Words: Aron Norris | Photography: Jonny Elliott / Danny Honour

The build-up, the anticipation.

So here we are again. Ultimate Dubs: the UK’s premium VW event. Welcome to our UD2017 show coverage. It feels like only 5 minutes ago we were at Telford International Centre for Ultimate Stance in November, which is the "sister event" of this one.

As the first show of the year, UD cuts the show season ribbon for us folks in England and it attracts cars from all over the UK as well as Belgium, France and Germany.

Ultimate Dubs is always eagerly anticipated, simply because it's a perfect platform to see the results of project car winter changes. #udprep.

Some owners change everything, some change absolutely nothing, but regardless of winter plans, ALL of the cars are top quality and definitely among the best in Europe.

The stage is set.

As you walk into the halls at the Telford International Centre, the air is filled with that ubiquitous Ultimate Dubs scent. A combination of fresh paint and leather, quick detailer, tyre shine and RollHard bubble gum air fresheners fill the halls. The anticipation builds, the automotive exotica awaits...

At this event, automotive perfection is the aim. It's often easy to overlook the details at an outside show, but at Ultimate Dubs, your eyes are drawn to body-lines, materials and textures...

Smooth paint is followed up with the odd styling cue in carbon, and leather teamed with alcantara. If you want ideas and inspiration, UD is definitely not a bad place to find yourself.

All of the big Automotive brands are here with their latest and greatest creations. With companies like Rotiform, Stillstatic, Gepfeffert, Auto Finesse, Meguiars, Car Audio Security and Riiva around, a high standard of trade stand demo cars is pretty much guaranteed.

We loved seeing the owners club area, respect for restoring a mk1 to better than factory...

If UD is anything to go by, the UK is definitely not in a recession, it's hard to tell which cars are company demos and which are owned by forex-trader playboys. It's nice to see the show car quality being raised year-on-year, this industry is going from strength to strength.

On paper, this is a VAG-only event. In reality, it isn't, which is great news if you hate VWs, but if, like us, you are slightly partial to the odd VAG-family car, then you will find some amazing examples here. If you prefer your VWs with a BMW badge, you'll love our "Part Two" show content, which presents the non-VAG metal and is coming soon to these pages.

On the RollHard stand, we tried our best to stick to the formula. We had the pleasure of Brad's Mk1 Passat B1, Jack's Mk1 Golf (as seen on these pages and in PVW recently) and Maarten's Porsche 964. We did try.

Taking a walk around the show revealed some seriously beautiful metal...

Like most shows, the car park is a great place to find a few hidden gems...

Oh, the drama.

2017… the year of not taking things too seriously… yeah right!

If there was ever any doubt that this year’s event was going to pass without any drama, that was, shall we say, "seen to" by Carl Taylor and Jay McToldridge with their controversial “big reveal” of Steve “Fish” Fraser’s Audi S3 saloon on the Thursday before the show.

We're not sure why, but Facebook found itself in a frenzied social media meltdown. It's one way to get people talking, I guess. We don't care, his car is absolute fire...

A word to the wise...

Just remember, build your car for you and no-one else. You can't please all the people, all of the time, so let's get along and enjoy this game for what it is. Express yourselves and support others doing the same.

The scene isn't dead, we're only getting started. We are RollHard.