Bergheholtz Racing Versus American Muscle - Battle In Seattle

There was an overwhelming amount of coolness for us to sort through at the Maryland Battle, including fast cars that broke numerous records on the 1320, girls dressed with nothing more than dental floss at the bikini contest, and hundreds of pimped out show cars hoping to win one of the huge BOTI trophies so they could claim bragging rights. But like most other events this year, it wouldn't be dry as rain delays kept us down, but not out. With one rain delay, the postponed event went smoothly, especially in the Pro class where Bergheholtz Racing announced on behalf of all the competing drag racers that Battle of the Imports is the drag racing event they intend on supporting with the recent cancellation of NOPI's remaining drag events for the years.

Scions dominated in a big way, representing in all four of the Pro class finals. First up was Leslie Armendariz in her Scion tC in the Pro Stock class who defeated Norris Proyoonto's Clutchmasters Honda Insight and even set a Pro Stock BOTI record with a 9:44 second run at 142 mph. This win took a chunk of the championship points lead from the blistering fast K-powered Honda dragster. Another tC built by Kenny Tran Racing also came out strong as the underdog when an almost perfect reaction time allowed a consistent mid-8-second racer to beat Mike Crawford's low 8 Chevy Cobalt. The closest race of the weekend was Ed Bergenholtz in his Mazdaspeed Mazda 6 against Chris Rado in his World Products Scion tC. This side-by-side race left people in the stands wondering who won this race because there was only a nine one-thousandths of a second differential and a couple of feet set between the winner and the loser. But here, it was Chris Rado who was the champion. In the finals, Rado paired up against Marty Ladwig's Lucas Oil Chevy Cobalt. Ladwig took the win with a very impressive 7.26 second run at 199 mph to stop Scion from taking a clean sweep.

Bergenholtz Racing didn't stop there. Battle's director, Frank Choi, recently introduced a new grudge match placing domestics against imports, and on that night Ed Bergenholtz decided to take on a challenge from Elliot Thompson's twin turbo Chevy Camaro. The fans in the stands were cheering as Camaro's huge turbos spooled up and set the 10.5-inch slicks smoking. It looked as if Ed was going to have his ass handed to him, but after a bad start from the Camaro, Ed took off with the win. All of the import fans in the stands cheered as Bergenholtz silenced the American muscle. - Scott Kanemura