Network
Friday
Today we get started with 6.0 index and Mr. PTC Kenny Ford who will make up half of the first pair out this morning. Ford is a longtime racer and huge supporter of DuckX Productions events from the early days. We will have overcast skies today which will help keep the track in prime condition for qualifying.
Eric Kvilhaug is the new pilot of the Dragzine Corvette and is in the process of purchasing the car from James Lawrence. Eric and James are longtime friends so the deal was a good match for both of them. Eric got started on the west coast on not the most radial-friendly of tracks so it was a little rough getting started to figure the power management, first taking power out and now putting it back in here at Lights Out 10. James and the crew have been right there with anything needed to ensure a smooth transition to the new owner.
The car will be campaigned in current trim and look through the year. The team did an engine swap here after hurting number one cylinder and will make repairs to the engine as soon as time allows as it was much quicker to swap in the backup, which is an identical engine. Eric plans to step it up today with an eye on 3.70s after qualifying Thursday with a 3.87 at 196, good for the 22nd spot.
“I left the laptop in the trailer yesterday knowing I would want to make changes after watching everyone running .60’s and 70’s, and as fast as they want to go, nobody was spinning but I just need to get down and get on the board. I have a fresh motor in the car so now that we have that out of the way we’re going to turn it up and keep plucking away at it.” Eric said.
This will be the only east coast race planned and the team will travel back home and compete in Boddie’s No Time Big Tire series, some West Coast Hot Rod and at the end of the year do the SCSN in Vegas. Kvilhaug’s Drilling and Pump Inc. is the family business and installs residential and commercial wells and pumps in northern California.
We dropped by the Quartuccio pits this morning to check on the team and spoke with engine builder Chris Laquerre from C&S Racing. Ken stepped it up for the 2019 season in his Outlaw 632 Camaro with a new design engine combo based around Edelbrock’s new BB3 heads from BES. The head was developed by Edelbrock and Tony Bischoff at BES and sits on top of a Chuck Newton billet block. The cam is a custom designed 65mm core from Cam Motion with a Jesel steel rocker valvetrain. The intake and nitrous is from Wilson as well as the throttle bodies with a FuelTech engine management system. The engine made 1450 horsepower on the dyno and 1200 RWHP on FuelTech’s hub dyno. They are starting out with a .036 jet at 2600 pounds but are still a little heavy right now. Ken made one pass on Thursday running a 4.35 at 165.
Chris has been in business for 13 years officially and did after-hours work at home for three or four years before pulling the trigger on a full service engine shop. He works closely with BES and Kip from Cam Motion and is based in Gonzales, Louisiana. Chris worked with the former owner of the Camaro, Jim Jarrett, who campaigned the car in NMCA Nostalgia Pro Street and was recommended by Jim to continue the engine program with Ken after the purchase, which worked out very well through the years. Ken is qualified eighth right now in Radial vs the World with his “Serial Killer” Corvette. Pictured at left are Ken and Denise Quartuccio.
We’re always on the lookout for new cars and ran across this 1978 Fairmont “Lead Sled” wagon this morning driven by Lea Ochs. This is Lea’s first time racing here at SGMP and first time in Ultra Street. The team is based in Dallas, Texas with Northstar Dragway their home track. They ran Drag Week with the car last year and are part of the All Out Live Call Out TV show starting in November last year. The engine combo is new for Ultra Street and somewhat of a last minute combination with out-of-the-box Trick Flow heads from Summit Racing and the new engine installed just before coming here in what Lea described as a “mad thrash.” The combo uses a Dart block and a class legal 76 MM cast wheel turbo and a Brian Tooley Racing cast intake manifold and camshaft. Ochs Performance in an LS based engine shop run by Gary Ochs who has over twenty years of experience in the European car market as a repair shop. In 2013 Ochs built the first Lead Sled and that led to opening the new LS based engine shop in Plano, Texas.
“I grew up in a racing family at the race track watching my step dad race and as we got older and he moved over to the crew chief side and two of my brothers started racing bikes and progressed into cars and we were following my brother around with the No Prep circuit and I told my husband I think I would like to get in, so that’s what we did and we built the first Lead Sled and did that for a while and then I wrecked it in Ennis in 2017.” Lea told us. The crash was pretty bad, totaling the car and sending Lea to the hospital with a concussion and bruised bone in her arm. It was not long after her recovery that a new car was sourced and a new build was under way, scrapping the nitrous combo and going turbocharged. Hazzard Fab did the roll cage on the car with most of the build done in house at Ochs. Sonnax is a major sponsor and provides the transmission internals with Mr. Wendell’s Motorsports doing the transmission builds with Pro Torque converters transferring the power back. 2JMFAB does a lot of the chassis work with John Minzenmayer doing the tuning on the car. Temple, Texas based J&M painted the car. Pictured from left to right: John Minzenmayer, Lea and Gary Ochs.
Chris Perry from Clearwater, Florida is running here for the first time and his first time in Limited Drag Radial. he usually runs Heavy Street Bradenton and Orlando. The car is a twin turbo combo with a Nelson Competition engine that has been in the 4.40 range. He qualified with a 4.73 at 153 yesterday but the car didn’t back half well on the run. Data showed some tuning adjustments were needed for weather conditions so they will make adjustments for today after finishing up with morning maintenance.
One feature here is the VIP tent for racers and fans providing breakfast and food throughout the day for busy racers and hungry fans. Stop in and grab a bit or take a few minutes off your feet to relax out of the sun and share family time with random strangers and friends. Now ten years in here at SGMP many of us feel like it's one big extended family gathering for folks you may only see the two or three times a year.
One of the more interesting cars here this weekend is the White Rice Nissan 240 SX entered in X275. It's powered by a billet block 2JZ Toyota engine from Arrow Machine in Brenham, Texas using a Mazworks block and 88 MM Forced Induction turbo this weekend backed by an M&M transmission and converter. The team has two engines and this is the tamer version. The car is driven by Zack Park and owned by Duy Bui based out of Houston, Texas from Prospeed Autosports. They run no prep and select import events such as the World Cup at Maryland International Raceway. The chassis was built by Fabian Bell at JG Civil Contractors with the rear ladder bar suspension done by Rick Stevens. The car is tuned by using a Motech system with Chris Delgado on the keyboard. The car is the world's fastest 240 and has run a best of 4.36 at 172 in the eighth and 6.66 at 214 out the back door using the better engine and a 102 MM turbocharger. The goal is 4.25 int eh eighth and the team will work on achieving that here this weekend.
Jamie Stanton downsized his engine to small block size for 2019 looking to take advantage of weight reduction and lower torque in an effort at consistency in hot tracks with the torque arm style suspension. The weight difference is right around five hundred and fifty pounds. The combo is a twenty three degree head combo built by Jake Holdridge with heads and intake manifold from Uratchko Racing Engines. Stanton also switched from a TH 400 to a Powerglide transmission “It's fared pretty well so far, we went 4.49 at 156 so far, we will get after it this afternoon and see if we can get back to where we used to be.” Stanton said. “It's just a different thing, I wanted to try something different. We have been doing the same thing for twenty some years, I've always had a big block I wanted to challenge us a little bit and see if we can run up front with a small block.” The team is based out of Syracuse, NY and started racing on radials around 2012. Jamie Stanton (at left) and Jake Holdridge pictured
Mike Decker III is competing here for the first time in Radial vs the World driving the Decker/Mobley Racing Corvette. The team competed here several years ago when the Outlaw 10.5 class was featured here and since they have also made the switch to radials last year decided to give it a shot and make the trip south. He qualified with a 3.77 yesterday, the car’s best pass to date. On the wrong tires the best the car ran was a 3.92 with Decker telling us the main difference is “The tire, the tire is that good.” The rules difference from Outlaw 10.5 is about two hundred pounds and the team is still working on the tuning package but making strides in the performance. Plans for 2019 include the Sweet 16 and Woostock and maybe a couple of local races and be back down here. Interestingly the team will not be competing at Cecil due to some particular circumstances that we won’t go into here but racers and fans are well aware of. No love lost seems an appropriate comment.
2018 X275 Champion John Keesey had to make a few small changes to the car to comply with the 2019 X275 rules package regarding throttle body placement due to an individual campaigning against an inconsequential issue on Keesey’s car. There are some hard feelings bouncing around over the issue but it’s likely to make zero difference on the performance of the car at the end of the day. “We made the change requested and a lot of the racers know the issue so, when he read this…this one’s if for you buddy.” an unapologetic Keesey told us. The car passed tech with flying colors and is powered by a 380 cubic inch Bennett Racing SBF tuned by KBX’s Justin McChesney using a Haltech 2500T ECU, a Forced Inductions turbo provides the boost backed by an ATF Speed transmission and converter. The cars wiring was done by Troy Baum at Race Wires in PA. Justin and the KBX crew will be going over the car today to ensure everything is as it needs to be. He lost two runs this week after a water leak and fuel pump sheared the drive mandrel so only has one 330′ run so far but it was on par with expectations.
Mike Riechers is here with R&R Racing Products and has a booth in the manufacturers midway displaying an array of the companies connecting rods and dry sump oil pumps along with a few other parts. The company is a family business that recently relocated to Punta Gorda, Florida from Gran Park, Illinois after his father founded the company in 1982. At first is was factory style machining and manufacturing then in 1992 they started making connecting rods and grew from there. R&R also recently purchased a Mountain Motor Pro Stock shop that was getting out of the business and brought that equipment down to Florida so offers engine building as well for a few popular engine styles as they seek to expand that part of the operation.
The Outlaw 632 has grown slowly and organically the past few years and is proving some exciting racing for lower budget teams with some older Top Sportsman and fast index cars coming in the group. We spotted Ryan Hallmark’s clean 55 Chevy in the lanes and had a quick chat. The car is powered by Howton Automotive built 632 ci Chevy on one kit using a Speedtech system. The car was purchased out of Birmingham, Alabama and came with a 748 inch engine which was pulled and swapped out with the 632 to compete in the class with the big engine finding it’s way in the teams grudge car. Ryan has competed here before in the Joker’s Wild winning 6.0 index here in September last year. Ryan and partners founded Rock N Roll Sushi in Mobile, Alabama which is now a growing franchise from Texas to north Florida with thirty-one locations.
Ryan was a commercial pilot who was working patient transport for University of Alabama Hospital when they started the franchise and quickly was running up hours in the restaurant business and and moved away from from being a pilot. “Outlaw 632 seemed like a real even keel class to get into with different weight and nitrous systems, with one or multiple kits, like a cast intake single system car car run at 2,450 pounds where we are. Gardendale Performance helps me out on a lot of the parts and suspension tuning and coaching from them, we get our nitrous from Angus Racing and met a lot of really good people who are supportive of our program. I have to thank my girlfriend Elizabeth for really being instrumental in my racing program through think and thin along with Scott Garner.” Ryan was racing 6.0 index before purchasing this car and will be running the 68 Camaro on 28’s at some No Time/Grudge events. The crew thrashed this month to install the engine and totally rewire the car to make this event. Ryan is pictured with his girlfriend Elizabeth Wesson.
Ron Belcher runs his dark red Corvette in Ultra Street and in NMCA. He switched to a supercharger from nitrous at the end of 2017 and spent most of 2018 working on that combo getting the car and engine to work together. He says they are close to getting that worked out with the performance coming around to competitive ET’s. The engine in an LS NEXT block topped with All Pro heads and a Wilson manifold with machine work done by BES and assembled by Kenny Johnson from RPM Transmissions who maintain the car for Ron. It has the full complement of RPM love and care with the build being done in house at RPM. Ron purchased this as a bone stocker with 17,000 miles on it and was bit by the racing bug after the first engine mod to the car and it’s been downhill ever since from driver to hot rod and now a full blown race car.
Justin Martin in the LDR record holder and plans a full season in LDR looking for the championship this year. He faced a hard year in 2018 with a late season charge that wasn’t quite good enouigh for the crown. He changed a few things over the winter and has run a 4.09 this weekend, just off his record. The team is looking for some day time data to tune it up and prepare for eliminations. He did wheelie the car pretty hard last night damaging some suspension components on the return to earth requiring some over night shipping from The Brake Man Jason Smith, TRZ Motorsports and Barry Lutz. “ Barry is very good friends with Todd Brasch from TRZ and between them and Jason Smith they got me all the parts I needed to fix the car and we threw some new MT fronts one and here we are. Mark Menscer and John Mellon come by to check the alignment for me and we’re ready to send it.” Look for Martin to race hard for the points in LDR this year against Daniel Pharris and Shane Stack and who ever else shows up in the hunt for the 2019 LDR Championship.
John Pryor has this Mustang based out Louisville, Kentucky and will be running X275 this year and running 26 in tire no time classes around Michigan. The car was built by Bivens Race Cars and is a 25.3 spec chassis. The engine is a bit unique, a Ford Windsor style bottom end topped with Hammerhead Performance Hemi heads. A custom design hemi head designed to bolt in a small block Ford. The engine is backed by a 2 speed TH 400 from Bilbrey Racing Transmissions and force fed by a Forced Inductions 88 MM turbo, the car is stopped by The Brake Man brakes. Pryor uses UPR Suspension and World Products engine blocks. Prior ran a 4.57 today and it pecking away at the car looking for ET and to keep the front end on the ground.
Chad Henderson is a long time participant here and has stepped up his performance recently running a 4.13 this week, a new best for Chad. He now as a Reher Morrison engine in the car and Steve Jackson has been helping out since Monty has passed away. “ Steve has been helping me out and we have a good crew behind us, the motor is running good, the car is healthy and working good, Chris Terry put a good car together for me. We are looking forward to running the LDR series this year and showing them we can compete with a nitrous combo.” – Chad Henderson
Buddy Fleenor “The Hillbilly Outlaw” is here running in OL 632 with Mike Wolf as driver, engine builder, chassis tuner and setter upper. The car maintained out of Wolf’s shop with the team running two Jerry Haas cars out of the shop. This Chevy Lumina which runs 4.40 Index and OL 632 this weekend and the other car running 4.70 Index. Wolf has been a 4.59 in testing here but spun the tires on their sole qualifying attempt. Engine machine work is by DJ’s Performance with Jerry’s Automotive in Moorestown, Tennessee on board as a major sponsor. Superior Septic and Fleenor Industrial Storage are also sponsors for the team. The team has a Hillbilly Nation following and will soon have a web presence on Facebook. Fleenor and Wolf have been best of friends for over twenty five years racing together as teenagers in brackets then getting into heads up and Index racing the last three or four years. Shown from left to right, Mike Wolf and Buddy Fleenor.
Kevin Rivenbark is on fire this weekend representing for team Galot and Pro Line Racing leading the field in Radial vs the World with a 3.613, a new RVW record. He has improved his performance repeatedly this weekend and looking for a win here at Lights Out 10. We had a chat with Eric Dillard from Pro Line Racing and discussed an assortment of things. Rivenbark’s last pass in qualifying was a .919, 2.41, 3.613 at 205 MPH, matching his Pro Mod ET from the US Street Nationals in Bradenton at the end of January. The team has worked very hard on the car and engine combo to achieve what they have in a short time, installing this new combo late last year.
“We always have said the tires are equal on a well prepped track for the tire, and a well prepped car. We did a .61 in Bradenton and now a .61 here after swapping tires to the radial, it’s like deja vu., it’s just crazy man. If you have the best of both conditions both tires can put up the number. The air is not as good as it was in Bradenton… that was a lot of what it had, they threw everything at it and it took it all. The Procharger deal is so new for us, it was kind of a dream and to see it all come together like this and be consistent and be able to team up with a great group like Galot Motorsports and watch all these guys do their job, is surreal man, it’s awesome.” said Dillard.
PLR has been in the game for a while now and made a great reputation for top performance and hard work. Proline was an early sponsor coming on board for the first event so many years ago and continued to support the series and racers. “I am proud for Donald and he does such a good job promoting and he has worked so hard for our sport and allows vendors like us to come out and make a living at what we’re doing, I appreciate Donald for what he does, and everybody here should. He works his but off for these events, he creates a desire for people to want to be at this race. I say no body is the best, but he is one of the best at what he does and I am proud that we are able to be out here and to compete on this level. This has been kind of a pet project for me, I took a risk to do this without anybody’s blessing and I knew, at the end of the day it’s a team. It’s something so different we weren’t sure what was going to happen, we were pushed by a few people, James Lawrence being one and I will always say that because he helped us open the door. It’s just cool, it’s something I never thought we’d do with the Procharger and here we are two years later with a top contending car. I feel like I am just a small part of it cause there is a lot of really good people that work inside our group and do what we do and everybody has their hands in it, from every aspect, along with everybody at Procharger, it’s just awesome.” – Eric Dillard, PLR. Pictured from left to right: Bud Hodge, Bently Dillard. Eric Dillard, Brandon Stroud, Kevin Rivenbark, Chris Foster and Steve Petty.
Final Qualifying
As of 11:30 PM Friday night Radial vs the World and X275 are the only two completed classes. Due to approaching potential poor weather conditions Sunday we will move into eliminations Saturday morning in an effort to complete the event. We will have final qualifying sheets for the rest of the classes posted in the morning.
