Ed Bergenholtz
The Ultimate Mazda 6
Bergenholtz Racing's Mazda 6 is "Zoom-Zoom" on Ethanol
If Ed Bergenholtz stopped racing today, he would already be guaranteed a permanent place in the sport compact drag racing history books. The twenty-nine year old from Santa Ana, California secured the right to enter drag racing immortality by driving his Honda CRX to a 9.78@147 quarter mile pass in back in a May 1999 Battle of the Imports event, the first sub-ten second pass ever for a unibody FWD (front wheel drive) car. Maybe more important than his time slip though, were the revolutionary "wheelie bars" that were bolted onto the back of the CRX.
Long a staple in rear wheel drive drag racing, the Bergenholtz team were the first to devise a way to utilize the wheelie bars as traction bars – to keep the front end of the car (where the drive wheels are) planted for better launches and quicker E.T.s (elapsed times). The invention catapulted the team to the forefront of front wheel drive drag racing and by the next race half of the competitors were equipped with their own versions.
Fast-forward to 2003 and traction bars are still considered de rigueur for FWD drag cars and Ed Bergenholtz can still be spotted racing down the drag strip – not in his famed CRX, but a stealthy black Mazda 6. The Bergenholtz Racing Team (driver Ed, brother and crew chief Ron, Vince Tiaga, and Nathan Tasukon) made the switch to Mazda power for 2003 after Mazda offered to help the pioneering race team field a new program centered around a new Mazda powered and bodied tube-chassis drag car.
Ed Bergenholtz, a software programmer by occupation, crunched the offer and knew it was a winning combination. The process started unofficially when MAZDASPEED manager Tod M. Kaneko began talking to the Bergenholtz brothers about Mazda's commitment to performance and interest in supporting the sport compact drag racing series. Those talks in the beginning of 2002 led to more serious discussions and a presentation of Mazda's cars and engine technology by Kaneko and Mazda's Jim Jordan. "When we saw the looks of the car and the engine technology, we said 'hey this stuff is bad ass' and in a lot of cases – much better than the technology we had in our CRX," recalls Ed Bergenholtz about the meeting.
By summertime, a concept plan was formulated and the Bergenholtz brothers began an almost day and night process to get a Mazda 6 prepared for a debut in front of the automotive aftermarket industry at the November SEMA (Specialty Equipment Market Association) show. The Pro FWD class car was literally built in the span of two months and rolled into the Las Vegas Convention Center in time to receive high marks from Bergenholtz and Mazda fans alike. The excitement generated by the Mazda 6 rolling chassis propelled the Bergenholtz team through the next few months in a fast paced scramble to complete a running car by spring 2003.
After another in-progress display at the SEMA International Auto Salon in April, the Bergenholtz Team received an unexpected call from the NHRA informing them that they were eligible for an invitation to the NHRA Extreme Rush program at the Lucas Oil NHRA Route 66 Nationals at Joliet, IL, May 29-June 1, 2003. The news was welcome but also put the program into the proverbial pressure cooker - at full boil, since the team was faced with completing and debuting the untracked Mazda 6 in front of tens of thousands of NHRA POWERade fans as part of a special sport compact exhibition. The Bergenholtz Team once again exceeded expectations by debuting the Mazda 6 to an 8.50 second, 171.40 mph pass (among the quickest passes ever by fwd drag cars) that dispatched MOPAR competitor Shaun Carlson’s SRT-4 and ultimately advanced the Mazda 6 to a semifinal appearance.
"We were extremely under pressure to perform, but in hindsight we had all our bases covered. Our tight budget forces us to get things right the first time and we did our homework on all aspects of the car," said Ed Bergenholtz about the fabrication of the built-from-scratch car and program. In fact, the team personally had their hands in the majority of the car and engine fabrication. The tube framed chrome-moly chassis covered by the sleek Mazda 6 skin was designed and built in collaboration with Bullet Fabrication.
The chassis is the most important and trickiest part of building any tube-frame fwd racer since there are no precedents – everybody out there is trying their own designs. So far, our chassis has been excellent."
The engine program, featuring a 2.3-liter Mazda four cylinder that has been de-stroked to 2.1 liters, was also engineered in house in partnership with Golden Eagle Fabrication. Mazda provided much of the critical technical information needed to jump-start the program while the team handled all assembly and fabrication duties. The factory production block and heads have been fortified with JE Pistons, Crower Rods, and REV valves. BCE heads prepared the heads for exceptional air flow while a Garret turbocharger teamed with a Tail wastegate provide the extreme boost levels needed to produce the 600+ horsepower needed for an eight-second quarter mile pass. A MoTeC M800 tuned by noted tuner Harv St. Mary and team crew chief Tasukon controls the delivery of ethanol and boost levels while a Fortin transaxle translates the flywheel horsepower into wheel horsepower.
The Bergenholtz Racing Team plans on competing at all remaining Summit NHRA Sport Compact Drag Racing Series events for the 2003 season with a primary goal of being the first team to break the seven-second fwd barrier in the quarter mile. With primary sponsor Boost Mobile and associate sponsors Konig, Apex-I, BCE, Modern Image, Harv’s Performance, REV Valves on board and Mazda power under hood, Bergenholtz Racing is looking forward to "ZOOM-ZOOM" their Mazda 6 into the same record books that they first rewrote four years ago.
The Ultimate Mazda 6
Bergenholtz Racing's Mazda 6 is "Zoom-Zoom" on Ethanol
If Ed Bergenholtz stopped racing today, he would already be guaranteed a permanent place in the sport compact drag racing history books. The twenty-nine year old from Santa Ana, California secured the right to enter drag racing immortality by driving his Honda CRX to a 9.78@147 quarter mile pass in back in a May 1999 Battle of the Imports event, the first sub-ten second pass ever for a unibody FWD (front wheel drive) car. Maybe more important than his time slip though, were the revolutionary "wheelie bars" that were bolted onto the back of the CRX.
Long a staple in rear wheel drive drag racing, the Bergenholtz team were the first to devise a way to utilize the wheelie bars as traction bars – to keep the front end of the car (where the drive wheels are) planted for better launches and quicker E.T.s (elapsed times). The invention catapulted the team to the forefront of front wheel drive drag racing and by the next race half of the competitors were equipped with their own versions.
Fast-forward to 2003 and traction bars are still considered de rigueur for FWD drag cars and Ed Bergenholtz can still be spotted racing down the drag strip – not in his famed CRX, but a stealthy black Mazda 6. The Bergenholtz Racing Team (driver Ed, brother and crew chief Ron, Vince Tiaga, and Nathan Tasukon) made the switch to Mazda power for 2003 after Mazda offered to help the pioneering race team field a new program centered around a new Mazda powered and bodied tube-chassis drag car.
Ed Bergenholtz, a software programmer by occupation, crunched the offer and knew it was a winning combination. The process started unofficially when MAZDASPEED manager Tod M. Kaneko began talking to the Bergenholtz brothers about Mazda's commitment to performance and interest in supporting the sport compact drag racing series. Those talks in the beginning of 2002 led to more serious discussions and a presentation of Mazda's cars and engine technology by Kaneko and Mazda's Jim Jordan. "When we saw the looks of the car and the engine technology, we said 'hey this stuff is bad ass' and in a lot of cases – much better than the technology we had in our CRX," recalls Ed Bergenholtz about the meeting.
By summertime, a concept plan was formulated and the Bergenholtz brothers began an almost day and night process to get a Mazda 6 prepared for a debut in front of the automotive aftermarket industry at the November SEMA (Specialty Equipment Market Association) show. The Pro FWD class car was literally built in the span of two months and rolled into the Las Vegas Convention Center in time to receive high marks from Bergenholtz and Mazda fans alike. The excitement generated by the Mazda 6 rolling chassis propelled the Bergenholtz team through the next few months in a fast paced scramble to complete a running car by spring 2003.
After another in-progress display at the SEMA International Auto Salon in April, the Bergenholtz Team received an unexpected call from the NHRA informing them that they were eligible for an invitation to the NHRA Extreme Rush program at the Lucas Oil NHRA Route 66 Nationals at Joliet, IL, May 29-June 1, 2003. The news was welcome but also put the program into the proverbial pressure cooker - at full boil, since the team was faced with completing and debuting the untracked Mazda 6 in front of tens of thousands of NHRA POWERade fans as part of a special sport compact exhibition. The Bergenholtz Team once again exceeded expectations by debuting the Mazda 6 to an 8.50 second, 171.40 mph pass (among the quickest passes ever by fwd drag cars) that dispatched MOPAR competitor Shaun Carlson’s SRT-4 and ultimately advanced the Mazda 6 to a semifinal appearance.
"We were extremely under pressure to perform, but in hindsight we had all our bases covered. Our tight budget forces us to get things right the first time and we did our homework on all aspects of the car," said Ed Bergenholtz about the fabrication of the built-from-scratch car and program. In fact, the team personally had their hands in the majority of the car and engine fabrication. The tube framed chrome-moly chassis covered by the sleek Mazda 6 skin was designed and built in collaboration with Bullet Fabrication.
The chassis is the most important and trickiest part of building any tube-frame fwd racer since there are no precedents – everybody out there is trying their own designs. So far, our chassis has been excellent."
The engine program, featuring a 2.3-liter Mazda four cylinder that has been de-stroked to 2.1 liters, was also engineered in house in partnership with Golden Eagle Fabrication. Mazda provided much of the critical technical information needed to jump-start the program while the team handled all assembly and fabrication duties. The factory production block and heads have been fortified with JE Pistons, Crower Rods, and REV valves. BCE heads prepared the heads for exceptional air flow while a Garret turbocharger teamed with a Tail wastegate provide the extreme boost levels needed to produce the 600+ horsepower needed for an eight-second quarter mile pass. A MoTeC M800 tuned by noted tuner Harv St. Mary and team crew chief Tasukon controls the delivery of ethanol and boost levels while a Fortin transaxle translates the flywheel horsepower into wheel horsepower.
The Bergenholtz Racing Team plans on competing at all remaining Summit NHRA Sport Compact Drag Racing Series events for the 2003 season with a primary goal of being the first team to break the seven-second fwd barrier in the quarter mile. With primary sponsor Boost Mobile and associate sponsors Konig, Apex-I, BCE, Modern Image, Harv’s Performance, REV Valves on board and Mazda power under hood, Bergenholtz Racing is looking forward to "ZOOM-ZOOM" their Mazda 6 into the same record books that they first rewrote four years ago.