Welcome to the Midwest, or to be more specific, downtown Chicago, Ill., a.k.a. Chi-town. On Saturday, July 11, the city hosted the return of Hot Import Nights in the parking lot of Soldier Field - home to the NFL's Chicago Bears - after the event last year was housed at nearby McCormick Place. The evening provided ample proof that the Midwest tuner scene is still hot; the place was jam packed!

The usual fare was on the HIN menu - huge show-n-shine, live entertainment, insane demos - and the drifting was especially crazy. The course was almost twice as big as previous years, most likely because the top five drifters were qualifying for the Chicago D1GP USA contest, which is scheduled for August 1.

Club FR, a grassroots drifting club in Chicago, ran the sliding part of HIN, and the drifters really gave it their all. In fact, most of the cars that competed ended up with at least some damage. Suspension members were broken left and right. There were plenty of love taps (or kisses) with the K rails, too.

A nearly new 350Z came in too hot and hit one wall, breaking a front control arm and scraping the rear quarter panel. Shortly after, a JDM 180SX took the same corner too hot (after having engine problems) and ended up smashing into the K wall even harder. His window broke into a million small pieces and flew into the crowd, and fuel immediately began leaking out of the car, so for a moment there was concern that the car could blow up. It was cleaned up pretty quickly, though, and the fishtailing resumed.  

In the car show the numbers of VIP whips were low, but the standbys of Hondas and other imports were reliably healthy. Indeed, H-badged vehicles ran the gamut, from converted right hand-drive cover cars to a rear-engine Civic. And there were others, both Honda and non-Honda, that caught our attention.

While the US 240SX never came with Nissan's badass two-liter turbo SR mill, swapping out the stock KA lump for a Japanese market SR has become popular. This 1990 240 was rocking one such setup from an S14 Silvia, with the factory snail upgraded to an S362 Borg Warner turbo. Inside, the owner went with a full custom cage, while outside we find the sports coupe shoed in Work Meister S1 rims.

From the Honda camp we found this elaborate 1988 CR-X, which was flossing a transplanted K20 engine complete with individual throttle bodies. The details on this thing are impressive: JDM front end, Honda S2000 gauge cluster, a 4x113 wheel hub conversion, and a center-exit exhaust, among other elements - very nice.

We love that Mitsubishi Evo VIIIs/IXs have become so popular in spite of their less-than-sexy dimensions, and part of the reason is because builders have found a way to give the car some aesthetic punch. This 2006 IX gets our motor running with its Bride Gias interior, Do-Luck wide-body kit and orange Volk Racing TE37s. The "go" (or "stop," as the case may be) to match the "show" includes pieces like the Power Enterprise RX6R turbo kit and Endless brakes (six pot in the front, four pot in the rear).

While the new Z may be getting a lot of attention these days, the old Z has the aftermarket behind it. This 2003 350Z offers a good example of the choices available from Stillen to Z33 enthusiasts, parts like the blower, exhaust and body kit. The coupe also sports an Eibach suspension and fully polished Work Meister wheels.

Fizz Auto brought out some of the hottest cars of the show. Since Fizz now has two locations (New York and Chicago), the New York crew drove in a pact to Chicago. The cool part about the Fizz display was that it had, by far, the most diverse car group - Toyotas, Hondas, Nissans, Subarus, they had it all.

The hired hotties were out in full force at HIN Chicago, as were a bunch of industry types from the tuner world. We were a little surprised to see Carter Jung from Import Tuner magazine out of his California foxhole, and he was joined by others who don't normally make it out to Chi-Town too often.

This year's HIN Chicago was a blast. There was a good turnout and both the cars and the women were hot. The next Hot Import Nights event will be in Pleasanton, Calif., on July 25th. If you see us at the event, make sure to stop by, say hello, and if you have the money, buy a shirt!

www.hotimportnights.com