From the late 1990’s and into the early 2000’s, import drag racing was being touted as the next big thing in drag racing, perhaps destined to singlehandedly carry the sport into the future. The Fast and the Furious films were all the rage, and America’s youth were shifting away from traditional domestic performance cars in favor of those from makers like Honda and Toyota, en masse. The market seemed ripe for the picking — and it was, for a brief period — as NOPI and the NHRA both got in on the action, each creating touring sport compact organizations that they believed would one day define the import movement and the very core of the sport.
By the late 2000’s, however, interest and participation had begun to wane, and it was evident that import racing was not the second-coming of the hot rodding craze as previously envisioned. The NHRA Sport Compact series closed its doors, and NOPI transitioned back to car show — or ‘lifestyle’ — events. But just because import drag racing didn’t live up to the sky-high expectations, that didn’t mean it just went away altogether. Rather, it simply retreated back into more modest quarters, filling a much-needed niche in our sport.
Today, import racing serves as a part of a larger whole, much like nostalgia and street legal drag racing. And there’s nothing wrong with that, because as we’ve seen, the segment has made greater in-roads with drag racing purists — who were adamantly defiant of accepting the sport — in the years since the fall of the import craze.
Perhaps none made a bigger impression than Florida-based Titan Motorsports, who, after being displaced from their former home in the import ranks, turned their attention to the American Drag Racing League’s Extreme 10.5 category with their six-cylinder, Toyota 2JZ-powered Toyota Scion in the late 2000’s. With Gary White at the controls, the Titan clan more than earned the respect of their peers, running in the three-second zone and challenging not only for race victories, but series championships.
Today, import racing serves as a part of a larger whole, much like nostalgia and street legal drag racing. And there’s nothing wrong with that.
Today, the most elite import-powered cars in the world are hot on the tails of their domestic counterparts, with elapsed times in the low six-second zone. Just recently, Kuwait native Ebrahim Kanoo’s Outlaw Supra — also with Gary White driving — reeled off an out-of-this-world 6.05 on 10.5W slicks, marking the new performance standard for import vehicles. When you consider that the world record on 10.5W’s stands at 5.94 — with a big block, twin-turbocharged car — that’s mighty impressive no matter what your outlook on imports is.
But thanks to performances like these that are quickly approaching the magical five-second zone, the import niche is once again drawing attention — and respect — from around drag racing. And the fact that a number of nations are locked into a tightly-contested, seesaw battle for performance supremacy and the honor of recording the first “five” has only made import racing all the more intriguing to the masses.
Racers from the United States, Australia, and the Middle East are all trading blows, and when you can get those kinds of rivalries going, you’re sure to ratchet up the intensity and the interest a few notches. It’s a win-win for import drag racing, and it’s gone a long way toward the Honda and Toyota racers of the world gaining equal acceptance.
Our parent company, Power Automedia, a traditionally domestic automotive media company, will soon be branching into the import scene with the launch of a new publication, known as Revved, which among other forms of import-based competition, will feature import drag racing events and machinery in-depth. This association will allow us to include more content from the import niche here on Dragzine. Because after all these years, and all the performance gains they’ve made, imports embody drag racing every bit as much as something that has eight cylinders and burns nitromethane. It’s not the savior, but it’s certainly here to stay. And if they keep pushing the envelope, they’ll be here to play, too.