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The field itself is empty, with the exception of the center-field bandstand that has been set up for the ZZ Top rock concert that starts at 8 p.m. Saturday. Some 40,000 Corvette fanatics are expected to attend. Many of them, including Larry Hoaldridge of Forth Worth, have been here since late Thursday afternoon, unloading or parking their vintage Corvettes in the stadium's parking lots -- polishing their cars and waiting for the spectators to arrive.

Hoaldridge trucked in his 1956 Aztec Copper and Shoreline Beige Corvette convertible, which he found in "horrible, horrible condition," but painstakingly rebuilt in 1973.

"It's a garage queen," Hoaldridge said. "I don't drive it long distances. It won't take that."

But some 5,000 attendees drove their Corvettes -- vintage 1953 polo white models, of which only 300 were made, and sparkling new C5 and Z06 Corvettes -- from all over the United States. They were part of the celebratory Nashville Cruize, which began pulling into the Coliseum this morning.

Some of the older cars struggled to get here on their own. Parking lot talk was filled with stories about engines overheating in 90-degree weather and other mechanical difficulties. But the stories were told more with bravado than chagrin. They were war stories, glory tales told and heard by comrades in wheels.

For Hoaldridge, his trip here actually began in the late 1960s.

"I was chasin' girls," he said in an accent filled with the heart of Texas. "It was all about the girls, man.

"I had a motorcycle and a friend who had a Corvette. Sometimes, we swapped. He used my bike and I drove his 'Vette. The girls always came around me when I was in the 'Vette. It started from there," Hoaldridge said.

His girl-chasing strategy worked.

"Oh, I guess it was about in 1969," Hoaldridge said. "I was layin' on top of the hood of a black Corvette, and these girls just kept circlin' and circlin' 'round. I told them that they needed to stop circlin' and park that car."

The girls parked. One of them was Sylvia, Hoaldridge's wife of more than 30 years. Sylvia is a former secretary for an oil company. Hoaldridge still commutes from Fort Worth to his job as a firefighter with the Dallas Fire Department.

But the two of them spend most of their spare time "racin' and fixin'" Corvettes. It's a love thing -- a seemingly irrational affection for fiberglass, two-seat car bodies and mighty powerful engines shared by five generations of Corvette buyers and owners.

And so thousands of them have rolled in here this weekend -- trading stories and Corvette buttons, buying Corvette auto parts and apparel, showing off their cars, driving up and down Nashville's streets, listening to music, line dancing, and generally just having one hell of a good time.

It will all be over after the ZZ Top concert ends at about 10 p.m. Saturday. That is, the 50th anniversary celebration will be over. But if you believe people like Hoaldridge, the love will go on.

"It's in the blood," he said. "It's in the blood."

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