Last weekend marked the first Optima Ultimate Street Car Challenge in Las Vegas, aside from the invitational held after SEMA. This event was number three of ten in the series and was held at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, a mecca of fuel burning fun in the Las Vegas area.

Driving to Vegas is always an exciting trip, since it’s only about four hours away. For roughly three solid hours it’s nothing but bushes, dirt, and rocks. Then you start to see the faint glow of city lights on the horizon – a few more miles and turns, Las Vegas comes into view with an overabundance of lights, hotels, and fun. But we weren’t there for glitz and glamour, we were there for horsepower and burnt rubber.

Saturday’s Action

Saturday started bright and early with tech inspections, driver meetings and walking of the courses. The autocross and the speed/stop challenge were next to each other, with a K-Rail enclosed walkway between the two which was great for spectating.

The Detroit Speed and Engineering autocross was a challenging course, with lots of switchbacks just trying to get the ass end of cars to spin around for them. The course was spread out over a large parking lot, making it a faster paced course, with many completing the course in under thirty seconds.

Unfortunately there was one major casualty claimed by the course. A maroon Mustang was pushing his car to the limits – and went a hair too far. The car lost traction, slid towards the K-Rail while completing a 180 degree spin, and slammed the passenger side into the barrier. Crews were there in seconds, and the driver was okay – minus some hurt pride. He drove the car off the course, fixed it, and was back out for the rest of the event.

The Wilwood Brakes street stop challenge was an exciting event to watch as well, with lots of people getting into the excitement. The drivers started with a long sweeping left turn, which led into a straight away. There was a slight jog in the middle of the straight away, then they had to slam on the brakes.

 

Many just clipped the cones in the jog, and a few overshot the stop box, plowing through a few cones. The Black Widow Exhaust S-10 had a hard time keeping the truck inside the box, and the back end of the truck often swung around, but he managed to stay inside the box.

The other event going on Saturday was the Lingenfelter Design and Engineering challenge. This is where a select group of judges look over every single car. They are looking for things like overall look of the car, fabrication, how street worthy it is, etc. This means that an all out “street legal” race car isn’t going to judge as high as the guy who still has a full interior in his ride. Afterall, this is the search for the ultimate street car!

Weather Permitting

All day Saturday it was fairly windy, but not overly cold. However looking off in the distance towards the South, you could see dark clouds and rain. The R-word was forbidden to be spoken around drivers, as they wanted all the traction they could get. But as the day went on, it was apparent rain was on it’s way. By 5PM you couldn’t see the mountains to the South, only a thick haze of rain.

The drivers then hopped in their cars shortly after 5PM to start the road rally. A few drops, but nothing major until they hit the interstate. That’s when the flood gates opened and the highway had puddles of water all over it. Again, these are street cars, so they flipped on windshield wipers – if they had them working – and cruised away.

Road Course Action

Luckily, the crazy rain from Saturday night cleared up, the clouds moved out, and Sunday was a beautiful day. The participants were eager to get on the Falken Tire Hot Lap road course and push their machines to the max. After some warm up laps where they get to learn the course, they were let loose!

Right off the bat a C4 Corvette fell casualty to the extremes of the road course. Smoke started billowing out from underneath the car, and the race came to a stand still until the car was removed. The other car that had a tiny bit of trouble was Jake Rozelle in his ’69 Camaro, when he decided to see how the car liked the dirt. No harm was done to his car, and he was back on the track seconds later.

Overall, the event was a great success – even being somewhat of a last minute addition to the schedule. We can’t wait till the next event! As always, results and a massive gallery are below:

GTV

Registrant (16)	Car #	Road Rally	Design	Hot Lap	Autocross	Speed Stop	Score	Rank
Mike Maier	22	25	16.9000	25	25	25	116.9000	1
Jake Rozelle	19	25	20.7000	22	22	22	111.7000	2
Larry Woo	52	25	21.3667	20	18	16	100.3667	3
Chad Ryker	17	25	19.9333	12	16	18	90.9333	4
Cris Gonzalez	47	25	18.1667	13	20	14	90.1667	5
Martin Pond	33	25	18.6000	11	14	15	83.6000	6
Michael Hamrick	66	25	21.4000	15	8.39	12	81.7900	7
MIke Armienti	21	25	19.1333	8.39	12	11	75.5233	8
CHERYL HERRICK	54	25	20.8333	8.8	11	8.8	74.4333	9
Valerie Pichette	55	25	19.5667	8.59	13	8.18	74.3367	10
Randall Pond	31	25	14.5667	9	9	8.59	66.1567	11
John McKissack	87	25	2.8333	18	8.8	9	63.6333	12
Wes Drelleshak	84	0	12.5667	16	15	20	63.5667	13
james crosby	26	25	13.2667	8.18	8.18	8.39	63.0167	14
Timothy Katz	82	0	13.5333	14	8.59	13	49.1233	15
Efrain Diaz	70	0	0.0000	0	0	0	0.0000	16

GTL

Registrant (12)	Car #	Road Rally	Design	Hot Lap	Autocross	Speed Stop	Score	Rank
Brandon Ranvek	39	25	19.1333	22	25	25	116.1333	1
Alexandra Zust	59	25	19.5667	16	22	22	104.5667	2
Rich Willhoff	14	25	18.4667	25	15	20	103.4667	3
John Lazorack III	50	25	21.2333	20	18	18	102.2333	4
Karl Dunn	40	25	15.5333	18	20	15	93.5333	5
Sammy Valafar	77	25	14.2000	15	16	16	86.2000	6
Kenneth Allan Mitchell	16	25	19.7667	14	14	13	85.7667	7
Jane Thurmond	45	25	20.5000	12	13	14	84.5000	8
Gregg Biddlingmeier	69	25	18.1333	13	12	11	79.1333	9
Frank Farace	13	25	16.6333	11	11	12	75.6333	10
Joe Escobar	27	0	18.9333	9	9	9	45.9333	11
Duke Langley	18	0	0.0000	0	0	0	0.0000	12

GT

Registrant (18)	Car #	Road Rally	Design	Hot Lap	Autocross	Speed Stop	Score	Rank
Danny Popp	10	25	19.9333	25	15	25	109.9333	1
Ken Thwaits	81	25	17.9333	22	25	18	107.9333	2
Jordan Priestley	36	25	19.3667	20	20	22	106.3667	3
Andrew Nier	15	25	17.9000	18	22	20	102.9000	4
Matt Alcala	72	25	18.1333	12	16	15	86.1333	5
Todd Rumpke	11	25	17.2333	16	11	16	85.2333	6
Robert Sanderson	53	25	18.1667	15	18	9	85.1667	7
Don Gonzales	38	25	17.9667	13	14	14	83.9667	8
Keith Jurcazak	23	25	17.0000	11	13	12	78.0000	9
Dannie Pinard	29	25	17.7667	14	12	8.8	77.5667	10
Cliff Elliott	24	25	18.8333	9	9	8.59	70.4233	11
George Dias	28	25	17.9000	8.39	8.8	8.18	68.2700	12
Martha Gregory	35	25	18.1667	8.59	8.18	7.98	67.9167	13
bill speed	86	0	15.3667	8.8	8.59	13	45.7567	14
Jade Barlow	41	25	0.0000	0	7.98	11	43.9800	15
kevin shaw	20	25	0.0000	0	8.39	8.39	41.7800	16
Jeff Vance	51	0	0.0000	0	0	0	0.0000	17
Ryan Volk	74	0	0.0000	0	0	0	0.0000	18

EC

Registrant (1)	Car #	Road Rally	Design	Hot Lap	Autocross	Speed Stop	Score	Rank
mark figuerado	71	0	0.0000	0	25	25		1