After a cold, wet weekend in 2025, Lone Star Throwdown 2026 gave the custom truck world exactly what it had been waiting for: sunshine, warmer Texas weather and three days packed with some of the best builds in the country. Held February 20–22 at the Lone Star Expo Center & Montgomery County Fairgrounds in Conroe, Texas, the 15th Anniversary of Lone Star Throwdown — better known throughout the scene simply as LST — brought builders, clubs, vendors and spectators back together for one of the biggest weekends on the custom truck calendar.
Gauge Magazine photographers Chris Gosda and Cheri Delgadillo were on the grounds capturing the weekend, and it didn’t take long to see how different 2026 felt from the year before. Gates and ticket booths opened at 8 a.m. each day, and by Saturday morning people were already lining up around 7:30. By midday, the grounds were packed with spectators watching, photographing and filming vehicles as they cruised through the show.
Lone Star Throwdown has built its reputation around custom trucks, and there was certainly no shortage of them in Conroe. Lifted Ford Super Duty builds, slammed Chevrolet and GMC pickups, classic C10s, mini-trucks, duallys, SUVs and highly detailed show trucks filled the grounds. But walking LST in 2026 also showed why describing it as only a truck show doesn’t tell the whole story.
Our photographers found restored classic cars, custom imports, hot rods, motorcycles, side-by-sides and off-road builds mixed throughout the weekend. There was even one of the more unusual builds of the show: a custom off-road tractor-style creation using a first-generation Ford Econoline cab.
That variety is part of what continues to make LST worth walking from one end to the other. You can move from a laid-out mini-truck to a towering late-model diesel, then turn a corner and find a traditional hot rod, custom SUV or something you probably weren’t expecting to see at all.
The Lone Star Expo Center & Montgomery County Fairgrounds gives the show room to spread out, and different areas of the grounds developed their own personality throughout the weekend.
The main arena was occupied by American Force Wheels and a hand-picked group of display vehicles. Inside the pavilions, the familiar C10 crowd occupied one half while vehicles from Relaxed Atmosphere filled the other. Displays from Plan B Fab and Nitto Tire added more high-end builds to the mix.
Past the judging lanes, the indoor area gave builders another opportunity to take presentation to a different level. Several vehicles weren’t simply parked and polished. Full displays included custom flooring, lighting, stanchions and carefully arranged presentations designed to make the vehicle itself the centerpiece.
Outside, the show stretched across the fairgrounds with rows of custom vehicles and plenty of movement throughout the day. That’s an important part of the LST experience. This isn’t a show where everything stays frozen in place. Vehicles cruising through the grounds create a constantly changing backdrop, and spectators lining the routes with cameras and phones have become part of the scene themselves.
The overall size of LST is impressive, but some of the best parts of the show reveal themselves when you stop looking at entire vehicles and start looking closer.
Paintwork, billet components, engine bays, suspension fabrication, custom interiors, audio installations and truck-bed treatments showed just how far builders are willing to take a project. Some builds were designed around flawless simplicity. Others were covered in graphics, flames, polished components and details that required several passes around the vehicle to take everything in.
The vendor side of the show followed the same pattern. Anyone building a truck could spend plenty of time looking through wheels, tires, suspension components, billet parts and other hardware, while fabrication and custom shops were on hand talking with owners about future projects. Apparel vendors filled out the mix with shirts, hats, stickers and other show gear.
With this level of competition, earning one of the major LST awards means standing out in a field filled with serious builds. The 2026 awards covered everything from paint, interior and engineering to mini-trucks, lifted trucks, classics and specialty choices.
The biggest award of the weekend, Best of Show, went to Ed Ganzinotti of Montgomery, Texas, with his 1968 Dodge Charger. Terry Rose of Mount Juliet, Tennessee, earned Promoters Choice with a 1959 Chevrolet Suburban, while Scott Luscombe took Best Debut with his 1985 Chevrolet K10.
Other standouts included Larry Gloria’s 1972 Chevrolet C10 for Best Full Size, Robert Smith’s 1967 Chevrolet Nova for Best Classic Car, Carolyn Sonnier’s 1959 Chevrolet Apache for Best Female Owned and Adam Ochoa’s 1968 Lincoln Continental for Best Lowrider. Best Paint went to Marlon Fuselier’s 1955 Chevrolet 3100 pickup, while Ken Tilton’s 1970 Chevrolet C10 earned Best Engine and Mike Lau’s 1970 Chevrolet C10 took Best Interior.
The mini-truck side was well represented too, with Nissan Hardbodys, Chevrolet S10s, Toyota pickups and Tacomas, Mazda B-series trucks and a Nissan Frontier making the Top 10 Minitruck group. Team Billet earned Best Club honors.
Weather can change the entire personality of an outdoor show, and after the cold and rain that hit LST in 2025, the warm and sunny 2026 weekend made a noticeable difference. The grounds stayed busy, spectators came out throughout the weekend and builders finally had the kind of Texas weather everyone had hoped for.
For anyone who has followed Gauge Magazine’s coverage over the years, the growth and evolution of Lone Star Throwdown has been interesting to watch. Check out our Lone Star Throwdown 2025 coverage to see what the show looked like one year earlier, or go farther back with our Lonestar Throwdown 2024 coverage and Lone Star Throwdown 2023 coverage.
LST isn’t slowing down. The next Lone Star Throwdown is scheduled for February 26–28, 2027, once again at the Lone Star Expo Center & Montgomery County Fairgrounds in Conroe, Texas.
If 2026 was any indication, expect another weekend filled with serious custom trucks, new builds making their debut, familiar clubs and shops, and plenty of vehicles that don’t fit neatly into any one category.
Photos by Chris Gosda and Cheri Delgadillo for Gauge Magazine.
Check out the full Gauge Magazine photo gallery below for more custom trucks, mini-trucks, classics, lifted builds, lowered rides, motorcycles, imports and details from LST 2026 in Conroe.
The post Lone Star Throwdown 2026 Brings Custom Trucks and More to Conroe, Texas appeared first on Gauge Magazine.
