North West Dyno Circuit–ATS Gauntlet Challenge

The second season for the North West Dyno Circuit kicked off this past weekend with one of the biggest events of the season at the ATS Gauntlet Challenge, held at ATS Diesel headquarters in Arvada, CO. With over 110 vehicles run across the rollers of two on-site dyno’s the ATS Diesel event was a massive jump in competitor and spectator turn out compared to last year. Some new rules to the 2016 NWDC circuit has made it a little more enticing for just about everyone to enter their rig and compete, which should make for better turnouts at every event along the NWDC circuit.

ATS Diesel is one of the top names in the aftermarket performance industry offering everything you can think of, with their transmissions and turbos being one of their strong suits. With the help of owner, Clint Cannon and Marketing Manager, Ryan Gelinas, some of the biggest names around came out to show off their muscle on the rollers. After the event concluded, the ATS staff setup a projector screen to broadcast the UFC fights for anyone that wanted to stay and hang out for a few hours swapping stories and sharing drinks.

The Gauntlet Challenge class is not for the faint of heart and only the biggest and baddest need apply. With huge prize money and bragging rights being the top prize multiple 1000+ horsepower trucks were in attendance. Taking home top spot was the familiar name of Shawn Baca, from Industrial Injection, who surprisingly had his ‘Silver Pearl’ put back together in less than a month after totaling it in a gruesome crash that left the whole front end destroyed. Countless late night hours went into the trashing the truck back together in time for the event, but it appears to have been worth it with a monstrous 1994hp run. Second place went to Shawn Aksamit of Peoria, AZ with 1476hp. Third place price money went to Tyler Mize all the way down from Alberta, Canada with a 1323hp run on a stock bottom end Common Rail Dodge.

The newly TV famous Diesel Sellerz crew from Diesel Brothers brought out their diesel powered ‘Hellcameno’ to show off and the wicked cool rat rod WelderUp crew out of Las Vegas, NV were in attendance as well. Big carnage on the dyno came from the little blue truck of Custom Auto who found out that even just a ‘little’ nitrous too soon in the RPM range can wreak havoc with even the best performance rods and pistons on the market, with still more than 1000rpm to go in their dyno pull, 1450hp proved disastrous at 3200rpm’s when shrapnel went flying as connecting rods found their exit through the cylinder block walls.

The new Stock Ford class was one by Carl Edelman with 694hp. Stock Dodge class went to Manuel Perez with 570hp and Stock Duramax class went to Matt Davis with 487hp. Small Single class winner was Trent Hibberd with 731hp and Large Single went to Salvador Pena with a 712hp run. In the new Small Twin class, which is any truck running under an 80mm atmosphere turbo, Rick Engh made 815hp Large Twin class was taken by Aaron Nones with 986hp. The Unlimited class went to Kelsie Epp with 1368hp.​