports theme. He got his spoon hood a few days before the show and was able to rock it that day. Looking to do a whole feature in him soon, where I’ll go deeper into his build.

We also had a chance to host our friend Alan’s newly added NSX, the car is incredibly clean and relatively stock except for some BBS wheels and a spoon vtec controller, which is fucking insane that such a cool piece came with the car. He’s got plans on updating a lot on the car, mostly bringing it up to date on things the car needs. He also recently acquired a testarossa which is a crazy parallel to the nsx especially considering they are both in red! I hope I can get some shots of it soon and all the other amazing cars in his collection.

We always try to do a different set up for our booths, but considering how cold and windy it was that day, combined with rain we just did the best we could lol

We really wanted to highlight Obies newest car detailing products and try to bring them to market. He worked hard on a ceramic detailer and tire dressing that smell EXACTLY like the JDM squash air freshener! A lot of work went into getting this scent and combine it with a quality product that he’s proud to put his name behind.

The best parts of these events are getting to kick it with our close friends, catching up and laughing, talking about our next plans for our builds and taking shit lol

This year was a little different because we got to see a few of the five star guys come down from San Antonio. I didn’t have much time to make my way around the show but definitely made time to stop and go see their cars.

Their builds are always top notch and have lots of quality time and though invested in to how they curate parts.

I went pretty nuts seeing a PY DC2 with a 97 front end put on there to make use of a 97 itr mugen lip. For me that was the highlight of the show, not to mention all the other JDM Honda accessories it has like Honda access headlight covers 🤯.

They continued bringing in heat with Mikes AP2 with an amazing j’s racing kit and flawless look all around, the way the regamasters fit on it is amazing, very well rounded build.

And can’t go on without mentioning Andrew’s fk8 in tiger eye pearl, freaking car looks AMAZING and really has a presence!

I wish I got more pictures of all the amazing builds and also wish I was way more eloquent with my words lol but I just want to bring you all the show from my perspective.

Well I hope you enjoy the pictures, I’ll put the rest here and some on instagram as well.

Thank you to Diego for putting on a great event, and thank you to all my friends and family who helped with the booth and keep this brand alive!

See you guys soon!

Machine Type

I don’t really know what I’m doing here… For starters, I don’t know if I’m adding to a continuous post or if I can make a page for every entry. Stay tuned as I learn and figure it out—ha ha ha!

I met Machine Type around 2017 or 2018 through our mutual friend Jorge. As our involvement in the local time attack scene grew, we saw each other more and more and inevitably became friends. Over the years, we started talking a lot more—mostly due to our crazy obsession with conspiracy theories and the belief that we are ruled by an underground lizard-alien race… but that’s a story for another time.

I’ve seen Juan go through multiple builds in the years I’ve known him, but the one that has always stuck around is his incredibly well-rounded BRZ. I’ve always seen it as a badass weekend warrior—one he can enjoy daily on his commute to work and then pack up for the weekend to hit the track. He’s been no stranger to our local time attack series and a frequent murderer of cones at many autocross events, and that’s where I got to know this car best.

There’s nothing exaggerated about the car’s look, but the subtleties of its upgrades give it a definite presence. The front canards and ride height make it clear that this BRZ is ready to party.

Open the hood, and the powder-coated intake manifold instantly catches your eye. Overall, the powerplant remains stock, aside from bolt-ons designed to improve airflow. Juan has truly enjoyed this car over the years, and every addition has been made with a purpose—helping him improve his times.

This was my first attempt at featuring a car, and I couldn’t be happier to showcase Juan’s BRZ. This wasn’t a professional shoot (or editorial) by any stretch of the imagination—just a casual hangout with friends and a chance to be around a cool build.

I chose Juan to launch this blog because he’ll also be contributing his own features here. I couldn’t think of a better way to introduce him as a collaborator on this new project. He also has an awesome AP1 S2000 that we’ll feature eventually, but for now, we want to focus on highlighting more cars and events in the local scene.

This shoot was done last month, and since then, I’ve been banking content to keep entries fresh. Like I mentioned earlier, there’s no set format—just a few enthusiasts sharing their experiences and perspectives. This past weekend, we had a local car show that was a lot of fun, and I was able to gather some content that I’ll be posting here next.

Right around the corner, we’ve got Super Lap Battle coming up in Austin, TX. Some local cars will be competing, including a featured sponsored build—Joel’s FK8 (Podium FK8 2.0, lol) in the Street Class. That’s a whole feature in itself, and I can’t wait to share that one with you all!

Back to Juan—this shoot was done on the fly. Normally, I’d shoot with more daylight to bring out the car’s details, but given the freezing temperatures and lack of sunlight, I think the images turned out pretty cool. We also got some video footage, which is up on the Podium Instagram page if you want to check it out.

Anyway, that’s all I’ve got for now! I really enjoyed shooting Juan’s car and tried to capture the details of his build.

I hope you all enjoyed this first entry—I’ll be back soon with more!

Enjoy the pictures!