2009 Cobalt SS Gets Great Reviews From RiceBoyTV.com

Many of you may not be familiar with www.RiceBoyTv.com, so let me bring you up to speed. John Naderi is a guy that has been in the market for many years. He has made his way through the famed site Overboost.com and eventually found himself at Primedia. This is where he became the editor of Super Street Magazine, which many of you are familiar with. John had a great run with Super Street and made a huge impact thanks to his contributions to the Tuner Marketplace. John recently took a chance at creating a new media outlet, which has given him creative freedom and a new perspective for the tuner market.

He is joined by some heavy hitters that worked along side of him at Super Street Magazine – Ricky Chu and Justin Kaehler. Both of these guys are huge assets to RiceBoyTV.com and have made a great name for themselves in the marketplace. We have been talking to them about the new Turbo Cobalt SS for a while now, and they finally got a chance to drive it. They recently did a story on the new Cobalt on their site, and gave it amazing reviews. read more...

NOPI Atco (and Atlanta Re-run)

It was a busy and blustery weekend in Atco, New Jersey for the NOPI Drag Race event. It’s not easy to keep everything straight when you’re essentially running two events in one, but I’ll do my best to summarize everything for you.

Saturday’s qualifying doubled as elimination rounds to make up for the rained-out Atlanta event. It was a good day for Hot Rod Chevy Cobalt driver Bryan Jimenez, who wound-up with the Atlanta win. Saturday also resulted in a hard-fought win for Gary Gardella in Pro FWD, who laid-down an impressive run of 7.27 seconds at 214mph. Later in the weekend, Gary was able to back-up this run, setting both elapsed time and speed records. Saturday resulted in runner-up Atlanta finishes for Chevy drivers Brian Ballard in Turbo Street, Marty Ladwig in Pro FWD, and Grace Howell in All Motor. It was not such a good day for Don Nase Jr., driving the ECOtec-powered Extreme dragster. He got out of the groove and, through a series of moves, wound-up hooking a tire and flipping over. Luckily, Donnie was OK and his dragster suffered only minor damage to the main hoop and wing. read more...

With a revamped car and a winning attitude, Erica Nocita is a racer to watch in her ECOtec-powered Chevy Cobalt.

Erica Nocita Shows She Can Play With the Big Boys

Many of you remember Erica Nocita with her aggressive driving skills and handful’s of Wally’s, not to mention her girl-next-door smile. We checked in with Erica and wanted to see how things where looking for 2008. From the sounds of it, she’s back on track and ready to race!

2007 was a challenging season for Dalcorp Racing, but also one of the most rewarding. After Erica wiped out the competition in 2006, winning the NHRA Quick16 East Championship, GM Racing decided to play hardball and upgrade the performance level of Erica’s 2005 Chevy Cobalt. Not one to be outdone, GM Racing decided to go all out and change the NHRA Quick 16 car completely, which included an engine and turbo change, suspension modifications, a different computer system and even a new paint scheme. read more...

GM VIP ECOtec Owners Meet Invades Englishtown Raceway on May 4

The GM VIP ECOtec Owners Meet was a great success at Moroso Motorsports Park in Florida that we decided to host another event in the North East for our ECOtec friends.

The GM Tuner Tour will be at Englishtown Raceway in NJ on the 4th, loaded with great cars on display along with all kinds of giveaways and prizes. Make sure to come out to the event and stop by the booth and check out the new display. read more...

Bryan Jimenez and Don Nase, Jr at the ECOtec Owner's Meet in West Palm Beach, FLA.

GM VIP ECOtec Event, Take One - Moroso Florida! Next Up: Englishtown NJ!

We had our very first GM VIP ECOtec event on Saturday April 5, 2008. The event took place at the NOPI Drift and Drag event held at Moroso Motorsports Park in West Palm Beach, Florida. The great thing about the event for GM ECOtec owners was the fact that GM took care of the costs of registration, so it didn’t cost the owners anything to come out to this great event.

As the sun rose early Saturday morning on Moroso Motorsports Park in Florida we could tell that there was going to be a great day ahead of us. We started off with a good turnout of a whole bunch of different ECOtec’s. Everything from hooked up Solstices, Sky’s, Redline’s and Cobalt SS/SC’s with elaborate paintjobs, the ECOtec owners showed us that they were waiting for one of these events for a long time to show their enthusiasm. read more...

Ryan Tuerck made an amazing debut for Gardella Racing at Formula Drift Long Beach.

Recap: Formula Drift Long Beach

The first Formula Drift event was in beautiful Long Beach, California. A clear blue sky, 85-degree weather, and intense drifting competition drew a huge crowd to the Streets of Long Beach. Pontiac Motorsports was proud to be represented at this event by Rhys Millen Racing and, new this year, Gardella Racing.

Rhys Millen’s Solstice GXP Drift was not able to compete at the Long Beach event due to some late-developing technical issues. But, RMR was well represented by the return of the Pontiac GTO Drift. The GTO launched Pontiac into the drifting circuit, and we like to think of it as a bit of a legend. After an unfortunate incident involving a NASCAR driver and a wall, the GTO needed some work to make its comeback in 2008. And, with Rhys behind the wheel of the Solstice GXP, the GTO also needed a driver. With the help of Bridgestone, the GTO Drift was revived and put into the hands of accomplished drifter Dai Yoshihara. read more...

Race Videos From NOPI Florida

We all love a good YouTube video - especially good racing videos.

Our friend Jeff Romack just posted six new videos on YouTube that are a must watch. Our Cobalt race teams look really good this year! They are under some new rule regulations that they are working through, and once they work through those, we will be seeing a ton of victories out of this bunch. read more...

Marty Ladwig captured the Pro FWD flag at the rain-shortened Moroso Motorsports Park Sunday.

Ladwig Captures Moroso Pro FWD Victory; Rain Postpones Some Elimination Races

We almost completed the first sport compact drag race of the 2008 season.

Intermittent rain, coupled with track oil-downs, disrupted the eliminations schedule on Sunday at Moroso Motorsports Park. Some classes were completed, including Pro FWD and All Motor. The finals for Hot Rod will be run during the second round of qualifying at Englishtown in May. Chevy driver Bryan Jimenez will be competing for the win.

In Pro FWD, Chevy driver Gary Gardella was the top qualifier with a run of 7.38 seconds. Note that qualifying at Moroso doubled as qualifying for the rained-out Atlanta event, making Gary the top qualifier for both events (eliminations for the Atlanta rain-out will be run during qualifying at Atco). Gary had to settle for runner-up in Moroso, however. The final round was won by Chevy driver Marty Ladwig. Marty piloted his ECOtec-powered Chevy Cobalt to a clean 7.33 second run, which also set a national elapsed time record. It’s a great start to the season for Marty Ladwig Racing. read more...

Gardella Racing Gears Up for a New Season

With the off season coming to end, Gardella Racing has got a lot done and it still feels as though we have a ton of work left to do. Our drag and drift programs have gone well over the past few months. Here is a quick recap… We are headed back down south to get some more testing in with the Red Bull Cobalt to make sure the new wire harness has no flaws in it; along with some other major upgrades we have done. We are excited for the changes and will keep everyone posted on how testing goes.

On the drifting side of things we have made some major upgrades on our Solstice GXP. We have gotten a lot done on the Pontiac since our first test session, 5 weeks ago. Driver, Ryan Tuerck, needed more steering angle than we originally had. With a stock lower control arm and upright, we were able to get an additional 50 plus degrees. This Pontiac Solstice is a great vehicle and it has a lot of potential to be a serious competitor in the Formula D series. read more...