Early morning in Springfield, Missouri. The driver’s meeting.

The number of cars on the tour keeps growing, but the crowds at the driver’s meetings keeps shrinking. Long days, late nights, cold beer. Something has to give.

This charming young lady is using our Mothers Showtime to detail her Pro-Street Chevy.

Last night, the TLC “Rides” show put together a small group of cars for filming on today’s route.

The plan is to make a quick detour to O’Reilly’s Automotive Corporate headquarters in Springfield, then follow the tail end on the tour as it winds towards Lake of the Ozarks.

Our hot rods pull out of the park, while “Rides” tapes the procession.

We arrive at O’Reilly’s a few minutes later.

The Edelbrock sedan delivery.

Titus presents O’Rielly’s product buyer, Kathy Combs, with a scale model of the Mothers ’59 Sedan Delivery.

One of the most formidable cars on the tour is this twin turbo Camaro. It makes 1,024 horsepower running on premium.

Titus takes a break from shooting to talk with Vic Edelbrock.

Cliff’s newly-acquired Dodge Dart has an eight-quart, deep-sump oil pan that sits way too low. Throughout our entire trip, the pan has been bottoming-out. We’ve consistently scraped chunks of asphalt, concrete and road-kill off every highway along the Power Tour route. It was only a matter of time until it broke.

Here’s my conversation with Cliff the moment before it happened, “Do me a favor and go around the speed bump, there’s plenty of room.” Being the headstrong person he is, Cliff aims directly at the speed bump and guns the motor.

Slam, Crash, Bang.

We happen upon the second Power Tour casualty of the day.

Some poor person in a Saturn was waiting for cross-traffic to clear when they were violently rear-ended by another car.

Their Saturn got pushed into traffic and hit a 1956 Oldsmobile Holiday 88.

No one was seriously hurt, though the passenger in the Olds was pretty bruised-up and had to be taken to the hospital.

About a half an hour down the road, we catch up with the mother of all traffic jams. We sit dead-still for nearly an hour.

Those among us with less-than-manly bladders must now pay the price.

We’ve had enough. We turn the sedan delivery around at Ozarkland and head south on Highway 7 to Interstate 44.

It was a good call. Those Power Tour participants who continued on the Lake of the Ozarks route showed up four hours late to the St. Louis show.

Gateway International Raceway, St. Louis.

The dragstrip is running.

I see the custom Chevrolet SSR from yesterday in line.

14.67 in the quarter-mile. All those TV screens, power amps and subwoofers must be weighing him down.

Troy and Jack Trepainer’s eBay Mustang, the “Fast Forward Fast Back.”

This car was built entirely using parts purchased on eBay. Even the car itself was acquired from an eBay auction. The build was the subject of a first-season “Rides” episode, and it also won the Mothers Choice award at last year’s SEMA show.

This 1966 Corvair — “Naders Hater” — is powered by a 383 Chevy engine lovingly shoe-horned into the back seat.

A 1969 “Mod Top” Dodge Dart Swinger. Fifty were made, this is one of two known to exist.

Two nice Mustangs in the BFGoodrich booth, a 1970 and a 1969.

Hot rods. Street rods. Rusto rods. You asked for them, we’ve got it.