After years of striving to win the coveted Summernats grand champion broadsword without success, a Canberra car-building couple have cracked an even rarer prize.
And it's a trophy which will likely never be awarded again in Australia.
Internationally acclaimed street machine creators Mike and Jim Ring, based out of Wisconsin, USA, awarded Jason and Tanya Sandner with their personal choice award at Melbourne's MotorEx Car Show, regarded as the country's premier static exhibition for modified cars.
Jason Sandner felt emotional a 15-year journey of construction and reconstruction with his family's Holden Torana "King SLR" sedan had culminated in such a rare award, presented in person by the two Americans at the show last weekend.
"I was totally floored. It feels like a dream," Mr Sandner said.
"Out of the very best cars in the country at that show, they chose ours.
"They [the Ring brothers] only made two of these amazing trophies. And now we have one of them."
The Ring brothers opened their first collision repair shop 30 years ago and since than have hand-built some of the most exalted examples of street machines, including a pristine, supercharged V8 1961 Rolls Royce Silver Cloud for the world's largest car automotive trade show, SEMA, in Las Vegas last year.
They travel the world looking for inspiration and the Sandner's blue Torana - a model never sold outside Australia - provided just that.
"They said our car was the sort of car they would want in their garage, so that's a huge compliment considering some of the amazing machines they have built over the years," Mr Sandner said.
Jason and Tanya Sandner bought their once-brown, bog-standard 1977 Torana for $4200 in Sydney some 15 years ago and drove it home to Jerrabomberra, the car overheating several times on the way.
Years of work followed until it was unveiled for the first time at Summernats in 2014. Multiple refinements, such as an all-new interior, have continued since then with ever more details added. Parts like the carbon fibre dashboard and billet aluminium bonnet hinges were either sourced locally, and from specialists all over the country.
The Torana's engine is an all-aluminium Donovan sprintcar V8, with every component painstakingly encapsulated.
"The standard of the show cars goes up and up every year so if you want to stay with the top bunch, you have to keep changing it up," he said.
But try as they might, the Sandners never quite cracked the Chic Henry prize, each time denied by even more superlative cars, like the million-dollar Queensland-built Falcon "Forged" which was at unbackable odds for Summernats grand champion in January until its engine failed to start with a simple fuel delivery issue.
So time has now been called on their beloved Torana's high-end exhibition aspirations.
While the Sandners will take it out to a few upcoming country shows, winning the Ring brothers' trophy seems like a fitting finale to a long journey.
Starting up a new business, SLR Specialised Restorations, will demand more time from the Fyshwick panel beater and spray painter but he admitted to recently acquiring something which has stirred his Torana-building zeal once more.
"It's just a bodyshell at the moment. But it's a two-door Torana shell, and they are as rare as hen's teeth," he said.
"So where that project will take us, we really don't know yet."
