Three different flavors of 500+ horsepower track machines | #FastFriday

By Colin Wood
Feb 7, 2022 | UTCC, #FastFriday, Ultimate Track Car Challenge

Trying to build the ultimate track machine? What’s your go-to setup: front-wheel drive, rear-wheel drive or all-wheel drive?

As it turns out, there’s no wrong answer, as our first round of entries to the Tire Rack Ultimate Track Car Challenge Presented by Grassroots Motorsports features all three setups.

What is the Tire Rack Ultimate Track Car Challenge? It’s our annual no-holds-barred track competition. The only rules are that car and driver must pass a NASA safety inspection.

Representing front-wheel drive is Chinchi Chiang’s 2017 Honda Civic Type R. With 500 horsepower on tap, it’s easy to see why this Type R is considered “possibly the fastest modern front-wheel-drive Honda track car.”

Sebastian Vasan’s 2019 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 1LE favors the traditional sports car setup: rear-wheel drive. The already-potent-from-the-factory ZL1 has received a number of incremental upgrades, allowing Sebastian to “dial in the car continuously.”

All-wheel drive, the result of trying to maximize performance off the tarmac, is the setup of choice for Ghais Khaleghi’s 2014 Nissan GT-R. Making use of “bolt-ons with an E85 tune,” the GT-R is good for some 700 horsepower.

View these cars, along with the rest of the field, on the UTCC website. If you think you have what it takes to win, enter your car here.

The 2022 UTCC returns to Virginia International Raceway May 13-14 in the center of NASA’s HyperFest weekend.

The Tire Rack Ultimate Track Car Challenge is presented by Grassroots Motorsports in association with Wilwood Engineering, CRC Industries, Deatsch Werks, HP Tuners and SPA Technique, with trophies from BimmerWorld, Track Advantage and Stifflers.

Join Free Join our community to easily find more UTCC, #FastFriday and Ultimate Track Car Challenge news.

Comments

PT_SHO New Reader
2/6/22 7:53 p.m.

That Honda, seems crazy, but it's been done before. I knew a couple of guys in the SHO Club with ~500 FWD HP. You couldn't really use all of it in 2nd gear, much less first. This was the first gen Taurus, pumped up with a Vortech supercharger and several other mods including Quaife differential. (Of course the Honda dragstrip guys are now well beyond that power level....)

My pal Nick was at a track day at Sears (now Sonoma) and the guy in the Porsche ahead of him saw a Taurus coming in his rear view. Apparently couldn't stand the idea of something with 4 doors going past him. (Long before the Panamera of course.) So the guy didn't lift soon enough at the end of the straight after the Carousel, and went off. Now he's not only "embarrassed" but also on the hook and paying for a lot of repairs.

You'll need to log in to post.