Butch is recognized as being one of the specialty aftermarket leaders, an individual whose business acumen has led to a preponderance of successes in the wholesale and retail distribution of performance parts and customizing accessories. Butch has been an ad director, account manager and marketing director. He has served on the SEMA Board of Directors and as the SEMA Treasurer as well as on various committees. Additionally, he served on the Board of Directors for AFFTA and SREA. He was both Director and Treasurer of PWA. PWA awarded Butch with its Pioneer Award in 1996, and he received the SEMA Person of the Year Award in 1984.

Joan Weiand overcame the obstacles that lay before her when she took over Weiand Industries in the wake of her husband’s death.  Joan supported industry causes with zeal; she established and maintained a SEMA Scholarship Fund in her husband Phil’s memory.

The founder and CEO of Superior Industries, former used-car salesman Lou radiated the spirit of entrepreneurship. He started his company, Superior Industries International, with the design and production of alloy custom wheels. Today, Superior wheels are found on tens of thousands of production-line new cars. He had been on the company's board of directors since 1958, serving as chairman until 2007. Lou was also a major supporter of the SEMA Memorial Scholarship Fund and one of the Scholarship's subfund sponsors; the L.L. Borick subfund is awarded each year to students seeking careers in the specialty-equipment industry.

Hilborn is a popular name in the Indianapolis 500 race, because Hilborn fuel injection units have been on Indy race cars for more than three decades. It was Stu Hilborn, an automotive engineer and lakes racer, who designed and developed the hybrid injection system, a variation of which is now used on new cars in an electronic configuration. His injectors have been used successfully and set many records in all types of racing including oval track, drag, dry lakes, super modified, off-road, motorcycle, tractor pulling, hydroplanes and Indy Lite series.

Bob retired from Chrysler Motors Corporation in the late 1980s, but he did so with credit for keeping the Chrysler nameplates prominent in all forms of racing. Bob is known as the originator of Mopar, a unit of operation that began as a performance parts division for Chrysler. It’s reported that he ran Chrysler’s Pure Oil Performance Trials team and the Mobilgas Economy Run efforts, and led the racing group that developed the Hyper Pak-powered Valiants for NASCAR’s short-lived compact car racing series. Mopar Magazine wrote that he “dreamed up” the Max Wedge and HEMI package cars Chrysler built from 1962 to 1968.

Pete was the co-founder of Pete & Jake's, a large and very successful street rod products manufacturer, also responsible for the design and construction of popular hot rods, among them the award-winning "California Kid" coupe. He has built, or had a hand in building, a number of notable rods, including the Eliminator coupe and two “HogZZilla” custom motorcycles for ZZ Top’s Billy Gibbons. He was also involved in the restoration of several historic hot rods for Bruce Meyer, including the Doane Spencer roadster, Pierson Brothers coupe and Alex Xydias’s original So-Cal Speed Shop belly tank lakester. Pete is also the owner of So-Cal Speed Shop. In addition, he was Vice President of Marketing at SEMA, and was instrumental in the formation of the Street Rod Equipment Association, a SEMA council. He was inducted in to the SRMA Hall of Fame, the Route 66 Hall of Fame, National Rod & Custom Hall of Fame, Hot Rod Hall of Fame and the Grand National Roadster Show Hall of Fame. He has been awarded the Grand National Roadster Show Builder of the Year, Detroit Autorama Builder of the Year, Legends of Speed Lifetime Achievement Award and NSRA (UK) Hot Rod of the Century Award.

Borré got his start more than 40 years ago as a teenage counterman at a neighborhood auto parts store. To this day he admits to a passion for cars of any kind. It’s an infatuation he traces to his boyhood years, and that, he says, is what has always influenced his career choices. From the parts counter to management roles, Borré advanced to president of Sperex VHT Corp., a position he held for 17 years. Today, Borré is the CEO of Manik Motors, a major national supplier of truck accessories.

Borré’s affiliation with SEMA spans many, many years. He has held a seat on the SEMA Board of Directors, been on the executive committee, been active in the Professional Restylers Organization (PRO) and he has been a major contributor to the progress and growth of the SEMA Scholarship Fund.

Amy Faulk, SEMA’s Person of the Year in 1996, has been interested in automotive technology since she was a preteen helping in her father’s body and radiator repair shop. During her automotive career, she has held management roles at Racing Head Service/Competition Cams and TCI/Fel-Pro/Federal-Mogul. She is currently the chief administrative officer at Hypertech.

Faulk has devoted much of her time and talents to serving on the SEMA Board of Directors, as well as the SEMA Businesswomen’s Network (SBN) and the SEMA Motorsports Parts Manufacturers Council (MPMC). She also is credited with the development of the annual Silent Auction at the SEMA Show, which raises money for the SEMA Memorial Scholarship Fund.

Faulk is also a distinguished drag racer, earning the NHRA (National Hot Rod Association) title “The Winningest Woman in Racing.” Plus, she has won the NHRA Super Stock Driver of the Year award and national title victories in three different competition categories.

Turbocharging is synonymous with performance. That is due in large part to the efforts and accomplishments of Bob Keller. A tireless advocate of turbocharger technology, Keller has perhaps done more to advance the acceptance of the technology than anyone else in the industry. At the same time, he has been a determined promoter of the performance aftermarket.

Upon graduating from the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn in 1960, Keller began his professional career working as an aerospace engineer for Grumman Aircraft (Northrop-Grumman). Around 1963, he decided to merge his technical knowledge with his love of performance. He formed a small moonlight company called Turbonics, Inc., and began to pursue performance turbo applications for automobiles.

Keller left the aerospace business in 1973 to pursue his “turbocharger dream.” He joined the Flagship Marine Corporation and, in short order, persuaded the company to join SEMA. Keller exhibited the company’s line of TurboNautic products at the SEMA Show in Anaheim that same year. That was the start of a long relationship with SEMA.

In 1978, after holding key positions with numerous aftermarket companies, Keller decided to make a go of it on his own. He founded Turbonetics as a manufacturer and distributor of special-purpose turbochargers. Keller guided the company from its humble beginnings in his garage to the multi-million-dollar business that it is today. He holds multiple patents and is an active member of the SAE. Keller also has been published extensively in a variety of trade magazines and is a technical contributor to the NHRA. He sold Turbonetics in 1999 to Kelly Aerospace, where he still serves as a consultant and President Emeritus.

Keller’s ongoing efforts to educate consumers and the industry about the technical advantages of turbocharger technology are matched only by his efforts to promote the performance aftermarket. He served on multiple SEMA committees and task forces and chaired the Management Committee, the Environmental Strategic Planning Committee and the WD of the Year Committee. In addition to playing major roles in the formation of the Motorsports Parts Manufacturers Council and Sport- Compact Council, he served on the Select Committees of both. Keller served two terms on the SEMA board and was one of the original members of the SEMA/Ford Technical Initiative Task Force.

As chair on the Environmental Strategic Planning Committee, he authored the Voluntary Product Identification Program for emissions-sensitive products in 1993. His hard work on emissions and regulatory issues earned him yet another accolade, the prestigious SEMA Person of the Year award in 1993. Additionally, his continual recruiting of new SEMA members earned him several Ambassador awards.

Known as an avid hot rodder from the beginning, Keller’s passion for the performance aftermarket not only led to his own unprecedented success but undoubtedly benefited the entire industry as well.

Herb Fishel's mother tells the story of how-decades before winning the triple crown of racing, driving the pace car at the Indy 500 or being named one of Hot Rod magazine's 100 most influential people-he used to take the nipple off his bottle so he could wash his toy cars with milk.

While in diapers, he was training for his relationship with SEMA. As an adult, he pioneered the concept of a featured manufacturer, creating Chevrolet's "takeover" of the rotunda at the 1984 SEMA Show.

"This was the first time a vehicle manufacturer played a major role in the SEMA Show and led to the expansive growth of the Show," says Chuck Blum, president emeritus of SEMA. "Up to that point in time, OEM participation in the Show was very limited and inconsistent."

During his 40-year career at General Motors, Fishel said that he always believed in the connection between the high-performance industry and the auto manufacturer. It was a career that took him around the world and a long way from his native North Carolina.

Herb Fishel said that he had already made his mind up to pursue a career in auto racing well before he got to high school. "Cars totally consumed my thinking at that stage, [but I] wasn't thinking much beyond being a master mechanic," Fishel recalled.

Fishel's Uncle Bill, a mechanic at the local Lincoln-Mercury dealership, possessed a rather well-equipped home garage where Fishel spent his free time. "I would spend all my spare time with him after hours and on the weekends sorting parts and working on things like a Crosley Hot Shot and a midget-type race car powered by a Mall 11-horsepower engine," he said. "We also repaired lawn mowers."

That same Uncle Bill took Fishel and several other neighborhood kids to Winston-Salem's Bowman Gray Stadium each week during the summer. NASCAR ran modified and sportsman race cars there and, as Fishel noted, his group arrived early and stayed late. Billy and Bobby Myers became heroes to Fishel, who hung out at their shop and often followed them to the junkyards as they pursued parts for their '37 Fords.

Fishel may not have been looking past a future as a master mechanic in high school, but his parents were. Had they not intervened, he said, he would have skipped college and gone to work as a mechanic. But they insisted, so he enrolled at North Carolina State College to pursue a mechanical engineering degree.

While in college, Fishel kept close tabs on the racing scene and took particular notice of the Mystery Engine Caper at Daytona in February of 1963. [The 427-cubic inch "mystery" engine showed up at the 1963 Daytona 500 and is considered to be the foundation of GM big-block technology.

As he neared graduation, Fishel still had racing on his mind. "I wrote letters to Lee Petty, Junior Johnson and Bondy Long seeking employment," he said. "I never heard from Lee or Junior, but I did receive a response from Ned Jarrett indicating that they really appreciated my interest but really didn't have any need for someone with my credentials."

Undaunted, Fishel continued with his automotive interests-especially a fascination with the engines and cars that Zora Arkus-Duntov was designing and building. An on-campus interview with a General Motors representative led to a follow-up interview with Chevrolet Engineering in Warren, Michigan. Fishel said that his flight from Raleigh, North Carolina, to Detroit in April 1963 was his first-ever plane ride.

During that initial interview, Fishel was asked if there was anything special he'd like to do while visiting and he said that he'd like to meet Duntov. As luck would have it, Duntov was free for a brief meeting, and Fishel's fate was sealed. "With that introduction, they could have had me for nothing," he said.

Fishel spent his first six years with GM doing design and development work on all the engines he'd read about. In 1968, he was promoted to design engineer in the production High Performance Engine Group where he worked on the development of the 302 V8 for the Camaro, among other things.

Fishel's motorsports career began at General Motors in 1969 when he went to work for Vince Piggins in the Chevrolet Product Performance Group. "For the next seven years I was able to work one to one with many of my racing heroes: Junior Johnson, Bill Jenkins, Jim Travers and Frank Coon," he said. "I spent a lot of time working with Smokey Yunick at his Best Damn Garage in Daytona Beach." In 1976, Lloyd Ruess convinced Fishel to make the move to Buick to create the Buick Special Products Group. He returned to Chevrolet in 1983 to replace Piggins, who was retiring. "In addition to running the racing group at Chevrolet, I was able to spend more time with the high-performance and custom parts industry by participating in the major trade shows like SEMA and the Circle Track Trade Show," Fishel said.

Unfortunately, we have nowhere near enough space to highlight all of what Fishel accomplished during his 40-year career at General Motors. He led GM to the triple crown of racing by winning the Daytona 500, the Indianapolis 500 and the 24 Hours of Le Mans all in the same year. Hot Rod magazine named him one of the 100 most important people in the first 50 years of hot rodding in 1997, and he was inducted into the Hot Rod Hall of Fame that same year.

When asked about the highlight of motorsports career, Fishel said it was driving a 1953 Ferrari 250 MM in the 2001 Italian Mille Miglia with the love of his life, Sandy Heng. Fishel retired from General Motors in September, 2003. One of his final duties was to drive the Chevrolet SSR official pace car vehicle to start the 87th Indianapolis 500.