H2oi Name is Ruined, Car Enthusiast Says

NEWARK, DELAWARE – A Delaware car enthusiast said car owners looking for attention have ruined the H2oi name after causing mayhem that resulted in two deaths in Wildwood.
Ryan Stransky, who said many members of his family have an interest in cars and racing, said those who have caused problems at H2oi rallies are not genuine enthusiasts. 
“It’s a cry for attention,” he said.
Stransky said his grandfather had an interest in cars, his father worked on and raced cars, and he has uncles who are car enthusiasts. He grew up around cars and going to races. Stransky said he has drifted away from the car community, being older, a husband and parent, but he still has a project car. And up until 2020, he still had an interest in car rallies but has seen them go downhill. 
“My last attendance was 2020. I knew the writing was on the wall,” he said. 
According to Stransky, the car rallies that were plaguing Ocean City, Maryland in the last five or six years were originally scheduled for outside of Ocean City. He said people started to book rooms in Ocean City for longer stays. 
“People would get hotel rooms in Ocean City and make a vacation out of it. They would cruise around, talk, meets would pop up, and it was really just a great environment,” he said. 
Stransky said there were some burnouts, some street racing, and what is now being referred to as “exhibition driving,” but for the most part, it was kept out of town. 
“I’m not going to lie, there was street racing, but there was a time and place, and a respect that is not here, now. The racing was on the back road in the middle of the night, and if anything would happen it would happen to the people involved, not innocent bystanders,” he said. 
Stransky said H2o-International began as a legitimate, sanctioned car show. The H2o portion referred to water-cooled engines specific to Volkswagen. Volkswagen started out with air-cooled engines, so water-cooled engines were more modern and the event was specifically about modified German imports.  
“It was a huge German car event. You used to see lines of lowered Volkswagens, Audis, Mercedes, and BMWs heading down to Ocean City,” he said.
Stransky said he was always a Honda or Acura owner, but he would go down to see the show. Eventually, owners of a lot of different makes and models started showing up, and as the sun would go down people started acting up. He said it was getting worse every year until it was no longer a sanctioned event. Around 2016 or 2017, Ocean City, Maryland was fed up. He said there was an attempt to move the H2oi event to Atlantic City after the 2020 event.
Stransky said the proliferation of social media has led to more people wanting to be tied to the car culture; however, along with car enthusiasts, it also draws in the “bad apples,” as it did in the Wildwoods during the fourth weekend of September. 
He said, whereas in the past, car owners appreciated the time and effort that was put into cars, and they used to compare power numbers, and so on, there are a lot of newcomers who are just interested in drawing attention to themselves. 
Even urbandictionary.com, a crowdsourced site that describes modern language use and slang, defines H2oi as “A gathering of the most obnoxious groups of people with loud cars, excessive drinking habits, Instagram clout, and parents’ money.”
Such events where hundreds of cars descend on an unsuspecting town are referred to as “takeovers,” and are part of a culture that genuine car enthusiasts abhor. 
“And here they are putting innocent lives in danger. They are not in it for the love of cars – it’s the love of attention. ‘I can get followers if I do this.’ It’s unfortunate to say, but car enthusiasts like myself do not want to partake or participate in H2oi,” he said. “Maybe it’s because I’m older, but I empathize with town officials and locals in Wildwood. What was demonstrated there was not what H2oi was originally about. People dying is inexcusable.”
Stransky was referring to an incident in Wildwood, Sept. 24, when a driver traveling at a high rate of speed struck a pedestrian before crashing into another car. The pedestrian and the driver of the car that was hit were both killed. The driver of the other car remains in the Cape May County Correctional Facility. Another driver seriously injured the driver of a golf cart and has been charged with two counts of assault. At least two more people have been arrested in connection with events from Sept. 24 in Wildwood and police are still on the hunt for yet another. 
 At the Oct. 12 Wildwood Board of Commissioners meeting, a member of the public said Myrtle Beach, South Carolina had banned “cruising” and installed cameras to record how many times a car passed a certain location. 
Stransky said Newark, Delaware had also cracked down on cruising along Main Street near the University of Delaware. He said the car enthusiasts asked for one day to cruise and show off their cars. He said the result was the Kirkwood Cruise, where the real car enthusiasts can cruise Kirkwood Highway in Wilmington to Main Street, Newark. 
He said for several years it has been “a good thing,” but some bad apples are starting to show up. He said with dedicated law enforcement it is still a good event. However, he doesn’t ever see something called H2oi ever being welcome. 
“If it were up to me, I’d nix the name,” Stransky said. 
Thoughs? Tips? Email csouth@cmcherald.com or call him at 609-886-8600 ext. 128.