North American Motoring - Welcome to Mini NEO!

Hello all!

Some of you may already know me as the bloke at the Dragon who drove the Union Jack cooper S ("Sprog II"), and who bought a lil' money pit of a 1991 Mini Mayfair ("Sprog III" teehee).

I run the Mini club of Northeastern Ohio, which pretty much covers most of Northern Ohio, as no one has really started anything in the NW that I know of. We have a great deal of Minis in our area, and are proud to have Classic MINI as our unofficial sponsor (enter shameless plugs here).

A little history behind our club:

The first member was actually not me, but a friend from a bit south of me, really nice bloke who's a professor at a local private college. I came along and decided it would be fun to have a loose organization of Mini owners. Very informal, with few rules to hold us back. This was back in October of 2002 after I bought my first MINI, "Sprog I". By chance I came across a guy in Kentucky that had aspirations to start up a large Mini club consisting of Ohio, Kentucky & Indiana. Some people may remember it - MiniOKI. My club became a splinter club of that one, but with all the bureaucracy that my friend in Kentucky started facing he disbanded the club in protest.

Hence, Mini NEO was born.

As I said, we're a loose organization. I've made it my mission as president of the club to keep things free and low pressure. We've had a few strifes due to the fact that I don't charge a membership fee, but I have recently resolved those problems in my own... special way.

The downside of being free is that I really have no funding to hold any big events. Classic helps us out on the bigger events, such as our largest for the Italian Job, with help from Mini Mania as well. The club is on a pay-as-you-go basis. If I were to rent BeaveRun raceway (which I plan to), whoever planned on going would have to pay their cut. But honestly, I think thats better than member dues.

I hope to see more people in and around our area (I let people in from anywhere, really) join up and contribute ideas. We have roughly 100 members so far, a number which I'd like to expand.

However, I promise that as long as I am running the club I will keep it free. All you have to do to join up is go to our club site at www.minineo.org and sign up. Feel free to e-mail me at president@minineo.org to introduce yourself.

Hope to see some people at another event soon! I will post events here as they are planned. I do hold get togethers over the winter as well, bringing your MINI/Mini is not mandatory.

Cheers!

-Jeremy Adams
President & Founder, Mini NEO