If John Kolivas is going to do something he is going to do it whole heartedly! John decided in 2004 he wanted to race with the best drag radial racers out there and that was in the NMRA. The car was put together to compete in the 2005 season and compete it did. John was able to get his first victory in his first year of competition, which is pretty rare with the high level of competition in all the NMRA classes. Being able to make two finals, one win and fifth place finish in the points says a lot about the dedication he has to winning.
Even though John had some success in 2005, it was not enough. The car was torn all apart and completely gone through to chase the championship John wanted so bad. He was not going to settle for anything less in 2006 then a championship. That is just what he did with 6 final round appearances in 8 races. Four of those final rounds were wins along with a win in the NMRA vs NMCA SuperBowl. All of that on his way to the NMRA drag radial championship.
You might think John could take it easy for one winter, but that was not the case. He was going to stay ahead of the pack. The winter of 2006 the car was off to Southern Speed and Wade Hopkins for a complete SFI 25.2 chassis upgrade to make the car safer and work better. There was nothing left untouched on the car for the 2007 season. The first pass out, everyone knew they were in for trouble. John ran as fast as 8.02 and won the first race of the season in Bradenton. John went on to be in the finals at 6 of the 7 races and winning 4 of those. They also won the TCI Shootout and the SuperBowl race and the season was capped off with a second straight championship.
The winter of 2007 brought on more change for Kolivas’s team and it was all a surprise to everyone in Bradenton. When they opened the hood everyone was shocked to see a 5.4 modular motor under the hood. The same record setting performance was there as the previous year. John had won the first two races of the year and that is big start to winning a record setting third straight championship. Another big accomplishment came in the third race.
The third race was at Milan, Michigan. The first day was pretty much rained out, so the NMRA gave everyone a test pass Saturday morning. John set the car on kill and was hoping the track would hold it, and the track did to the tune of 7.99 at 176 mph. This is not an official pass as far as the NMRA is concerned but John even stopped by the scales because no one has ever claimed to run a 7 second pass on BF Goodrich drag radials. He wanted someone else to verify he was NMRA legal on the killer pass. The day went down hill from there. The track went away from there with the sun shinning and the heat rising. John was only able to muster an 8.50 in his two qualifying shots on Saturday, but it got worse. They found a dropped valve and did not know how much damage was done.
John yanked the motor out and was very lucky that the guys from Aeromotive were there and Brett jumped in and went to work on the cylinder head that was hurt. Dave Guy loaned a valve to replace the broken one, and after Brett worked 2-3 hours it was ready to go back together and in the car. The car was very consistent running 8.17 until the finals when is slowed and Joe Bridge was able to get around him.
With more weight in John’s future from the mid-season rule changes it is hard to tell what will be under the hood of the Cobra at Joliet. John is getting frustrated with getting more weight for his hard work and is still undecided on where and what class he will race next year, but he is 90% sure it will not be NMRA Drag Radial class. Check out
www.stangtv.com to see what John will be running at the SuperBowl. Over the last two and a half years Kolivas Racing has been in 15 of 18 finals with 10 wins, 2 SuperBowl wins and a TCI Shootout win. Here are some of the sponsors that make it possible for John to be successful.
TCI Southern Speed Bennett Racing Motive Gear Diablosport AMS-1000 Ford Racing Six4Designs UPR Products Precision Turbo
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