Car Lamley Group: The Lamley Awards: Reader's Choice for 2012 Hot Wheels Model of the Year is...

Welcome to the final Hot Wheels Reader's Choice Lamley Award for 2012. We have asked you all to participate, and the response has been overwhelming. We have received thousands of votes from all over the world spanning all categories, and have crowned Best and Worst New Models, Best and Worst Super and Regular Treasure Hunts, and best Premium and Collectible Models.

But this is the grand-daddy of them all, the 2012 Hot Wheels Model of the Year. We asked Lamley contributors from all over the world to peruse forums, websites, blogs, and all other mediums to come up with a list of 15 models that garnered more buzz, opinions, and excitement than all the others. The list itself was instantly controversial, but we asked you to vote, both on the Lamley Blog and HWC, and after 646 votes, we have a winner.

But before we get into that, there was something much more interesting than what model actually won. As I mentioned earlier, there were two places to vote - here on Lamley and on HWC, and the results could not have been more different.

Check out these results:

Lamley Blog vote:

Hot Ones '87 Toyota Truck (89/20%)
Racing BMW M3 (67/15%)
$TH/Mainline Ferrari 599XX (59/13%)
(tie) KITT (35/8%)
(tie) Racing Greenwood Corvette (35/8%)
Mystery Machine (23/5%)
$TH/Mainline '71 Challenger (22/5%)
Custom El Camino (21/4%)
Mazda RX-7 (19/4%)
Dan Wheldon DW-1 (17/3%)
Boulevard '77 Firebird (13/2%)
Hot Ones Subaru BRAT (12/2%)
Hot Ones Long Gone (9/2%)
Mad Manga (8/1%)
Racing Silverado (6/1%)

HWC vote:

$TH/Mainline '71 Challenger (39/18%)
Hot Ones Long Gone (21/10%)
$TH/Mainline Ferrari 599XX (20/9%)
(tie) Mystery Machine (17/8%)
(tie) Racing Silverado (17/8%)
(tie) Boulevard '77 Firebird (16/8%)
(tie) Racing Greenwood Corvette (16/8%)
KITT (15/7%)
(tie) Custom El Camino (10/5%)
(tie) Dan Wheldon DW-1 (10/5%)
Hot Ones Subaru BRAT (9/4%)
Racing BMW M3 (7/3%)
(tie) Mad Manga (6/3%)
(tie) Hot Ones '87 Toyota Truck (6/3%)
Mazda RX-7 (2/1%)

Could these results be more different? Look at the Toyota Truck. The runaway winner on the Lamley Blog, and almost last on the HWC poll. The Long Gone mirrors that, finishing near the top on the HWC poll, and near the bottom on the Lamley poll. There are many factors that created that, including geography, a definite "JDM" and international vibe on Lamley, the love of muscle and classic Hot Wheels on HWC, among many others.

If anything, it reflects the worldwide appeal of Hot Wheels, and suggests that the folks in El Segundo are nicely tapped in to what interested consumers and collectors worldwide. The muscle has and will always be a staple, but the emergence of popular international vehicles, including many new Japanese and European castings, expand interest all over. And hopefully that introduces many US collectors to cars they may not have thought much about previously, and does the same for international collectors. In fact, the Lamley Choice for Model of the Year reflected that expansion of car culture knowledge more than any other this year, but we will reveal that model on a future post.

Nonetheless, more than revealing a specific winner, the best thing about doing this poll was the clear evidence that Hot Wheels' worldwide appeal continues to grow, and we all benefit.

Ok, ok, you say. We get it. Let's move on...

With all this mumbo jumbo, how do you determine a winner?

We could go with overall votes. If we did, your Model of the Year is the Hot Ones '87 Toyota Truck, a model definitely worth that distinction. But how do we factor in the fact that it was almost last on HWC?

We could go with overall percentage. If we did, the winner would be the Mainline/Super TH '71 Challenger, another worthy choice. But in the Lamley poll, which had double the total votes, it finished right in the middle of the pack.

So here is what we did. We are by no means statisticians, but we wanted to come up with a formula that represented both polls, and voters around the world. So we factored overall votes, overall percentage, along with final rank on both polls. Using that formula, four models emerged:

Of those four, the one model the ranked high on both polls won out, and is a very deserving winner.

Ladies and Gentlemen, the Lamley Reader's Choice Award for 2012 Hot Wheels Model of the Year is...

...The Mainline/$TH Ferrari 599XX:

And a valid choice it is. When the news broke that the 599XX casting was moving from the Speed Machines

line to the basic range as a mainline AND Super Treasure Hunt, I was clearly not the only person excited. Ferrari is a Hot Wheels staple for both US and international collectors, so the 599XX was an instant hit.

Out of the gate, even the mainline was a tough get. A beautiful Ferrari red, with understated side and hood detailing, as well as appropriate MC5 wheels:

And this was an ever-giving casting, getting the vari nerds (which includes the author) all frenzied with the emergence of an OH5-wheel variation, found mostly in Kroger shippers:

And then there is the Super. I think the Ferrari Super TH epitomizes what Super Treasure Hunts have become, especially in 2012 with the introduction of the Secret Supers. It seemed in the past, Treasure Hunts have been mostly collected because of their rarity and collectibility. There were always a handful of popular castings, but also mixed in were several non-licensed castings that were not collector faves. That surely changed in 2012 with the Secret Supers. Almost all of them were enhanced versions of popular castings, including Mustangs, Camaros, Mopars, Ferrari, and even Japanese cars. Each model looked much more realistic than previous Treasure Hunts, and because they were unmarked, they were even a little easier to find for many of us. There were a lot of very popular Supers in 2012, including the gorgeous '71 Challenger, but ultimately, the cream of the crop is, and in the opinion of many, one of the best Treasure Hunts ever, the Ferrari 599XX:

Many thanks to all of you who participated in the Hot Wheels Lamley Awards. We hope to make it even bigger next year. It was a work in progress, but I think we have it figured out at this point.

Any early predictions on your 2013 choice? Another Super? A New Model? There are lots of options to come...