Real Street Eliminator Competition - Real Street Eliminator V

The main reason Randy's Camaro made 605 rwhp can be traced to that Magnuson TVS supercharger perched on top of the Wegner Motorsports 403ci stroker LS. Those Eaton blowers move a ton of air for their size.

The main reason Randy's Camaro made 605 rwhp can be traced to that Magnuson TVS supercharg

Lucas Oil/E3 Spark Plug Dyno Challenge
Inevitably, performance hinges on horsepower. Talk is cheap, but when you roll your car up on the dyno truth machine at the Summer Nationals, the whole world quickly knows if you're blowing smoke. This was the first test for most of the RSE competitors run by Andy Wicks and his hard-working DynoTune crew from Watertown, South Dakota (DynoTuneUSA.com). Right out of the gate, one of the first cars up on the wheel was Nick Abernathy's '07 Corvette, which belted out a solid 559 rear-wheel horsepower helped by a nudge from a Nitrous Outlet 150 shot. Dan Neinstadt thought he had Nick covered, but a tiny slip of the M/T 315/35-17 ET Street tires put him an ego-bruising 1 hp short. Rick Adams earned style points for knocking out 531 naturally aspirated horsepower, while Rod Strumbel's supercharged Ford was close behind with 510 horses to place Fourth.

Dan Neinstadt thought he had something for Nick Abernathy's Corvette with a big horsepower number up his sleeve, but a little bit of tire spin cost him the top spot by 1 hp. We've never experienced a horsepower tie, but if it happens, peak torque would be the tiebreaker.

Dan Neinstadt thought he had something for Nick Abernathy's Corvette with a big horsepower

While it wasn't worth any extra points, it was Randy Johnson's colorful Camaro that earned the top horse-power honor for the RSE cars with a stunning 605-rwhp achievement, outpulling David Alfred's '69 Camaro 335hp run. Jeff Schwartz made a valiant effort to boost his little 5.3L motor's mettle with a 150 shot, but Andy noticed a deadly lean air/fuel ratio problem that would have melted several pistons, so Jeff elected to turn off the bottle, which is why the Vega's max power effort appears a little short at only 291 hp.

John Boos now has a two-year winning streak on the RSE autocross, knocking down a very quick mid-36-second run that covered Nick Abernathy's Second Place run by three tenths.

John Boos now has a two-year winning streak on the RSE autocross, knocking down a very qui

QA1 Autocross
Between the cones is where driver skill played a big part in RSE. This year's course was significantly longer than last year's while still occupying the same real estate. With several returning players, we knew guys such as John Boos, Nick Abernathy, Randy Johnson, and Jeff Schwartz would be quick. Just like in previous competitions, we didn't limit the number of official runs against the clock. We had many more Summer Nationals participants also running the track, which meant the RSE cars were somewhat limited to the maximum number of passes. By Saturday morning, an elapsed-time duel was shaping up between last year's autocross winner, John Boos in his '86 C4 Corvette, and Third Place '09 autocross finisher, Nick Abernathy. The sting of losing Second Place by a mere 0.02 second to Keith Anderson's Viper may have been a big reason Nick was on a mission. On Saturday morning he commented, "He's got me by 0.006 second!" By Saturday afternoon, the times were in the low 37s, and the competition spilled right into Sunday morning. Finally, Nick thought he had John covered with a 36.9, but John showed up with sticky tires on Sunday and blitzed a very quick 36.606 that Nick couldn't match-giving John the win for the second straight year.

Our favorite late model was Eric Winsor's stripped-to-the-bone C4 that had the otherwise stock Corvette down to an amazing 2,780-pound fighting weight. Eric borrowed John Boos' 8-year-old Pilot Sport tires and managed a Fourth Place finish, proving that light makes right.

Our favorite late model was Eric Winsor's stripped-to-the-bone C4 that had the otherwise s

On the muscle car side of the fight, it appeared that Randy's Camaro had the performance edge, but Jeff's budget Vega didn't make it easy. In fact, Jeff buzzed the autocross so hard on Friday, he burned up the BFG 15-inch Drag Radials-so he bolted on a set of stickier BFG R1 road race tires on Saturday to push the little Vega into the low 39s. Jeff's a good driver but just couldn't match the big Camaro's effort blessed with monster Nitto 315/30R18 rear tires and a prototype Heidts IRS. Derek Kiefer showed up to run the autocross as a Summer Nationals participant with his '69 Chevelle, but we talked him into entering Real Street. His 39.078 on Dunlop 265/40R17 street tires was less than 0.2 second behind the Vega's quickest lap.