Tracylynn Mitchell’s 2007 Torch Red Ford Mustang GT is practically a child to her.
“It’s my baby. I really enjoy it,” she said, with a laugh. “I come from a family that has always shown cars, worked on cars. I had family that worked for Ford, so I’m a Ford girl.”
She and her husband, Lance, are car enthusiasts, to say the least. Besides taking their sweet ride to car shows, they’re members of the Midwest Street Rod Association and the Platte Valley Mustang Club. Michigan natives who transplanted to Columbus seven years ago, the couple last year went to and participated in the famed Woodward Dream Cruise. It’s considered the world's largest one-day automotive event, drawing about 1.5 million people and 40,000 classic cars each year from around the globe to Michigan. Spectators can see muscle cars, street rods, custom, collector and special interest vehicles dating across several decades.
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The two have remained busy with work throughout the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, as both have essential jobs. She works as an operation supervisor at UPS, while he is a fabricator for Roth Racing.
“So our lives really haven’t changed, aside from you can’t go anywhere or do anything besides get up and go to work,” Lance said. “We just started talking about we all had to go do something before we all start going stir crazy, which I think will happen really, really quick.”
Lance said they began noticing how cruise nights were becoming popular in towns across the country. Even communities in nearby Colfax and Butler counties have hosted them in recent weeks. So they decided to plan the first-ever Cruising Columbus from 6-8 p.m. this Thursday, April 23. As part of it, people are encouraged to bring out a ride of their choice for a couple of hours of good old-fashioned cruising.
The plan is to start in the parking lot that is home to Pizza Ranch, 2266 33rd Ave. in Columbus. The tentative route is for vehicles to head south and turn right at Ace Hardware onto 14th Street, wrap around Typhoon Wash, turn left back onto 33rd and head north, making an eventual right on 23rd Street down to Menards and repeat (Maps of the route will be available for pickup on the night of the cruise in the parking lot).
“We’re just trying to get everyone together and go have some fun,” Lance said. “Get out, have some fun, show off your cars and keep social distancing in mind.”
If Mother Nature doesn’t cooperate Thursday evening, the Mitchells said they’ll try again for the following Thursday. Ideally, it will become more than a one-time thing.
“Who knows what it could turn into,” Lance said. “We want to get it going once a month and hope it becomes a thing around here.”
Tracylnn said they’re proud to be the ones spearheading the effort.
“We would like to do this here for the community,” she said, adding that she’s a member of the Red Pony Mustang Registry on Facebook. “We haven’t seen anything like this here, so we would love to give to the community and add to it.”
The two said they’re wanting as many people as possible to come out, noting it doesn’t matter what kind of ride one shows up in. It’s all about having a good time as a community. Although they expect to see all kinds of vehicles on the road Thursday night, there is no question of what they’ll be driving. It will be the Torch Red Mustang with the black stripes they’ve souped-up, modified, invested in and taken to numerous car shows.
“Most definitely,” Tracylynn assured, noting they’ve helped organize cruise nights for various clubs previously and enjoy showing off their cars. “I would prefer a ’67 (Mustang), but they’re pretty expensive. This is my fourth Mustang. The first one was my dad’s – he had a ’79. … But I love mine.”
Matt Lindberg is the managing editor of The Columbus Telegram. Reach him via email at matt.lindberg@lee.net.