LS Fest East 8

Holley one-ups themselves … again

- Nick Licata

Heading into Bowling Green, Kentucky’s Beech Bend Raceway I was wondering if my eighth trip to the Holley LS Fest would be just as fun and exciting as the seventh, or any of the previous Fests for that matter. I mean, the energy of an event has to level off at some point going into its eighth year, right? Wrong. Holley’s 2017 celebration of everything LS, now referred to as LS Fest East (due to Holley throwing in the LS Fest West, which goes down in May at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway), was bigger and better in every aspect over all previous gatherings. There were more spectators, more participants, and the car show area was as full as I’ve ever seen it. The Dyno Challenge was constantly buzzing all weekend. Even if you wanted an event T-shirt you had to stand in line awhile, but it, too, was well worth the wait. What you didn’t have to wait long for was competing in your LS-powered hot rod. With two autocross courses operating simultaneously (one at Beech Bend and one at the National Corvette Museum), participants got plenty of runs in throughout the weekend.

The Grand Champion portion (autocross, 3S Challenge, â€‹and drag racing) of the 2017 event was sold out in record time so those wanting to have a shot at the big trophy had to sign up soon after the registration opened up online. Procrastinators were relegated to a wait list so you definitely couldn’t snooze if you wanted to take part at the 2017 Holley LS Fest East.