“We haven’t been in the Winner’s Circle for so long, our Champagne has aged”, said McLennan jokingly of the win.

The triumph has been a long time coming for the team, who brought the all-new hemi-powered dragster to the March Meet with but a single test run completed only one week before the race. Once at the March Meet the car went quicker and faster with each pass.

Winning the March Meet is the realization of a dream for driver Adam Sorokin, who said he has always wanted to follow on the legendary lines of his own father Mike Sorokin, who took the 1966 March Meet win in The Surfers hemi-powered AA/Fuel dragster.

“It is almost too big of a dream to actually realize”, said Sorokin fresh from the winning charge that brought his longtime dream into reality.

“This thing pulled as hard as anything I’ve ever driven”, said Sorokin of the new dragster.

Become a fan of the Champion Speed Shop on Facebook for quick updates from the free Monday session of the March Meet at Famoso Raceway.

Actually there’s about twenty or so seconds of video with the team handing over the car to Adam Sorokin for the second full qualifying pass on the hemi-powered dragster. For the second time in as many rounds, the car in the other lane suffered mechanical breakage, handing Sorokin a second single qualifying pass at Famoso. While these occurrences may give rise to unsubstantiated rumors of some sort of mechanically disruptive secret weapon hidden under the carbon-fiber body panels, the new car may in fact be so incredible that it simply disables worthy opponents before they even get a chance to run. What really happened though, is what you see here. Sorokin took the car down track and into the show with a 7.63 second ET pass at 207 mph. Click on the video above or head on over to the Champion Speed Shop YouTube channel for more videos.

More: Champion Speed Shop YouTube Channel

South San Francisco, California USA – More nitromethane through the pipes is always a good thing. Just ask the Champion Speed Shop, who will field not one but two supercharged front engine top fuel dragsters for the 2010 drag racing season. The South San Francisco crew will run with an all-new Van Dyke Motorsports hemi-powered Retroliner entry in the NHRA Heritage Series points battle, and retain the Chevrolet-powered flip-top canopy Special for select vintage drag racing events. This unique situation makes driver Adam Sorokin the only man in drag racing to have a choice between a top fuel Chevy or nitro-huffing hemi to hammer down the full 1320 feet of the quarter mile.

The latest Champion Speed Shop creation features a Rodeck hemi engine between the Neil and Parks frame rails. The Guy Ruchonnet body panels wear a paint treatment that only Art Himsl himself could create. The car is ready to put the twist to the Hoosier tires, and driver Adam Sorokin is ready for twice nitromethane behind the wheel of a machine that hearkens back to the late sixties while running quicker, faster, and safer than ever before.

“This thing is really beautiful”, said Sorokin of the new hemi-powered car.

The psychedelic-era Art Himsl paintwork was still curing on the panels when the team rolled up to Sacramento Raceway for testing just one Sunday before from the final round of top fuel eliminations at the 52nd running of the Bakersfield March Meet. The team and car will descend onto the legendary patch this weekend March 5th, 6th, and 7th 2010.

Information on the 52nd running of the legendary March Meet March 5th, 6th, and 7th at the Auto Club Famoso Raceway in Bakersfield can be found here: Be There!

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Photos Dennis Barraza, Adam Sorokin and the Champion Speed Shop lens crew.

The reward for a hot day in the sun at Sacramento Raceway is a long cool night of top fuel drag racing. Eight cars lined up in the field from afternoon qualifying set first round of eliminations at dusk. From eight would come only four, then two in the final round at 10 p.m. Adam Sorokin took a round one 5.88-second quickest ET yet at 215 mph victory over Williamson, who crossed over the center line for a foul. Second round eliminations appeared at first to be the last for the Champion Speed Shop against Brett Harris, but again the center line was breached. Sorokin would challenge Rick White for the top fuel Governor’s Cup.

Both teams tore their cars down to the engine block in a thrash to get their machines back together again for a final round slated for 10 p.m. On one side was the small block Chevy, on the other was a Chrysler hemi. Adam Sorokin and Rick White paired up under the stars where a fraction of a second can win, or in this case, end a race before it starts. One thousandth of a second was all the clocks needed to turn a green light to red for Sorokin. Rick White took his hemi-powered dragster downtrack for the win light with a 5.72 elapsed time at 264 mph blast.

Making it to the final against the record-setting Neil and White entry was a victory in itself for the Champion Speed Shop team, who clicked off the best yet elapsed time at the same race track where only months before the crew made the first ever shakedown runs with the all-new small block Chevy combination.

“I feel like we left here winners big time”, said Adam Sorokin of the weekend spent reaching for the Governor’s Cup. Next stop South San Francisco, for a return to Bakersfield for the NHRA Hot Rod Reunion.

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The Champion Speed Shop has made it to Bowling Green, Kentucky for the NHRA Reunion, and clicked off a 6.15 at 204 mph in the 90-plus degree heat during a an afternoon qualifying session at Beech Bend Raceway Park. With one eye clouded in with humidity and nitromethane and the other on the track, driver Adam Sorokin left a hair early on the tree in the right lane. Howard Haight is shown here on his way to a 6.07 run at 245 mph blast in the left lane. The Champion crew is now readying the car for the second round of qualifying for the top fuel dragster field, set to run on what is forecasted to be a slightly cooler Saturday top fuel qualifying session.

“It’s like going to Churchill Downs to drag race. Bowling Green is truly beautiful, and unlike any other drag strip. It’s one of my favorite races of the year”, said driver Adam Sorokin.

For more information on the 2009 Holley NHRA Hot Rod Reunion head on over to the NHRA Motorsports Wally Parks Museum. Note: That’s Jim McLennan wearing a suit and tie in the cockpit of the circa-1966 Champion Speed Shop Special in a photo shoot on the streets of San Francisco.

Thanks to the miracle of modern technology we’re able to present this inside the cockpit video of driver Adam Sorokin on a complete run in the Champion Speed Shop small block Chevy front engine Top Fuel dragster at the 2009 Rod and Kulture Dragfest. Seeing is very much believing. This short movie occurs in real time, and covers the entire run. First comes engine start to burn out, backup, and staging into the lights. Once the bulb goes green, Adam puts the screws to the Chevy for the run. 5.99 seconds later he hits the parachutes, and puts on the whoa from 235 miles per hour to make the turnout road.

The long haul to the Bakersfield started before sunrise on Friday at the Champion Speed Shop world headquarters in South San Francisco. The Special and trailer were already under way. The Champion Speed Shop 1934 Ford pickup’s blown small block Chevrolet was idling ready. Crew members motored towards Famoso Raceway from all points on the California map. A little over a month after the return of the small block Chevy on nitromethane to the March Meet, the Destination was once again the same. Bakersfield, California. This time it was Dragfest.

Friday started out early and ended just as fast. Less than an hour after the car was out of the trailer and fired up to seat in the clutch discs, skies darkened and a wind pushed ahead of something that doesn’t happen all that often out at the Famoso. Rain. And lots of it. Buckets of rain stopped the race for the day. The car and all the equipment were pushed back into the trailer without even one run. This rain would pass, and Saturday brought a blue sky and nitromethane back out to the lanes.

Saturday Chicago Style

After nipping at the fives with 6.01-second 234 MPH first round qualifying blast, the Champion Speed Shop Special was back and ready for the late afternoon Chicago-style eliminations round at the Rod and Kulture Dragfest. The team was ready to rock when a jammed reverser felled Brad Thompson after both cars heated up the tires with a burnout. Adam Sorokin was able to back up and was in the beams when the order came to shut it down. With not enough fuel in the tank to complete another burnout and run, the team was sidelined until after fuel altereds and funny cars.

Just seconds later a medical emergency in the stands had the only ambulance leaving the grounds, and resulted in two blinking reds flashing on the tree. The entire show was postponed until another ambulance could make it back out to Famoso. Champion Speed Shop veteran Tom Homer joked that he could call the Auto Club to bring some nitro combusted during the burnout and backup. The 400 cubic inch small block huffs thirteen gallons of the good stuff on a stout pass, and can evaporate five gallons on the burnout alone.

The crew was dispatched to the pits to pick up a few gallons of the good stuff. With the tank topped off, engine cooled down, and any extra nitromethane backed out of the cylinders, the starter kicked over the small block Chevy to life. The Champion team worked with the clockwork precision required to get a 2500 horsepower race car consistently down the quarter mile. With the staging bulbs lit, driver Adam Sorokin took it and motored down the quarter mile to click off the quickest time and fastest run yet for the new setup. The clock lit up with a 5.96-second elapsed time and 235 MPH speed.

“It didn’t even throw up on me”, said Sorokin.

Despite the five-second time, the race was over for the Champion Speed Shop. The AA/Fuel top fuel dragster show at Dragfest was run Chicago Style. This means that every car makes one run. After the tire smoke clears, the two quickest and fastest cars come back to run for the win. In this particular Famoso-style Chicago sangwich, Rick Williamson bested Adam Sorokin’s 5.96 by a mere one hundredth of a second. While racing was a wrap for the Champion Speed Shop, the show was not finished.

Race and Run Again

The car was torn down and reassembled as night fell and the Dragfest transformed from race to entertainment mode. The crowd gathered underneath a drive-in movie sized screen running drag strip visuals to a period correct soundtrack by the Dynatones. Nitro action would continue come sun up, with exhibitions of nitro altereds, funny cars and kustom kontraptions running non-stop. The Sunday sessions netted two more runs for the Champion Speed Shop, with a 5.99 and a late afternoon 6.06 to wrap up the weekend for the South City crew.

Next stop – Bowling Green, Kentucky for the NHRA Hot Rod Reunion. June 19th-21st 2009.