Wall Speedway New Jersey… the 4th round of the Formula D Championship. For the RRE Turbo LS Powered 350Z FD Team featuring Carl Rydquist as the driver… well the team went into the wall so to speak :-P
First Carl’s mentor and inspiration Bryan from Berk Technologies decided he was off the team. He still sent his tent though. Sam was mean to him or something. So the weekend started with Carl out of sorts. Then Sam’s woman wouldn’t let him go so we were two men down. John Vick came to help out.
[youtube]http://youtu.be/gP9WJGCbspU[/youtube]
Problems with the sway bar clearance did not allow the car to run with the sway bar that they needed for the bank transitions so that put the car at a disadvantage. Add in that the video guy was a tooth off and the team was in for major disappointment.
So we just made this cool video and took some cool pics with the fans that didn’t know any better. Rossy called a team meeting and regulated so better luck next event in Washington!
Before this event we mentioned that we were ready to battle, and battle we did! Piloting the Road Race Engineering Berk Technology Nissan 350Z powered by Champion Spark Plugs through both the PRO and PRO2 categories at Formula Drift’s newest venue Homestead-Miami Speedway, our driver Carl Rydquist started off with winning 1st qualifying spot in PRO2, followed by a 23rd qualifying result in PRO, then Carl went onto win 3rd place in the PRO2 tandem competition on Friday night and finally capped off the weekend with a Top 16 finish in PRO.
Rossy Welch, team manager Road Race Engineering
Carl’s FormulaD Pro2 podium finish under the sunshine of Miami has made one of my biggest dreams come true in my favorite racing series. It feels wonderful to work with such a talented, young and passionate team. I’m so proud to be part of it and thankful for the opportunity. We can feel the love from our fans and with the support from our sponsors, that is what keeps us working harder.
Carl Rydquist, driver RRE 350Z V8 Turbo powered by Champion Spark Plugs
What an amazing weekend! The team behind this car consists of Road Race Engineering, Berk Technology and S-Empire, Carl explains, and it’s a strong combo that combines tons of experience with brains and competence to find solutions to the challenges we come up against and to execute the jobs that are needed. I am equally impressed, fascinated and thankful and I’m extremely happy to have won my first Formula Drift trophy!
Formula Drift PRO Rd4 in New Jersey takes place on June 20-21 and our preparations have already begun. The Z chassis, then powered by a V6 engine boosted by a Garrett GT3582R turbocharger ran well there last season so we have a great baseline and Carl did well in qualifying at that track, but still with today’s level of development speed in Formula Drift we have to work tirelessly on sharpening the competitive edge to climb further up the standings where we are currently sitting in 29th place in the PRO series and 3rd in the PRO2 standings.
We have amassed great momentum during the start of the 2014 season by excellent working relationships with our technical partners and with great support from fans around the globe, however we did suffer a no-points weekend in the second round of the 2014 Formula Drift PRO Championship by taking 34th spot out of 60 cars at Road Atlanta. Now how do you handle a gut punch like that? Answer: Like a Champion.
Long time RRE customer Nic sent me a pic of his personalized Indiana license plate with the RRE plate frame on it. I asked for a little more info on the car and Nic sent me this:
Hi Mike,
Here are some pics and info on my 95 Eagle Talon TSi. Some of my mods include:
MHI Big 16G turbo
Injen Intake
Punishment Racing FMIC/piping
3” Exhaust (Apex’i Dunk cat-back)
Mishimoto Aluminum Radiator
255lph Walbro Fuel Pump
AEM Big Rotor upgrade
NGK Iridium Plugs
NGK Wires
CX Racing Fuel Pressure Regulator
H&R lowering springs
Tokico adjustable struts
NXS Manual Boost Controller
Auto Meter Phantom Gauges (A/F, Boost, Oil Temp, Oil Pressure, Water Temp)
Wings West Aggressor front bumper
Z3 Fenders
18” Nippon Racing Wheels
HKS Turbo Timer
Kenwood touch screen head unit
Optima Yellow Top battery
Custom fabricated wing
There are a few other goodies here and there, but that is the big stuff. Thanks for supporting DSMers for so many years. I’ll be rooting for the RRE team when I head down to Road Atlanta for Formula Drift next month.
Road Race Engineering’s 2014 Formula D Season debut happened in front of a sold-out crowd of more than 20,000 drift fanatics in Long Beach California last weekend. Our practice session ran trouble free and our driver Carl Rydquist qualified the Road Race Engineering Berk Technology 350Z into 24th spot among 64 professional drivers. This was Carl’s best result since his Formula D comeback (best previous FD qualifying position to date: 7th, 2009).
During the Top 32 tandem practice sessions it was clear that the car was significantly quicker now than last season. The tight turns and close walls of the Long Beach Grand Prix circuit isnt necessarily known as one of the higher speed drift events. But it was obvious that Carl was able to chase down several other big power cars.
In the battle for a spot in the Top 16 bracket, Carl was able to pull out a gap in his lead run thanks to the Garrett GTX4088R turbo powered LS2 V8 and our sticky Hankook Ventus R-S3 tires, however being fast also turned out to be a challenge in the follow run behind opponent Forrest Wang.
Carl comes from a road racing back ground and said: “I am used to being in front and racing hard to leave the competition behind so that part went as planned. While I was following Forrest, I started out too close too soon and simply bogged down behind him and he was able to maintain great angle and line at a relatively low speed.
The Road Race Engineering Berk Technology 350Z, (Carl calls the car “Animal”) ran flawlessly. The 830hp turbocharged LS V8 motor didn’t miss a beat all weekend, so this one’s totally on me. It was frankly one of my worst tandem follow runs I can remember. Nothing that I can do about it now, but something to draw experience from. The good news is that the car is quick and controllable, I can charge close and battle for tandem wins this year.”
Thanks to the qualifying result Carl and the team are moving onto Round 2 at Road Atlanta in 19th place, tied in points with among other drivers former champions Daigo Saito (2012) and Daijiro Yoshihara (2011).
Rossy Welch our Team Manager said: “I could see that Carl didn’t want to damage the car at this event, which is good, but you also have to go for it 100% to win. We’ll focus and push harder at Atlanta next month. But this is a really good start for us, we made important points and we met so many fans that love the car that this awesome team has built and we feel very blessed and happy for the support from all of our sponsors. This is already becoming a really exciting year!“
See you at Road Atlanta on May 9-10 or on the FD Livestream!
The RRE/Berk Technology LS Turbo powered 350Z was all ready for the show and safely in the pits the night before the FD season opener in Long Beach California. Danny George had some last minute parts challenges and a long haul from Las Vegas and needed a place to spread out and finish up some details the night before the race. We opened up the shop, the dyno and some sofas to crash on for our 2nd favorite Formula D team for an all nighter.
Gary from Motegi Racing asked us to use the shop after hours to shoot some pics for their upcoming calendar and FD Posters. Ummm…. sure! Dont have to ask us twice! :-) Olivia Korte (Rockstar Energy Drink girls) was in front of the camera with makeup and hair by Elfie Simon. Watching Aaron Okayama with the setup, shooting and lighting was a treat. Oh yeah, there was a car, almost forgot. Looking back at the video I guess it was blue or something.
5 year old Bryce’s first day on a track. Before he was the parking lot king on his little kart. We went testing with Carl Rydquist’s FD 350Z and Bryce was able to get on the oval at Willow Springs to pick up his speed some finally.
We have the rebuilt refreshed respiffyfied repowered 350Z up and running after the off season rebuild and overhaul. Time to go testing at Willow Springs Raceway.
Last season Carl’s 350Z ate it’s VQ turbo motor half way through the season. He made the decision to simplify things and go LS2 V8 power. With some higher flowing cylinder heads and a little Nawz it was running high ~400 whp to the wheels. Enough to drift on but not enough to make mad smoke on demand and put the car sideways at will.
So in the off season Art (S Empire) and Sam added a Garrett GTX 4088R turbo to the mix. With Sam’s tune using the AEM EMS Seris 2 ECU we now had all the power we needed and then some. Time to make some smoke and dial in the suspension for the new power.
Carl Says:
This thing’s getting quicker now. First time out with the Road Race Engineering (official) 350Z with this mad S-Empire turbo V8 setup. Turned out to run solidly so far in the SoCal sunshine (knock on wood!), so I started to play around with it. Small but crucial chassis setup adjustments by Berk Technology ended up giving me a really good car. Great feeling in the car, very solid feeling and completely different sound with turbo and straight cut gears. Love it. Going to have a lot of fun taking this to the Streets of Long Beach.
We took the Varis Widebody EVO 6 to Chuckwalla for the POC Time Attack. It was Dr Alex’s first time running at Chuckwalla and also the first full track day in anger with the wide body and wide wheels and Stoptech Trophy brakes. The first time out on low boost he was running just over 2:00 lap times the first day.
With the brakes giving full confidence and the power set on “Kill” (450 tq/500 whp) instead of “Tickle” (370tq/450 whp) the car really came alive.
Lap times dropped to a low of 1:56 flat by the time the Time Attack sessions rolled around. The 1:56 flat was good for the 4th fastest time of the weekend against some seriously beautiful looking and sounding German machinery.
