I like it out here in Tennessee. The people are nicer than in LA (I’m not too friendly myself but nodbody’s perfect) and the landscape is super green everywhere which makes for a much nicer drive than say a drive to Buttonwillow in California where it’s nothing but brown nothingness. Its crazy to see younger guys with import cars talking about JDM this and Buddy Club that in a southern drawl. I never thought I’d see the day where building import cars has become this mainstream. I guess we can thank Nopi and the F&F movies for that.
The Redline Time Attack was actually only half of the event. The other half is a big car show thrown by Import Alliance. The show side is obviously not my scene, but it does bring people to the track which is good enough for me. There are even show Altimas and Maximas running in the street class which is cool. At least they are using their cars and that is after all why you build a car right? There’s more diversity of cars running in the time attack too instead of the 9,000,000 S2ks, EVOs, and STis that run in California.
At 6:45am Tennessee time (4:45am LA time) Mike, Jet, and Ron unload the Sierra Sierra EVO 8 from the trailer. I am sucking on a cancer stick and drinking the buffest coffee from the Hampton Inn while taking this picture.
The track opened at 9am for the first track session. About 9:15am the P&L Motorsports/Takata Time Attack STi had an engine fire and Ron from Sierra Sierra (red shirt) ran to the rescue with a fire extinguisher. Later it was discovered the engine threw a rod (they pitted right next to us) and the P&L guys cranked and swapped in a used stock long block that started up by 4pm. Larry from Sierra Sierra also helped some dude re-weld his downpipe that he had BRAZED in what looked like brass/bronze. People should really do some research before trying to “do it yourself”. Anyhow my point is that the Sierra Sierra team is pretty helpful.
Sharif and his crew from Forged Performance brought out their shop R35 GT-R to run in the modified class. For a car with pretty much bolt ons, a small diet and a ECU remap, it was pretty quick with a 1:08.x lap time.
Dent Sport Garage (DSG) brought out their S13 to compete in RWD Unlimited. I’ve seen pictures of this car and it’s definitely a different kind of build. Crazy looking aero, trippy uh…mounts, and a twin scroll EVO turbo make for a psycho looking unconventionally built S13.
See, I told you the mounts are trippy.
I didn’t get any times on this car, but it has BIG ass meats (BFG R1s) on the rear.
This was my view for most of the day since I was staring at the laptop most of the time. The Forged R35 is on the left and the AMS EVO X is on the right. Peep my fishing hat on the table. I find a fishing hat is the best way to prevent my chrome dome from sunburn.
YEAH! You never see these late 80s Dodge Shelby 2.2L turbos anymore. I think the diversity here is great.
The Sierra Sierra boys had to do some brake master cylinder changes to get some more brake bias adjustability. I never saw the car with the carbon dash off, but the Tilton pedal assemblies with the SSE custom machined mounts are sick. Bomarito was going faster throughout the day with some changes to the car’s setup. Ground clearance is a big issue here at the Nashville Super Speedway with the transitions off and on to the oval. The Cosworth 2.2L 4G63 performed flawlessly throughout the day of course.
This really isn’t typical of Tennessee, but I thought you guys would enjoy the sticker job. Keep in mind its a MkIII Supra while laughing. I think the dude was messing around (I hope).
The two fastest cars as of today are the AMS EVO X with a 1:02.7 and the SSE EVO 8 with a 1:02.8. Pretty damn close huh? Both cars have some more boost to turn up tomorrow. SSE has softer tires to try still. Maybe AMS has some tricks up their sleeve still. I know SSE does. Remember that most of the SSE EVO is mostly black in color. Like Wesley Snipes said, “Always bet on black.”