Yesterday marked the opening day of the 2011 Formula Drift season and GM opened the season up with a bang! Thanks to some fearless driving during qualifying by Conrad Grunewald and his GM Performance Parts-powered Chevy Camaro, GM earned the first qualifying position among the top 32 competitors out on the field. Conrad’s Camaro is powered by a GMPP Crate Engine version of the upcoming supercharged Camaro ZL1 powerplant, so there’s plenty of power to swing the Camaro’s rear end around. We’ll be excited to see just how well those ponies can leave little bits of Hankook rubber on the Streets of Long Beach track today.

Formula Drift action opens up today at 11:30 PM PST and we’ll be carrying all of the action here on GMTunerSource.com via the livestream here - http://www.gmtunersource.com/gmracing/drifting/formula-drift-live

In case you can’t sit glued to your computer all day, GMTS will be broadcasting up to the minute updates during competition runs on our Facebook page here - http://www.facebook.com/GMTunerSource

SOURCE: Wrecked Magazine

The results are in! And it turns out that the 4th Annual CrateEngineDepot.com Sport Compact Meet was a resounding success! As we all know, it’s the people that make up a community, and luckily we have tons of great people that make up the GM small car family – and apparently some that have a little bit too much free time and access to tons of blue painter’s tape! Hit the jump and check out the mischief and fun that went down at CED this past weekend.

The party started with some good ole fashion drag racing Friday night at the Great Lakes Dragway. This was the first time at a drag strip for quite a few Cobalt owners who were anxious to lay down the best passes possible to show they had the goods before Saturday’s beauty pageant. One of the most notable passes of the night was by a 70 year old veteran who had not raced in over 50 years. That fact surprised a lot of those in attendance though because he was able to pull off a .089 reaction time and hit 14.1 through the whole 1320. Quite impressive indeed for 50 years of dust to shake off! You can check out all of the great shots of Cobalts taking on some classic drag cars in our image gallery at the bottom.

On Saturday, the festivities made their way over to Rockenbach Chevrolet which was the official gathering point of the meet. One of the best things about a large meet like this is being able to check out all of the unique modifications each person has done to their cars, and boy was there ever an eclectic range of ideas on display at Rockenbach. Everything from a Batman-inspired HHR and a Cobalt with Italian Police livery to lambo doors and grand sport stripes. The customization didn’t stop there either as the blue painters tape was out in force and even completely covered a Cobalt’s hood, which was good because it served as a message board to display some very descriptive and seemingly very important information about a few owners at the show (you can check that image out in the gallery and see if you can spot all of the not-so-subtle notes).

Something really exciting about this year’s show was the vast distances that owners came from. There were Cobalts from as far away as California, Florida and New York that made an appearance which only means one thing… The ION, SKY, Solstice and HHR groups need to step it up for the fall show! For those that did make it out, there were special gifts and deals available from GM Performance Division and GM Performance Parts. Never one to miss an event, Bill Duncan from GMPD was on-site to answer questions and bounce ideas off of which he seemed to never stop doing all day long.

If you couldn’t make it out to Rockenbach Chevrolet for the event, don’t fret. We have almost 60 pictures documenting the weekend that you can thumb through in our gallery below. Do you see your car in the coverage shots? Give us a shout below and let us know who you are!

 

The HOT ROD Power Tour keeps on moving along and for day 5 of the tour, Chattanooga, TN is the destination. The first couple days of the Power Tour was mired with rain and clouds but Chattanooga brought out the sun for the convoy of hooked up rides that follow the tour from city to city. There are some amazing cars at this stop, like every stop, but in TN a restored, flat back drop-top with suicide doors and an LS1 stuffed under the hood made us drool. Check out the gallery for full details on that sick piece of metal.

One of the unique opportunities of catching up with the Power Tour is that the GM Performance Division always has the coolest items on display for gearheads to check out. One of those features is the very detailed cut-away and stock engines they have in the GMPD booth. For the Power Tour, GMPD has been showcasing a few of the top dog engines that hot rodders of any age will appreciate.

On display is an old style Z383 small block with a Holley carburetor for the old school and budget minded while a 572 cu in. is showcased for the Big Block fans. But what engine display would be complete without a LS9? That’s right, you can check out the mighty LS9 at the GMPD booth in all its supercharged glory. The LS9 is not for the power- or price-squeamish though as it commands $22,000 for all 600hp of its supercharged ponies – and that doesn’t even include the accessory drive, wiring harness or ECU. If that’s too rich for your blood, or your tires, you’re in luck as GMPP has an engine for every budget on display.

GMPD is also featuring the new E-Rod street package, which is a 100% California emission-compliant package and it comes bundled to a few of GMPP’s most popular motors including the LS3. As any novice knows, the LS3 has over 430hp and at only $9,400 for the entire package you might as well be stealing it – word around town is that if you ask your GMPP dealer nicely you’ll get a hefty discount off that price too.

We’d like to give a special callout to Keith & Donna Kenney who have been participating in the HRPT since year 3 and have made quilt from past year’s HRPT shirts. Now that’s dedication! Take a look at their masterpiece in the gallery below.

Be warned Birmingham, AL. The Power Tour is coming to you next!

 

The Cobalt Stage 1 Kit is well along its way to being available at a dealer near you. As such, we hear more details weekly that we can then pass on to you, the Cobalt SS Turbo owner and fan. If you are the lucky owner one of these turbocharged monsters, you’ll be able to run out and buy the new Stage 1 kit from a GMPP dealer and instantly add 20hp and 60lb.-ft of torque to your Cobalt and keep your full factory warranty intact. In addition to the added power, the kit serves as the gateway mod for the Cobalt and will disable the “learn down feature” of the stock PCM. This nifty feature allows your Cobalt to fully utilize any other modifications (intake, header, exhaust, downpipe, etc) that you’ve may have or wish to add in the future – making your dream 350hp Cobalt a very close reality.

GM Performance Parts Stage Three kit, plus the required components from the Stage Two kit. Stage Three is an upgrade to Stage Two.

This is GM's highest level performance kit for the Chevy Cobalt SS Supercharged and Saturn ION Redline cars. It is an off-highway (not street legal and not emissions certified) kit.

I hope this post will answer most of your questions -- both about how to make the kit work for you and about why we did what we did with the kit.