About 10 years ago, Dale Earnhardt finally won the Daytona 500, President Bill Clinton "Did not have sexual relations" with his intern, a company called Google started up, and GM discontinued the LT1 motor to make way for the LS1. Fast forward to 2008: Sadly Dale Earnhardt is gone, Bill Clinton is still denying allegations, and none of us at GMHTP bought stock in Google. The good news is that the LT1 and LT4 engines never left and they are making more power than ever-proof of which was available to those on hand for the first annual LTX shootout in Kansas City on April 19, 2008.
When the LT1 came onto the scene, it was an amazing motor, definitively crushing Ford's V-8 efforts, but it's relatively short production run, oft-maligned Opti-spark, and GM's fantastic support of the LSX have overshadowed one of the best performance bargains on the planet.
Last October, the LS crowd got together for the massively sponsored and successful LSX shootout-an event that was long overdue. While the GM faithful were thrilled by the event, for those running LTs it begged the question: "What about me?"
Enter Tony Shepherd, the guy who didn't ask, "What about the LTs," but immediately asked, "How can I make this happen," and proceeded to throw the idea out to the Internet forums frequented by the LTX crowd. It didn't take long before the idea took on a life of its own and enthusiastic bench-racing and smack-talking started. Tony quickly realized that if he was going harness this pent-up demand and energy, he needed a forum for those interested in discussing it-so, he enlisted Kyle McKenzie to put together a Web site and forum aptly called www.ltxshootout.com. The Web site would prove pivotal in organizing the event and attracting a dozen top-shelf sponsors, including ProCharger, AFR, BMR, Nitrous Outlet, and event sponsor Speed Data Solutions Inc. Tony and friends were swiftly putting together a precisely researched, well-planned, and richly sponsored event that would make any corporation blush with pride.
According to Shepherd: "The hardest thing about organizing the event was setting up the classes and rules, and as ideas were thrown out, some were pleased, and some weren't. I decided to start public polls on the forums to gather data to determine what the majority would like to see at the shootout. Decisions such as where and when the event should take place, what classes, and what rules for each class."
Tony knew he was never going to make everyone happy, but decisions had to be made, so he created a panel of eight hard-core LTX racers to help the process along and get buy-in from the community.
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Steve Hetzler made the trip from St. Charles, Missouri, in his teal green 1995 Z28. | 
Matt Holubec out of Waco, Texas, brought his '93 Camaro Z28 powered by a 383 LT1 topped off with AFR heads and 100 hp of nitrous, and managed 10.30 at 130. Matt's very streetable Z28 was hooking hard consistently with 1.35 60-foots. |