NO TRAILER QUEENS ALLOWED; A celebration of driving, no matter how rare or delicate your ride.(News)

Byline: MARK VAUGHN

Not too long ago, critics of the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance said that while the cars were beautiful, the darned things couldn't drive as far as the door of the restoration shop. Concours organizers, stung by such arrows, pointed out that a Pebble winner had to be able to drive up the grass and over the ramp in front of everybody under its own power to win. Failure to do so meant no trophy. Six-time Best of Show winner J.B. Nethercutt, for instance, would have been seven-time Best of Show winner had it not been for a faulty fuel pump on his otherwise exquisitely finished entry. Other tales of woe are as common.

To further Pebble's goal of having runners instead of trailer queens, and just because it's fun, the concours has hosted The Pebble Beach Tour for the last six years. On the Thursday before the main event, entrants are encouraged to show up at the Polo Grounds for a little drive-about 50 miles-up, over and through the hills of the beautiful Monterey Peninsula. The route includes Cannery Row in Monterey, Highway 68 east out of town to Laguna Seca-where they will all do two laps of the course-then south to the twisting, steep haul over daunting Laureles Grade, through downtown Carmel and back to the Polo Grounds.

We got a lift a few years ago (Sept. 4, 2000), being snuck into the rumble seat of a sturdy and sprightly 1924 Wills Sainte Claire owned by concours entrant Stan Lucas, then riding like a dictator in the back seat of his 1929 Lincoln Model L.

"If you scratch the paint, you're fired,'' Lucas said.

We didn't, and it was pretty darned fabulous. A lot of people turn out to watch the cars power by. The route goes through about the entire 17-mile drive, and this year organizers are working out a route that could go directly through downtown Pacific Grove.

There are many places from which you could see the 110 cars scheduled for this year's tour (about half the total entered in Sunday's concours). The best place to view them might be downtown Carmel, where they all stop for lunch. Three of the four lanes of Ocean Drive, Carmel's downtown, are given over to parking for the magnificent beasts. The fourth lane is saved for fire engines and ambulances and the like, so pretty much the whole of downtown Carmel stops and ogles. You can ogle, too. There is no admission and no restrictions, though it is considered bad form to try to pocket a hood ornament.