Records, Wins and a little clag….

Fast rising grassroots drifter Vitaly Sopkin took 2nd overall at Round 1 of Xtreme Drift Circuit. Vitaly runs a 30-6100, AEM 3.5 BAR MAP sensor and IAT sensor in his 2JZGTE-equipped Nissan S13.

In Round 2 in Las Vegas, Vitaly finished 7th out of 42 competitors. Check out the Great 8 round videos below:

Vitaly leading Garret Nikolich

Vitaly following Garret

Not a bad start to the season as he works his way toward earning an FD license. Vitaly said the car is running strong with the Series 2 EMS and with the addition of new front tires and a fatter sway bar “it feels like it drives istelf!” Who you kidding Vitaly? No car drives itself that well! Great control and we look forward to hearing from you after Round 3!

Road Atlanta is recognized as one the world’s best road courses. It is also the Series birthplace nine years ago with a section exclusively designed just for Formula Drift.

With a strong start to the season in Round 1 Long Beach, Millen and the RMR Crew were confident in the Hyundai Genesis Coupe performing flawlessly all weekend long after testing the week before.

Millen was set to place 4th overall in qualifying after two of his best looking laps ever at Road Atlanta, but a decision by Formula Drift Officials to award “SPEED” points to other drivers ultimately pushed Millen back to 11th for Saturdays TOP 32.

An undaunted Millen battled through the Top 32 and Top 16 rounds during Saturday’s main event, pairing against fellow Hankook Tires driver Fredric AasboIn the Great 8. After a mirror run by both drivers, a “One More Time” was not given from the crowd’s request to the Judges and the win awarded to Aasbo.

Overall RMR would finish 5th for the weekend and awarded valuable points pushing the team into 4th in points overall in the fight for the championship.

The Formula DRIFT Pro Championship continues with Round 3: Invasion at West Palm Beach International Raceway on June 1-2, 2012. Check out the video on the video on The Gainseville Times website!

Fredric Aasbo scored a career-best second-place finish in the Need for Speed/Papadakis Racing Scion tC this weekend, moving the driver into the top-three in the Formula Drift standings. Aasbo was a contender from the start, scoring a strong, third-place qualifying position on Friday — even as other drivers struggled to find their rhythm on the fast and technical Road Atlanta course.

“The car and the team are dialed,” said Aasbo, who is driving his second full season in the U.S. with Papadakis Racing. “We have the podium in our sights at every round.”

Racing under the lights for a packed crowd Saturday evening, Aasbo put in a series of excellent drives to advance through the field — including a spectacular Final 4 battle that saw him running virtually blind through clouds of tire smoke from Japanese veteran Daigo Saito.

“The smokescreen can get so thick when you’re chasing another car that you can’t see anything,” said Aasbo. “The only way to win is to stay committed and get close enough to see taillights; it’s a battle I’m really proud of and the crowd loved it.”

The Need For Speed/Papadakis Racing Scion tC produces more than 600 horsepower from its high-revving turbocharged, four-cylinder engine and shoots flames through an exhaust pipe routed through the hood.

It’s an atypical set-up in a field that has made the move toward big-muscle V8 power, but team owner Stephan Papadakis is accustomed to being on the vanguard and he said the result proves the competitiveness of their approach.

“You could see from the first day this weekend that we’ve built a strong team and vehicle package with our Scion tC and Hankook RS3 tires,” said Papadakis. “Our goal this season is the championship and we’re on track to achieve it.”

Aasbo, the 2010 “Rookie of the Year,” returns to the Formula DRIFT championship in 2012 for only his second full season of American competition. He closed out his debut Formula DRIFT season at the end of last year in 12th overall.

Aasbo will next travel to China, where he will take on some of the best drivers in Asia at the World Drifting Series. His next U.S. competition is Round 3 of the 2012 Formula Drift Championship in Palm Beach, Florida, June 1 – 2.

OK, if we ever get a pickup game of hoops going I want Aasbo. The other team can have Hillier. Seriously, you couldn’t get a credit card under his feet!

Got a message from Paul and the guys at Dynamic Performance that Rolando qualified #2 and Allan (driving Paul’s car) qualified #3 out of an 18 car field in the SFWD class last weekend at the 16th Annual Spring Nationals at E-Town. Check out the attendance! Starting to look like the good old days are new again…

This is what Paul had to say: “Sport Compact Drag Racing in the Northeast is back! The event was packed and our class was another full field! There were 18 cars trying to qualify for 16 spots in our SFWD (Sport Front Wheel Drive) class. Rolando qualified number two with a 9.1 @ 169 MPH and Allan (driving my car) qualified number three with a 9.2 @ 152 MPH. It was an extremely fast field, and once again we were near the top spots. In eliminations, Rolando could not make first round because we lifted the head during the last qualifying pass. Allan made it to the semi-finals but he missed third gear.”

Congrats to Dynamic Performance for another fast showing and strong representation.

Bisi’s One of a Kind, 1,004 WHP Civic Si is still capturing the attention of media worldwide. Look to his recent cover story in Europe’s Total Honda Magazine as evidence! Way to keep racking up the accolades Bisi! And well deserved.

Some of you may be asking when it’s going to make a pass. Bisi told us that track testing is coming very soon as the team is ready to drop in a new gearbox and larger injectors, which should also allow for more power.

If you are on the West Coast, you can see this freak of engineering in the flesh–er steel, at the upcoming Motion Car Show in Long Beach, CA on Sunday, May 20th.

Rhys tearing it up in the Philippines.

The Berk Technology team headed out to Buttonwillow this past weekend for the Global Time Attack season opener with its BMW 135i aiming to set records. Armed with a full complement of AEM Performance Electronics the BMW pulled double duty competing in both the Limited RWD and Street RWD classes. The team was more than pleased with the results, as they not only took home first place trophies in both classes, but set new class records in the process.

Running the car in two different tire classes posed unique challenges to the team as they would have to run their turbocharged BMW in back to back sessions in temperatures nearing 100 degrees. The car relies heavily on the AEM Water/Methanol injection kit to keep intake air temps and detonation in check during their record breaking runs in the heat.

“It is hard enough on the car to run at record pace for an entire weekend and the hot weather we saw this weekend made matters worse. The track surface temps were nearing 140 degrees making our air to air intercooler ineffective once it heat soaked. The chemical intercooling effect of the AEM Water/Meth system allows us to run nearly unaffected by the heat and we are making safe power regardless of the weather.” – Bryan M. – Crew Chief, BerkTechnology

The Berk Technology BMW135i runs the following AEM Performance Electronics Products:
AEM Water/Meth Injection Kit – 30-3000
AEM Water/Meth Failsafe Device – 30-3020
AEM Needle Gauges –Boost, Water Temp, Oil Temp, Oil Pressure, & Air Fuel Ratio

1:56.591 lap time on Hankook’s RS3 street tire in the Street RWD Class
1:52.487 lap time on Hankook’s Ventus TD tire in the Limited RWD Class

Congrats to the Berk Technology team and driver Carl Rydquist for a record setting performance! That’s what cool under pressure is all about–like a fine water/meth injection down a boosted inlet pipe. Looking forward to the next event!

You have to love running 6s with 125 cubic inches. Bob and Tony Niemczyk ran a personal best 6.92 @ 195MPH at the NHRA 4 Wide Nationals at Zmax Dragway in Charlotte, NC.

Check out the run here:

The team had just finished installing the 4-Channel Wideband UEGO Controller for individual cylinder tuning. Here’s what Tony had to say:
“We went racing this past weekend at the NHRA 4-Wide Nationals at zMAX Dragway in Charlotte. First run off the trailer we had the launch tuned fairly conservatively just to make a good pass and get a feel for the track. The car went a blistering 6.92 at 195 MPH! That’s both a new best ET and MPH for the car. After the run, I downloaded the data from the AQ-1 Data logger and checked out my new wideband data. Our AEM Series 2 EMS holds a phenomenal tune the whole run with all 4 widebands basically laying directly on top of each other. I also checked out the back pressure values thanks to the new back pressure sensor and discovered that we’re well below a 1:1 ratio even at our power level with this 76mm BorgWarner turbocharger. All incredible data thanks to the AEM 4 Channel wideband kit and AQ-1 Data Logger.”

Unfortunately, a crack in the torque converter prior to the first round ended their day, but the guys got a lot of valuable engine data while also setting a new personal best. Congratulations Bob and Tony! We look forward to catching up with you in May after the Lucas Oil Series race in Maple Grove PA, May 25-27.

Watch more videos of the 4G-powered Niemczyk Dragster

(Some eye candy from the Indy race, below)

This Mustang GT is owned by Cal Hayward. It was tuned by LambdaTuner in Southern Michigan, and put out 1020 HP on 93 pump gas on the dyno…

…then broke off an 8.86 @ 153.64 in track testing.

The car has full interior, power windows, locks, mirrors, carpeting, rear seat, sound deadener, etc. There’s also a full exhaust under the car to keep the noise at bay which is important since the car is driven to & from the track.

Electronics include an AEM Series 2 box with a custom LambdaTuner engine harness, custom chassis harness, AIS methanol injection, AEM Peak & Hold injector driver box, Coil on Plug ignition, LambdaTuner crank sensor & wheel, AEM Wideband UEGO driver and a Racepak digital dash.

A 429 cubic inch Dart block powers this GT. This new motor has TEA ported TrickFlow-R heads, hard parts & cam from Steve Morris Racing Engines, a new twin-turbo setup with Turbonetics 76mm turbos and a new Reid Racing SFI case Powerglide.

Check out the dyno chart and engine pics, and follow the car this season at Lambdatuner.com. Very nice work gentlemen.

Got an email with some pics from Paul at Dynamic Performance in NJ from Honda Day at Atco. It was a sold out event for both spectators and racers! His crew had two cars qualify in SFWD (Rolando Blanco in his 95 Si at #2 and Allan Jiminez in Paul’s 97 EX at #5) and they ran consistent 9.0s all weekend. A deep stage in the finals is the only thing that kept them from the win.

Check out this string of ET/MPH:
9.0 @ 175
9.0 @ 174
9.0 @ 172
9.1 @ 156 (lifted)

Paul says: “We’ve used AEM products since we opened our shop back in June of 2006. We
only promote AEM and we sell them on our online store as well.”

You can catch them at Atco and MIR this season. Props to Dynamic for representing strong and with class! Best of luck to you all this season.