‘No Prep’ Champ Reveals Incredible New Camaro ZL1 Racer
Street Outlaws star Ryan Martin reveals his latest Camaro designed to dominate streets.
If you’re a fan of Street Outlaws or Street Outlaws: No Prep Kings, you’re already quite familiar with Ryan Martin. The driver of the Fireball Camaro has spent his fair share of time winning races on both shows. He’s a regular on the 405’s top ten list, as well as the latest No Prep Kings champion. Which is a pretty impressive feat given the level of competition in this hotly contested format. But like anything in life, if you want to stay successful, you have to keep upping your game. Thus, Martin has commissioned a brand new, highly advanced Camaro ZL1 racer to replace his old red one.
Martin pulled the covers off his new ride at the Performance Racing Industry Show in Indianapolis, Indiana, and DragZine was on hand to get the details on this slick Camaro. And it’s an impressive machine, combining incredibly advanced kit with seriously beautiful details. The new ride was built by Billy Gilsbach, who also built the Fireball Camaro. Gilsbach used a mixture of ultra-lightweight materials in its construction, including prodigious amounts of carbon fiber and titanium.
But there are a few notable differences. The new Camaro is two inches shorter and the engine sits further back in the chassis, for starters. It’s also much lighter, to the tune of 200 pounds. According to Martin, his Fireball Camaro was originally built for Outlaw-style and drag radial racing. This new Camaro, however, is designed specifically for street and no prep racing. Which is amazing, really, to think that Martin has enjoyed so much success in a car not even designed for what he does.
“When we first bought that car and got to racing on the street and in no prep, we said, ‘this car shouldn’t work good, because the engine is too for forward.’ It’s got a 92-inch axle to mid-plate centerline measurement,” Martin said. “But we made it work, and obviously it’s one of the fastest no prep cars there is. But, I knew when we were building the new one that we could do better. We could improve upon it. Now, we have done things to gear it more toward being a no prep car. The engine was moved back approximately 8-inches, and a double framerail has been built to be both higher and wider, which should make for a more stable car.”
To make all of this fit and retain the look of a real Camaro, Gilsbach had to do a ton of fabrication. The doors and front end alone required hundreds of man hours of massaging. In the end, he managed to do the impossible and make this Camaro look like a real one – not some sort of street legal funny car. As far as the drivetrain goes, the ZL1 packs the same combo as the Fireball. Prodigious power is provided by a Pro Line Racing 481X fitted with two Precision Pro Mod 98mm turbos. It’s controlled by a FuelTech FT600 ECU, and sends power back through an M&M-built Turbo 400 transmission. Because why try and fix what isn’t broken?
Martin and his team just finished the build right before PRI, so obviously the car hasn’t seen any track time yet. But we can’t wait to see how it does in the upcoming racing season. At this point, it almost seems like an unfair advantage for the already established street racer.
Photos: DragZine
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