VIAN, Okla. -- Just off the main road in Vian, Okla., sits an unassuming house with an unassuming garage.
But inside that garage is a different story.
Jim Lewis is a Vian native who just happens to build the best National Hot Rod Association Stock Eliminator motors in the country.
He has clients all over the country, and those clients’ continued success means his business is booming.
“I’m making good power right now,” Lewis said. “We’re doing it in small motors and large motors. We’re doing it in Chevys and we’re doing it in Chryslers.”
Just weeks ago, Lewis transported a motor he built to a race in Louisiana, where he dropped it into a car just hours before the race.
That car won.
Lewis says the technology is always changing, and the key to staying on top is knowing someone on the inside.
“You try to buy your parts from a guy that does a lot of stuff inside NASCAR,” Lewis said. “He knows how he’s changing his pistons to fit your block, or he’s changing his cam grind because of what they learned inside NASCAR. You just take your rule and you just try to put the square peg in the round hole.”
That’s not to say he ever gets all the answers.
“He drops you a hint that you can make this work, but you have to try to find that third piece of information that he didn’t give you,” he said.
Lewis has been in the drag racing game for a long time. He got his start at the old Razorback Dragway in Fort Smith, where he raced h is 1969 Plymouth Roadrunner he still runs today.
“This is one of the first passes I ever made down a quarter mile was in this car at Razorback Drag Strip in Fort Smith,” Lewis said while showing a visitor the Roadrunner. “It’s got the 383 engine in it, and it’s gone 11.56 [seconds] and 114 miles per hour in the quarter [mile].”