More than 10,000 gleaming street rods, muscle cars and vintage rides will cruise into the Minnesota State Fairgrounds this weekend — and then 130 of them will take off in a hurry for the legendary Hemmings Great Race to South Carolina.

The nine-day, 2,300-mile rally will take the antique, vintage and collector cars to Irmo, S.C., departing Saturday from the 51st annual Back to the ’50s Weekend. The newest cars will be from 1974 and the oldest in this year’s race is a 1913 Chevrolet truck.

Two Minnesotans will compete: Craig Amundson in a 1973 BMW 2002 and Jerome Reinan in a 1918 American LaFrance. The two men say the race is a family event, more of a rolling family reunion about making memories.

Reinan, who grew up outside of Fergus Falls, Minn., and now lives on Lake Lida near Vergas, drove a 1949 Plymouth in high school and since then has always owned at least one older car.

In college, he first heard about the rally and was determined to compete in the race one day. After law school, working on his career and raising a family, he entered his first race in 2013 driving a wood-paneled 1931 Rolls Royce Shooting Brake.

His team, the Wandering Troubadours of Finland, is named partly for his mother’s Finnish heritage and partly for “a popular acronym that by itself is not family friendly.” They have competed every year since 2013 except one.

The members of the team sometimes change, as well as the cars that race, but normally it consists of Reinan, his two brothers, two cousins, a lawyer friend, his father, his uncle and his brothers-in-law, he said.

“That group of jolly, liver-challenged knuckleheads travels behind the rally in an old tandem diesel school bus that has been converted to an RV,” he said. “Since we have no real fear of winning the race, the race is more of a family gathering than an actual competition. We have also come to see our Great Race competitors as extended family as well.”

He said they most often compete with the 1918 American LaFrance.

“It usually is the most primitive car on the rally, even if it is not necessarily the oldest,” he said. “It has only rear brakes, which are activated by a handle instead of a foot pedal. It is a dual chain drive, and the chains are about 10 times the size of a normal bicycle chain. It has wood spoked wheels and a huge 9.5 liter, four-cylinder T-head engine.”

For perspective on that engine, the largest V-8s in today’s pickups range from 6.2 to 7.3 liters.

The LaFrance has proven to be very reliable, Reinan said, and he has put more than 30,000 miles on it, “none of them even remotely comfortable.”

For car enthusiasts, the rally is the ultimate gathering, he said.

“You get to see the best part of our beautiful country through the windshield of an old car — provided you have a windshield. You get to use your mechanical skills, your survival skills, your interpersonal skills and your skills as an ambassador for the hobby,” Reinan said.

A ‘young’ 1973 BMW

Several years ago, Amundson, of Eden Prairie, put his name on the wait list to compete in the Great Race after hearing about it from an acquaintance. In 2022, he was offered a spot, but didn’t have a car that would qualify so he began to look around.

“My wife, Kris, spotted the 1973 BMW 2002 sitting on the street, with a for-sale sign,” he said.

The car required some work before it was ready to race but had been a competitive vehicle.

The BMW, named Emily Re-Tyred, was initially restored by Paul Wegweiser in Pittsburgh as a 2002ti Alpina tribute car, with European esthetics. Emily has competed in multiple rallies, most associated with the Great Race, he said.

Amundson drives the car while his son-in-law, Jeff Mischke, of Hopkins, navigates.

“It has an interesting history and is a known car within the BMW 2002 world,” he said. “The only drawback is that it is young — 52 years old — and its age does not help in scoring calculations.”

Involvement in the race has been “an exceptional experience,” Amundson said. “For us, it is a family event” as his children and their partners follow along on the race as crew members.

“We try to arrange vacation times to meet at the finish line location for some family time,” he said. “Universally, the people involved in the race are friendly and supportive, even though the race is intense and competitive. Each day of the race includes community-supported lunch stops and end of day celebrations. The crowds are surprisingly large with plenty of old car stories. Almost everyone likes old cars.”

Organizers say the race is a “competitive, controlled-speed endurance road rally on public highways” and is not a test of top speeds but “rather a test of the teams’ and drivers’ ability to follow precise course instructions and … ability to endure on a cross-country trip.”

Saturday starting ceremony

An 11:45 a.m. Saturday ceremony will precede the noon official start time for the race, which will begin at the Fairgrounds main gate at Dan Patch and Snelling avenues.

The racers make their first stop in Rochester, Minn., for the night and then make 16 more stops in Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, West Virginia, Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina. The race takes a different route each year and drivers compete for the $160,000 prize, split among five classes. The biggest winner takes home $50,000.

Each stop is open to the public and people can visit with the drivers and have a look at the cars.

“It is common for racers to allow kids to climb in the cars for a first-hand look,” said Houston Gibson, race coordinator for this year’s oldest vehicle, the 1913 Chevrolet truck.

The most popular vehicles in the races tend to be classic 1960s Mustangs, Gibson said.

“When the Great Race pulls into a city it becomes an instant festival,” says Jeff Stumb, director of the race. “Last year, we had several overnight stops with more than 10,000 spectators.”

The race will end Sunday, June 29, in Irmo, S.C., near Lake Murray.

The Minnesota Street Rod Association’s Back to the ’50s Weekend will feature more than 200 vendors inside and outside at the Fairgrounds. Wally Burchill, a board member, said the association is proud to have been selected for the second time as the location for the start of the Great Race. (The first time was in 2013.)

Admission to the Back to the ’50s Weekend is $15 for those over 15; children 15 and under are free with each paid adult. Advance discount tickets with $2 off are available at participating NAPA auto parts stores.

For more information to go to msrabacktothe50s.com and greatrace.com.