As the cars in the Unlimited class were breaking records, the Limited class cars were breaking records of their own. In the Limited AWD class, the Evasive Motorsports Evo driven by Robert Walker smashed the old record with a 1:53.916. Crawford Performance, a favorite in the Limited AWD class ran into some issues with their car the day before at Import Tuner's STI versus Evo shootout and couldn't get on the track to give Evasive a much desired run for their money. In the Limited FR class, Rob Walker jumped into the A&J/T1R S2000 sponsored by Nitto Tires and set the fastest Naturally Aspirated time of the day and won the class with a 1:54.888. To show you that it's not all big name tuners kicking ass and taking names, the Limited FF winner wound up being taken by privateer, Tage Evanson in a '95 Honda Civic hatchback. Tage was sent to the Super Lap Battle finale after competing in our Phoenix qualifying round to gain a spot and is a perfect example of how you can make it and run with the big boys. His 1:58.366 was not only fast enough to win his class but broke the long standing Limited FF record by over a full second!
We expanded our Street class this time with 10 cars competing overall. All drivetrains were allowed to compete, but next year we'll be breaking it down to Street AWD, Street FF and Street FR to give each class a more definitive classification. The difference between the Street Class and the Limited Class is that they must retain a full interior, run a tire with a minimum UTQG of 140 and be street driven 15 minutes from the morning rendezvous point/inspection at the host motel. The beauty of the Street class is that it doesn't take a huge amount of money to be competitive; the difference between winning and losing in this class is how good your setup is. The average power output in this class was within the mid-300 hp to 400 hp range with the exception being the 240 hp naturally aspirated Evasive Motorsports S2000. The competition was definitely stiff for the Street class but in the end the JIC/M1 Evo on Hankook tires, driven by Russ Warr, pulled out on top with a 1:58.340. Second place was JC Meynet in his STI, followed very closely by Tim Kuo in the black Evasive S2000. We don't usually recognize those who position after the top 3 spots, but the fourth and fifth place teams put in a massive effort just to compete. Phillip Chase from TEIN had just finished his new Evo a day before it was supposed to be in SEMA for their booth so he never had a chance to shake the car down and pretty much just drove it up to Buttonwillow and right onto the track. Same with the Yokohama Supra; they were still working on the car up until the last session.
As you can see, the '07 Super Lap Battle was a surprising round of record breakers in all classes of competition. In just a few years' time, the tuners have really shown through to produce race bred vehicles at the highest caliber. So, what's on the plate for the '08 Super Lap Battle season? Check www.superstreetonline.com for the full schedule of qualifying events across the country and get ready; if you thought this year was full of surprises, just wait until we show you what we have in store for the next round. Congratulations to all of our class winners and record breakers for delivering the hottest round of time attack action yet!