NHRA - National Hot Rod Association

Geoff Turk likes to be a step ahead. He's a thinker, a planner, and – most importantly – a doer when it comes to breaking barriers. Turk is determined to be the first and fastest, and he's making history in the Holley EFI NHRA Factory X class, aligning his program with those goals.

Turk is the owner of the Blackbird X Dodge Challenger, the first car built for NHRA's still-new Factory X class, which made exhibition runs at four races in 2023.

As a refresher, Holley EFI Factory X features supercharged engines, manual transmissions, and lightweight modern muscle cars powered by engines akin to those in the Flexjet NHRA Factory Stock Showdown category. The Factory X cars, though, are much lighter than Factory Stock and are outfitted with wider and taller rear tires. They also have a downforce-instigating rear spoiler that looks a whole lot like what's found on a 500-cid Pro Stocker. The drivers of these Dodge, Chevy, and Ford entries are shifting their way to quarter-mile passes, edging toward the six-second zone with speeds in excess of 200 mph – and it's fun as heck to watch the unruly beasts and those who try to tame them.

Holley EFI Factory X made its national debut as a championship category earlier this year in Las Vegas, and the Stanfield Racing Engines Chevrolets have taken home three of the four so-far-available trophies. Lenny Lottig put his Bill "Grumpy" Jenkins tribute Camaro in the winner's circle in Norwalk, the most recent race on the schedule, ahead of the upcoming Toyota NHRA U.S. Nationals in Indianapolis.

Trophies aren't the only thing these teams are racing for, though, and Turk has been at the forefront of the parallel battles of being the first to reach 200 mph and first to make a run that eclipses seven seconds.

"I'm driven by a lot of things in drag racing after 40-something years doing it," said Turk. "I spent a lot of years bracket racing, but I was never a great bracket racer – I was always trying to go faster. I belong in heads-up stuff; it's the driving force behind what I do. So, being 'the first' at these things is one of the main motivators for me."

Kentucky-based Turk isn't striving for these goals from behind the wheel, however. He fully intended to be the driver of Blackbird X, a second coming for the Blackbird moniker that he successfully campaigned on a Dodge Challenger Drag Pak in the Factory Stock Showdown category, but a significant crash while first testing the X version brought about health issues that hindered him from getting back in the car.

Though down, Turk was certainly not out. He named 2012 Pro Stock world champion Allen Johnson as the driver for that first 2023 season of exhibition passes, and right away the team proved productive. Johnson was runner-up in Charlotte, then flew into history as the first member of the Jesel 200-MPH Club with a 202.55-mph run in St. Louis. He went on to win the event there at World Wide Technology Raceway and was runner-up at the last exhibition of the year, which took place in Las Vegas.

For 2024, Johnson elected to step out of the seat to focus on family, and Turk named diverse driver Alex Laughlin as the new wheelman of Blackbird X. On his second run in testing at Beech Bend Raceway Park in Bowling Green, Ky., Laughlin broke into the sixes with an unofficial though exceptionally pleasing and promising 6.976 at 199.26 mph. The class, as a whole, is currently focused on being the first to join the ARP Six-Second Club. Laughlin's done it once, and Turk wholeheartedly believes he can do it again in official competition.

"Getting that e.t. slip that says we made the first official six-second pass, our team would love to do that," he said. "A lot of people can go on to win Wallys, but there's only one first. The first to 200 was important, and now the first to get that six is certainly important."

Turk has said that the Factory X cars have become easier to drive as the builders, tuners, and drivers have begun to understand how to make them "act right." He also explained that it's still quite a challenge for whomever is behind the wheel.

"You have to shift four times and do it when you're supposed to, and that's not as easy as it sounds," shared Turk. "When it shifts, the rear end moves around on you. In fourth gear, about 160 mph, you shift and it skates around, you're holding onto the steering wheel and have to make a decision about whether it's OK to stay with it. I've never been around a driver better on car control than Alex Laughlin.

"It doesn't matter what you give him, he'll figure out how to get down there and make a pass. He shifts like a robot, and he's like a RacePak [data recorder] getting out of the car and telling you what happened. That's a pretty unusual set of characteristics for a driver, that they can get out and tell you exactly what happened, what he did wrong and right, so precisely."  

In his class debut in Las Vegas, at the first Holley EFI Factory X race of the year, Laughlin raced to the final round next to event winner Greg Stanfield. In Norwalk, Laughlin became the second member of the Jesel 200-MPH Club with a stunning 7.056, 201.43 that also came with a start from the No. 1 position. He absolutely had the car to beat and clocked a 7.219 that was low of the opening round, but an uncharacteristic .092-second reaction time was the decider. Opponent Aaron Stanfield was .033 on the Tree and 7.268 at the finish line for a holeshot win.

"Alex was beside himself," said Turk. "It was heavy for him – he knew the car was good. He is such a highly accountable guy and an incredibly good human. Yes, this is about the cars, performance barriers, and figuring this stuff out – but it's really about the relationships with these people."

While he's been impressed by Laughlin both as a driver and in his work outside of drag racing, Turk has taken on a different role as he stands behind the car instead of powering it toward impressive goals from the driver's seat. For some, that may be painful. For Turk, that's OK.

"The truth is, it's only hard when I have to watch one of those in-car camera videos my friend Alex makes," he admitted. "When I see him banging through the gears and throwing the 'chutes, it's a little hard. But I was trying to help my brother go fast when I first started out – I didn't start driving until I was 16, so the first three years, I helped my brother go racing."

Turk explained that those early days helping his brother set the tone for the years ahead. He's been involved with large organizations and helping them improve, working as an engineer designing products, and all of that rolled over naturally to the work he and his team have done with Blackbird, Blackbird X, and now Blackbird Performance, a business that offers complete builds, parts, tuning, and at-track support.

"Most of the work goes on long before the car goes down the track," said Turk. "The driver gets the credit for leaving, shifting, keeping the car safe, and stopping it at the end, but the vast majority of hours, effort, and intellect are put in before they come to the starting line, so to see it happen from outside the car is just as exciting and thrilling. The hours and hours you spend as a team analyzing data, making changes, thinking outside of the box to try to understand what someone hasn't been able to do quite yet – it's just very rewarding. It's also extremely rewarding to see Alex Laughlin get out of the car smiling and see Allen Johnson holding a Wally. That's a pretty big high.

"We ran sixes and 200 mph before anybody else, and we're competing against top-notch teams and incredibly capable people. Our resources aren't even close, so to come out and compete with them is cool. Like a lot of things in life, heart matters as much as brains. We're not the smartest people in the world, but we have a lot of heart."