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Pro Am
the place for motorsports gifts
By Tony Sakkis
Correspondent |
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Published December 22,
2005
Talk about Christmas
blues. Times are tough for racers at
Christmas time. We either have what we need,
or we need things we can’t quite describe to
our wife or husband. When the question,
“What do you want for Christmas, dear?”
comes up, explaining that we want an
electronic cutoff switch and fire system for
a D Sports Racer is not an easy thing to do.
And you just can’t send them to Dillards and
expect any kind of reasonable selection of
intake manifolds. Sure, the new Bell
Racestar helmet was fine, but that was last
Christmas. The subscription to Autosport was
delightful, but it’s the off-season. And
there’s so much you needed for a racecar.
Let’s face it, shopping for a racer is tough
work. So what’s the relative of a
“been-good-all-year” racer to do?
Do what racers all across the
Houston/Galveston area do: Go to Pro Am.
The area’s best racing accessory shop, Pro
Am is a collection of stuff you’d love to
have because it makes your car faster, and a
bunch of other stuff you’d love to have
because it’s cool. They don’t have gifts a
lot of people would want, or — for that
matter — what any reasonable person should
want.
But if you race, you want what they’ve got.
“We pride ourselves on being a unique
accessory store. Kind of like an automotive
boutique. We specialize in special order,
top-of-the line stuff,” said store manager
Cliff Gardner.
The number of merchandise reads like a wish
list for A.J. Foyt himself: a complete line
of Recaro seats; all the Simpson safety
equipment you could ever ask for; driving
suits; helmets; every Bilstein shock
available in the United States (including
the really trick racing stuff); custom key
chains, watches, gear shift knobs and radar
detectors.
If you’re about to start racing, you can
give a gift from new racer gear to roll
cages. You need stickers? They have them.
Heck, they can even broker you a deal to
have your car modified to fit its racing
class. Most of this is for SCCA road racing,
but racers are racers and crossovers are
likely.
In fact, you’d be surprised.
What’s been selling best? The Recaro child
seat is pretty hot this year.
“Business has been pretty good,” said
Gardner.
And you have to figure that, sure, you can
do the mail order thing from a race shop out
in California. But if you’re a nonracer
buying a gift for a racer, it’s kind of like
sending a nonsmoker going to the store for
cigarettes.
It’ll never work out right.
But at Pro Am, you have all the goods right
there in front of you. Better yet, they’re
all racers. They know what’s cool and what
isn’t. They’ll know what the hot set up on
your friend’s car is.
Heck, in some cases they’ve even raced
against him or her. So, depending on how
much your racer friend has been on the
track, they can even tell who’s been good or
bad — and what kind of present they deserve.
What’s the most expensive thing?
“We sell Ginettas,” said Gardner. “It’s no
longer imported into the United States, but
we sell it in kit form.”
These English, Lotus-like bodies are
assembled by the buyer and use Mazda running
gear and cost around $29,000, which begs the
question as to how many the shop has sold
for Christmas.
“Not yet,” Gardner said. “But we’re hoping.”
Hope is big around Christmas.
Pro Am is located in Houston on Richmond at
Greenridge, across from Ruth’s Chris
Steakhouse. For more information, call (713)
781-7755 or visit the Web site at
www.proamauto.com.
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