The first-ever, Carb Shooutout at the BLP Corral in Orlando, Florida, which ran this last November, was a huge success that will undoubtedly lead to many more carb-build competitions to come, as Speedtalk’s Steve Zicht has so promptly indicated.

Image credit: GZMotorsports.com

The November event was a historical first for the Corral and for GZ Motorsports of Volcano, California, whose ground-breaking, VP410N Super Pro Pump was chosen as the vacuum pump of choice for the innovative, performance carb build-off. The engine platform of choice was the so-called, “very healthy” Chev big block from Steve Schmidt Racing Engines of Indianapolis, Indiana. Schmidt Racing Engines’ mill that was used with various carb applications throughout the “shootout” was a 1235-horse, 614-cube big block with Dart 11-degree heads and a Dart Box Ram intake.

GZ Motorsports was pleased to be such a substantial player in the horsepower-happy showoff of carburetor design, and their VP410N unit helped the 1200+-horse big block to run with every carb application that the BLP Shootout contestants could throw at it, limiting the vacuum pump’s output to 20 in hg. Speedtalk’s Steve Zicht describes the atmosphere of the BLP carb shootout as festive yet cooperative, as none of the Shootout contestants “teased” or made “lude comments” during the competition, but instead helped each other out, as Zicht himself explains, “I gathered that the atmosphere during the competition was lively and many of the competitors were actually helping each other [evaluate] dyno data during the Ultimate Testing Phase of the testing.”

Steve Zicht was also excited to report some of the dyno results from the BLP Corral, including the Small Block Shootout portion of the competition, which was won by contestant and, as Zicht proclaims, “maverick” carb builder, Mark Whitener. Dave Braswell, deemed as the “godfather” of racing carburetors, finished in second place of the Big Block shootout, with the crew of AED Performance of Richmond, Virginia grabbing first. While we were at the 2011 PRI show we had a chance to talk with John Dickey of AED about the success that AED had while at the shootout.

The future of the BLP Carb Shootout looks promising for 2012, as Speedtalk’s Steve Zicht explains, “I’m sure that many of the ‘non-competing’ shops that could not be there will make plans to be there in 2012…As I had suspected previously, the 2011 contest did produce some real surprises in the end…”