Calling All Street Cars: Street Car Takeover In Oklahoma City 2019

One of the events that keep popping up on our radar is the Street Car Takeover series. Justin Keith and Chase Lautenbach are the masterminds behind this street car event which has been gaining popularity like wildfire. We loaded up last weekend and headed out to Street Car Takeover in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma to see what all of the buzz was about.

A Street Car Takeover event consists of two parts. Normally on Friday, the event will host a kick-off party including all of the racers as well as streetcars. In our case, we met up at the Twin Peaks West location in Oklahoma City. Unfortunatly this area has been bombarded with rain and thunderstorms over the past couple of weeks, so we were unsure what to expect.

The kick-off party was in the parking lot of Twin Peaks West but quickly spilled over into other parking lots as the cars kept rolling in. There was a chassis dyno in the parking lot along with several vendors that were selling shirts, hats, as well as showing off some of their new products.

The Deatschwerks crew was at the show with an orange turbo LS-swapped BMW that was getting a lot of attention. The Bimmer was not the only item in the booth that was drawing a crowd. Deatschwerks had a bunch of new products that are coming to market. On display was their brushless fuel pumps, fuel rails, as well as an all-new DW400 drop in fuel pump module for the 1999-2009 GMC and Chevrolet 1500 trucks.

The all-new Deatschwerks DW400 drop in fuel pump module is now available for the 1999-2009 GMC and Chevrolet 1500 trucks.

As we walked around the parking lot, we could not help but notice the variety of cars on the property. There was a ton of LS-powered vehicles of course, but there were also muscles cars, Vipers, Mustangs, imports, and exotics. Unfortunatly the clouds opened up as rain moved into the area which cut the show short. We loaded up and decided o call it a night after a couple of hours.

Day 2 of the event sent us south of Oklahoma City to the 1/4-mile track know as Thunder Valley Raceway. Even after the rain dumped tons of water on the track overnight, the event was still scheduled to start on time. The crew worked on water removal using brooms, pumps, and even tractors to make sure it was done on time.

When the track was dried out, roll racing was the first event of the day. Like clockwork, the paired cars lined up and made passes against each other through the finals. If you like diversity, this event was for you. With CTS-V’s lined up against GTR’s, Vettes against Miatas, Hondas versus GTO’s, you had no way of knowing what was going to line up next.

After the roll racing had finished, it was time for the drag racing portion of the event. We had a chance to talk to some of the participants during this time. Texas had a great representation on the grounds with several racers coming out of Amarillo. We even met a couple of seriously fast cars from Arkansas.

One of those racers was Brandon Tapp out of Manhattan Kansas showed up to the SCT show with a killer 1964 C2 Corvette. He raced the car in both the roll race and drag race portion of the event. Brandon found the car as a project that someone had given up on and left sitting since the ’70s. The car was exactly what he needed as a base, so he bought it and went to work.

Brandon started with an SRIII Motorsports chassis for the ’64 which uses all of the C6 suspension on the front and rear of the car. For the engine, an lsx block was equipped with a set of Texas Speed and Performance PRC heads and a custom Holley Hi-ram manifold. The 88mm turbo pokes just enough out of the hood to grab some fresh air while giving the car a sinister look. A Hughes 4l80 transmission connects to a Ford Currie Enterprises 9-inch center section fitted with The Drive Shaft Shop axles. For the engine management, Brandon decided to go with a Holley Dominator ECU of which he handles the tuning duties.

Brandon didn’t build the car for one specific event and plans on drag racing, roll racing, and possibly doing some 1-mile and 1/2-mile events in the future. The C2 has managed a best of a 9.6 elapsed time at 142 miles per hour. He is pretty confident that the car will run in the eights as soon as he gets all of the bugs worked out of this new combination.

Another car that caught our eye was Joe Young‘s Trans Am out of Amarillo Texas. Joe usually runs no-prep 1/8-mile events but wanted to see what the car was capable of in the 1/4-mile while supporting Street Car Takeover.

The Pontiac was home to a stock LS block that possessed 370 cubic-inches and is equipped with Trick Flow heads, Lil’ John Motorsports cam and valvetrain. The car also has a massive Forced Inductions 98mm turbo positioned in the front of the engine compartment. Joe told us that this combination is good for over 1,400 horsepower and 1,200 lb-ft of torque at 6,500 RPM on 30-pounds of boost. He thinks there is still some power left on the table because when racing, he shifts the car at 7,500 RPM.

Joe ended up winning the small tire class against Chris Harper’s Trans Am in the finals. He then went up against Derrick Kelly in the Street Racer class and unfortunatly lost. Joe said, “I gave my stock block car some scary boost numbers but ended up just shy in the finals. I went a new personal best in the 1/4-mile running a 7.8 @ 180 mph.” You can catch Joe at the LS vs. The World race is coming up in a couple of weeks in Kansas.

Mitchell Stapleton showed up with what had to be a crowd favorite. The full-sized four-wheel-drive Escalade dubbed the LSXcalade was a monster of a vehicle with an engine to match.

Mitchell had a 1972 Monte Carlo with a big block in it, but it was always broken. So, he would take the Escalade to the races, and one thing led to another. After installing some bolt-on performance parts, the heavy hitter ran a best of low 14s on E85 fuel. Soon after this accomplishment, Mitchell decided he liked racing the SUV over the Monte and the real modifications commenced.

In 2016, Mitchell loaded up the LSXcalade and headed out for Drag Week. The SUV averaged an 11.9 elapsed time during the week with an LSA blower on top of the 6.2-liter LS engine. After Drag Week, Mitchell decided it was time to go all in and tore the LSXcalade apart.

The Escalade now has a Dart block 427 engine with a Dart billet crank. For the internals, Mitchell went with a set of CP Carrillo rods and pistons. Frankenstein Engine Dynamics heads were utilized to make sure that the air from the twin Precision 76/75 turbos could get in and out of the engine efficiently. A Rossler Terminator 5 4l80e transmission handles the gear changes, and a Pro Torque Converter helps get this big boy rolling down the strip. Mitchell left the stock 3.42 gear set in the axles. The teal wrap sets the Escalade apart from the others especially with the help of the bead-lock front and rear Weld Wheels.

Mitchell learned to fabricate by working on the SUV. He used products from Wolf Aircraft for all of the piping and even built the intercooler piping to the CSF intercooler.

You might be wondering, what will a 6,000-pound SUV run in the 1/4-mile with no shakedown passes on a new build? We were hoping you would ask! Mitchell and the LSXcalade managed a 10.34 at 135 miles per hour on only 15-pounds of boost. When he gets this beast lined out, it’s definitely going to hurt a lot of feelings.

Jaime Sepulveda brought out his beautiful LS-swapped 1991 Fox Body Mustang with a new engine combination from San Antonio Texas.

The car is powered by an ls2 402 cubic-inch engine with the help of a rather large Precision Turbo 88/91 unit. JMS Performance out of San Antonio took care of the engine build which dynoed right at 1,000 horsepower. Freakshow Performance built the Powerglide transmission and converter. A Ford 8.8-inch rear is used to get all of that power to the ground with the help of 35-spline axles. For suspension, Jaime is using the stock setup with adjustable control arms and coil-over shocks.

Jaime enjoys the car on the streets as well as the track. The Fox has been a best of 8.70 with the older setup, but Jaime is looking to improve on that after the kinks are worked out.

Our hats are off to the Justin Keith and Chase Lautenbach, owners of Street Car Takeover. SCT is one of the smoothest run events that we have attended. Best of all, the show and race are all about streetcars and having a good time, which we managed to do. Be sure and check out Street Car Takeover for an event near you.

Video by David Van Voris

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About the author

Brian Havins

A gearhead for life, Brian is obsessed with all things fast. Banging gears, turning wrenches, and praying while spraying are just a few of his favorite things.
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