$10K Drag Shootout: Team Bigun Earns The Final Spot!

Your votes have been cast, the ballots have been tallied, and North Carolina’s Team Bigun is headed to the Horsepower Wars $10K Drag Shootout!

Headed up by Drag Week and street car racing standout Eric Yost, this stacked team of racers, tuners, and fabricators is unequivocally a force to be reckoned with in this 10-day build-off and the subsequent drag race that will decide the whole battle later this summer. Yost’s team nabbed more than half of the votes cast, earning 56-percent of the overall vote to beat out the other two finalists: Dwayne Gutridge’s Team Dirty Jersey and Brad Riekoff’s West Bend Dyno Tuning squad.

“We had a lot of family and friends to help out with the vote count, and we had a ton of good companies to share our posts and give them likes and it went really well. All the Drag Week guys, all of Lyle’s supporters, and groups like Real Tuners and Leaf Spring Nation, they all pushed our stuff,” said Yost.

Yost’s highly successful, street-driven ’68 Camaro.

Team Bigun’s cast includes a few household names in door-car racing circles; its driver, Lyle Barnett, is one of drag radial racing’s most accomplished and well-liked stars, having driven to a leaf spring record behind the wheel of Jason Digby’s “Tooth Jerker” Dodge Dart. He has also wheeled a host of other small-tire machines at various points. Yost campaigns his familiar, patina-themed 1968 Camaro that he’s driven to victories at Drag Week and Rocky Mountain Race Week. Tuner Peter Harrell has been behind a host of radial tire racers and records over the years. The team is rounded out by Jason Smith, who works in sales at TBM Brakes, and Chris Bailey, a talented robotic control specialist by day who works for Yost after-hours doing fabrication, CNC machining, and robotic welding.

“We’re absolutely looking forward to it,” Yost says of this unique build that will award $10,000 — and the winning racecar — to the last team standing. “This is right up our alley, and we’re excited about coming out to play with everybody.”

The leaf spring record-setting “Tooth Jerker” with Barnett at the controls.

A team like this, of course, goes to the racetrack prepared every time. But the $10K Drag Shootout is designed to be a virtually wide-open affair for the four teams who will go to battle, with the vehicle makes and models and the base engine packages a virtual unknown prior to the build. So what do Yost and company have up their sleeves?

“We’ve talked about some plans over a beer or two, just trying to figure out a game-plan, but the bottom line is we don’t know what we’ve got to work with, so we’ll have to see what we have to choose from and what all the rules are. The Dream Team looks like it may have some heavy-hitters, but with my guys that I work with every day, I know exactly what my team can do and I’d put them up against anybody.”

The Horsepower Wars $10K Drag Shootout has been made possible by some of the leading companies in our industry, including Royal Purple, Comp Cams, TCI Transmissions, Mickey Thompson Performance Tires & Wheels, E3 Spark Plugs, Fragola, Holley, Diablosport, Mahle Motorsports, Dyna-Batt, ProCharger, Weld Racing, ARP, BMR Suspension, QA1, PRW, Covercraft, and of course, Summit Racing.

About the author

Andrew Wolf

Andrew has been involved in motorsports from a very young age. Over the years, he has photographed several major auto racing events, sports, news journalism, portraiture, and everything in between. After working with the Power Automedia staff for some time on a freelance basis, Andrew joined the team in 2010.
Read My Articles

Drag Racing in your Inbox.

Build your own custom newsletter with the content you love from Dragzine, directly to your inbox, absolutely FREE!

Free WordPress Themes
Dragzine NEWSLETTER - SIGN UP FREE!

We will safeguard your e-mail and only send content you request.

Dragzine - Drag Racing Magazine

We'll send you the most interesting Dragzine articles, news, car features, and videos every week.

Dragzine - Drag Racing Magazine

Dragzine NEWSLETTER - SIGN UP FREE!

We will safeguard your e-mail and only send content you request.

Dragzine - Drag Racing Magazine

Thank you for your subscription.

Subscribe to more FREE Online Magazines!

We think you might like...


Street Muscle Magazine
Hot Rods & Muscle Cars
Diesel Army
Diesel Army
Engine Labs
Engine Tech

Dragzine - Drag Racing Magazine

Thank you for your subscription.

Subscribe to more FREE Online Magazines!

We think you might like...

  • Streetmuscle Hot Rods & Muscle Cars
  • Diesel Army Diesel Army
  • Engine Labs Engine Tech

Dragzine - Drag Racing Magazine

Dragzine

Thank you for your subscription.

Thank you for your subscription.

Dragzine - Drag Racing Magazine

Thank you for your subscription.

Thank you for your subscription.

Loading