Formula Drift Round One: Streets of Long Beach

Formula Drift Round One: Streets of Long Beach

Posted on by Konig Wheels

April 5th, 2014 – Formula Drift: Round 1 – “Streets of Long Beach”

Dennis Mertzanis made his re-entry back into the professional drift series, Formula Drift – with his revamped Hyundai Genesis Coupe.

1,000 horsepower is generated from a built CBM engine, with a Vortech Supercharger. This beast sits on Konig Milligrams, wrapped in Kenda Tires, and they spin furiously in every gear.

Mertzanis totes that the practice round was good. Having a solid car, ehem, beast of a racecar for Formula Drift will prove some adjusting, but as the session continued his runs improved.

During the event, the Genesis Coupe made a transition into a wall, which sent the bumper flying off of the car, but this wasn’t a show-stopper.

Dennis qualified 24th in 2 runs with an equal scoring of 70. In the Top 32, Dennis was alluded by Chelsea DeNofa after an engine stall / restart episode.

Shortly after, DeNofa broke an axle and called it quits. Mertzanis had some repairs of his own to make, which with some quick help – got him back on to the blacktop.

Dennis Mertzanis ended up making it into the Top 16, and will move on to Round 2 Atlanta.

You can follow news about Dennis Mertzanis’ 2014 season right here on the Konig Blog as well as visiting Dennis’ Blog over at Wrecked Magazine.

Check out the video and photography and video right below.

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Wrecked Gallery: Formula Drift (Round 5)

Posted on by Konig Wheels

KÖNIG Wheels sponsors the Wrecked Magazine Formula Drift Main Event Gallery. After every round, some great event coverage is collected into a gallery on Wrecked Magazine. Check out all the scenes from Formula Drift Round 5 Right Here and check out some of the clips after the break of Dennis Mertzanis after, who made the Top 16 in Round 5 at Evergreen Speedway.

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2013 Nitto Tires United States Touring Car Championship

Posted on by Konig Wheels

The start of the 2013 Nitto Tires United States Touring Car Championship (USTCC) has started heating up some of the best tracks around! This season promises to be one of the best seasons in USTCC history with some awesome tracks and extreme levels of competition. Race # 2 will be at the longest race track in all of North America; Utah’s Miller Motorsports Park . The USTCC teams will putting their cars through some terrific terrain on the 4.5 mile road course with a breath taking 3500 foot straightaway towards turn one.

There are lots of new cars and lots of new teams for 2013. Some of the existing teams will be expanding their efforts with added drivers and cars. The GoGoGear.com team will be running three cars at most races while they will field four cars at selected events with the addition of their new E90 BMW chassis to their existing BMW M3 and the always popular Hyundai Genesis Coupe.

We will be bringing you up to date information following the race in only a few short weeks! Best of luck to all of the competitors. Check out the Gogogear Hyundai Genesis Coupe driven by Ali Arsham #33.

 

Mertzanis’ Genesis Spotted at 2013 Formula Drift (Tech Day)

Posted on by Konig Wheels

Dennis Mertzanis and his brand new Hyundai Genesis Coupe have made their debut at the 2013 Formula Drift tech day this last weekend.  He has been testing rigoriously at Buttonwillow raceway to dial in the car in time  for the season opener.  The streets of long beach is about to turn in record ticket sales for the 2013 season starting in Long Beach April 12-13.  The new setup has gobs of power with an already potent 3.8L v6 under the hood; that was just not enough to break the tires at 80mph.  A Brian Crower 4.0L stroker kit was exactly what the car needed, oh and the addition of a large turbocharger the car will easily blow the tires off at well over 100mph. The car is now putting out a wopping 600hp and 540ft/tq

Video Interview:

 

Forza Motorsport 4: GoGoGear Hyundai Genesis

Posted on by Konig Wheels

KÖNIG is really excited to see another one of our sponsored vehicles in Forza Motorsport 4.

New to the Forza Motorsport 4 platform is the GoGoGear.com Hyundai Genesis Coupe. The GoGoGear Hyundai Genesis utilizes KÖNIG Kilograms on the track, and were certainly well rendered on the car in Forza Motorsport.

Check out some of the studio shots below as well as instructions on how to pick up the car in Forza Motorsport 4.






The GoGoGear Hyundai Genesis can be downloaded from the Xbox 360 Storefront by searching “ali arsham – ustcc”. A tune is also available for this car.

All images are courtesy of Forza Motorsport 4 / Turn 10 Studios

First Podium for Hyundai

Posted on by Konig Wheels

Ali Arsham Scores his First Podium for the GoGoGear.com/Konig Wheels Hyundai Genesis Coupe

Willows, Calif., May 22, 2012 – Ali Arsham, driving the GoGoGear.com/Konig Wheels Hyundai Genesis Coupe, finished in third place in round two of the Nitto Tires United States Touring Car Championship (USTCC) at Thunderhill Raceway in Willows, California. The team fought hard against many other manufacturers including Volvo, Mazda, Dodge, Honda, Acura, Mitsubishi and BMW using crew mostly comprised of students and instructors from Universal Technical Institute, a leading training school for future automotive technicians.

The race started off in a normal fashion with Robert Thorne’s K-PAX Volvo C30 starting from pole position and assuming the lead. A fight soon began between the Volvo of Thorne and the TNI Racing Mazdaspeed 3 of Felipe Cabezas. Cabezas was glued to the yellow Volvo and would not let Thorne get away. The two started to pull away from everyone else and nearly collided on the first lap in Turn 6. Behind the pair, Arsham’s Hyundai was running on a completely different strategy. Things really got interesting as soon as the fuel stops started to come into play.

After about 90 minutes of racing the battle for the final podium spot started to heat up. Arsham’s Hyundai was running in third place in the latter part of the race. “My strategist was on the radio telling me that Cabezas was on the same lap as me and was gaining on me quickly. He did the math and said that I need to speed up considerably or I will get passed,” commented Arsham after the race.

The GoGoGear.com team’s strategy was bold and risky from the beginning. They decided to try and complete the race without stopping for fuel. “Hyundais are known for their excellent reliability and fuel economy. We knew that these were the strengths of our Del City.net Genesis Coupe and knew that we needed to use those strengths to gain an advantage,” added Arsham.

On lap 39, the Mazda caught up and passed Arsham and it looked like the Mazda was headed to the podium. But five laps later, the Mazda was forced to pit. The turbocharged engine was thirsty and needed more fuel while the 3.8-liter V6 engine in the Hyunai was providing much better fuel economy. The TNI Racing Team crew hurried and did a super quick pit stop lap of 3:03, the fastest pit stop of the day to try to send Cabezas in front of Arsham. But as the car was still in the pits, Arsham roared by the pits and reclaimed third place. Then both teams started to work out the math to figure out the gap. With only five laps left in the race, Arsham’s crew radioed him to step it up. They knew that third place was theirs to lose. Arsham started to click his personal best laps in the last five laps of the race trying to stop Cabezas from catching him. The TNI Racing crew also knew what was going on and were telling Cabezas that he needs to step it up. While on the last lap, Cabezas was behind the winner but one lap down and the checkered flag was shown. Cabezas was done but Arsham who still had not received the checkered flag had one more lap to finish.

Everything was looking good but suddenly at Turn 9, the Hyundai slowed down out of fuel. “I knew it was out of gas because we have done considerable testing and know exactly what the car will and will not do. I knew that if I can get to Turn 14, I would be in good shape because it is a right hand turn and the fuel pick up is on the left side. Sure enough, just when it looked like the car was done, it came back to life,” said a very happy Arsham. The Hyundai crossed the finish line and then stopped on the side of the track, just after the pit exit in third place. “We used Hyundai’s fuel economy to our advantage to score a podium finish. This was our first podium finish in our Hyundai. Being able to do it with the help of the Universal Technical Institute students and instructors, is a real bonus,“ added Arsham.

The GoGoGear.com Racing team will be racing their Hyundai Genesis Coupe at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, CA on June 16-17, 2012 joining the National Auto Sport Association for their big summer racing festival. For more information visit www.gogogear.com or www.ustcc.com