For the first week of 2022, I kicked off the new year with five incredible days learning high-performance driving at Radford Racing School in Chandler, Arizona. Over the course of a wild week, Radford instructors threw me in a Dodge Challenger Hellcat Widebody, a Viper GT, a Lotus Evora GT, and then a legit Ligier F4 car as the curriculum for their Grand Prix Racing course. Then, on Friday, I hit the drag strip behind the wheel of a Dodge Demon.

By the weekend, my body needed some time to recover from the many hours of aggressive driving—and my mind needed time to process everything I'd learned about racing lines, throttle control, braking, and burnouts. But I still made time to swing by my first Cars and Coffee meetup of the new year on the way out of town.

The Standard Selection Of Supercars

AZ Cars And Coffee
via Michael Van Runkle / HotCars

Driving towards the northeast corner of Phoenix, more and more cool cars kept catching my eye in the brightening sunrise. By the time we arrived at High Street, where the dealership Highline Autos puts on the event, engine revs from the standard assemblage of supercars bounced off the building facades—the clean buildings and roads almost resembling a film set designed to replicate what a modern city should look like. Of course, the Radford crew brought a Demon and Viper to show off and attract attention to their booth among all the Lamborghinis, Ferraris, Porsches, and Audis.

FOLLOW HERE: HotCars Official On Twitter

Do It For The Gram

AZ Cars And Coffee 2
via Michael Van Runkle / HotCars

Unlike most cars and coffee gatherings I've been to in West LA, Highline Autos allowed multiple other sponsors to set up booths and the many restaurants on High Street also opened their doors to sell breakfast burritos, sandwiches, and coffee. More cars filtered in as the sun rose further, lining up as cleanly as possible to set up perfect photo opps for social media posts. Clearly, groups of friends attend regularly—same for a bulldog in his miniature G-Wagen who attracted the most consistent crowd of amateur (and professional) photographers.

RELATED: Comedians In Cars Getting Coffee: 10 Sickest Rides We've Seen On The Show

Classics Coming Out For A Cruise

AZ Cars And Coffee 3
via Michael Van Runkle / HotCars

Among the modern supercars and luxury SUVs, plenty of classics also rolled in. Air-cooled 911s still probably made up the majority—as they do in LA—but a solid selection of American classics also made appearances. Almost all the cars received a quick wipe down of their front ends, thanks to the dusty and rocky roads in Arizona, but this C2 Corvette even got a sweet air cleaner cover to show off while the owner tilted up that front-hinging hood.

RELATED: EXCLUSIVE: Cars And Coffee Is Just The Beginning At Porsche Santa Clarita

Getting Into A Different Mood

AZ Cars And Coffee 4
via Michael Van Runkle / HotCars

Even with the vintage muscle and classic European sports cars, the Highline Autos Cars and Coffee still brought in more modern cars than I'm accustomed to seeing in Malibu or Santa Monica. The Exige above seemed like a star simply due to the tiny proportions—and a few funny stickers—while an entire club of Dodge Vipers (other than Radford's) also lined up together.

RELATED: Attending A Cars & Coffee Event: Everything You Need To Know

Unknown Cars, Too

AZ Cars And Coffee 9
via Michael Van Runkle / HotCars

By this point in my automotive career, rarely do I spot a car and have absolutely no idea what it is. At the very least, I can usually say, "Well, that's gotta be an early Ferrari or Lamborghini model," even if I don't know the exact alphanumeric nomenclature. But one car at High Street baffled me nonetheless, looking something like a Morgan meets the Disney character Cruella de Vil's car from the animated version of 101 Dalmations.

Thankfully, Google always has answers and, it turns out, the outboard wheels and art deco body that looked like modern kit car designs to me might have actually been a historically significant model from legendary racecar designer Frank Kurtis and, if real, hailed from the 1950s. The interior looks absolutely spotless, though, as did the exterior, so I have my doubts. Essentially a 1950s Indycar for the street, the Kurtis 500 looked like it must have been a force to reckon with in period amateur racing.

RELATED: EXCLUSIVE: Scoping Out West LA's Newest Sunday Morning Car Meet

A Mistaken Porsche

AZ Cars And Coffee 7
via Michael Van Runkle / HotCars

Other times, I see a car that my brain just glazes over mistakenly, like a Speed Yellow 996-generation Porsche 911 Turbo that I watched pull up. "Yet another Porsche," I figured, even if I do have a soft spot for the Mezger-engined variants of perhaps the most maligned 911 generation of all time. But when I swung back around, I noticed that this Porsche actually bears GT2 badging which could make it incredibly rare, while the aftermarket steering wheel on the interior suggests that someone hopefully likes to let this widowmaker get a bit rowdy. Whether it's a real 996 GT2 or a rear-wheel-drive-converted Turbo with mods remains a mystery (as did the Kurtis) but I still fawned over it for a bit, regardless.

RELATED: EXCLUSIVE: The Montecito Motor Classic Brings Out The Best Of Santa Barbara

Gorgeous Builds Among The Attendees

AZ Cars And Coffee 8
via Michael Van Runkle / HotCars

Another mystery spotted among the early attendees before I peeled out and hit the 10 freeway back to LA came in the form of what looked, to my eye, like a Jaguar XKSS-inspired replica. Pulling in with a twin-turbocharged Porsche 914 in tow (which I also checked out, finding intercoolers in the wide, flat trunk and a borderline unbelievable set of snails mounted around the rear-hanging transaxle), the owner of this car helpfully propped up the hood to allow a clear view of the Offenhauser valve covers under the hood, plus the VIN plate, to provide hints for those of us in the crowd with curiosity in our bones.

Once again, this could be either the real deal or a very thorough replica build, since Scarab Motorsports LLC still sells replicas badged as 1950s cars. Regardless, the Scarab provided even more excitement and intrigue at a Cars and Coffee that thoroughly impressed, even in my short visit, and provided just another reason to look back fondly at one of the best ways to begin a new year pushing cars (and myself) to the limit thanks to Radford Racing School. Stay tuned for more in-depth coverage of the courses and cars I drove over the full week of Grand Prix and drag racing at the facility formerly known as the Bob Bondurant School of High Performance Driving.

Sources: radfordracingschool.com, highline-autos.com, ligierautomotive.com, and scarabmotors.com.