As a native Texan, you can take it from me: When Texans say, “Everything’s bigger in Texas!” It’s because they live and breathe that mentality. So when it comes to things like cars, trucks, engines, and horsepower, you know they don’t skimp. They do it big; it’s the state’s specialty and LS Fest Texas is no different.

Holley‘s LS Fest is the biggest multi-day event dedicated to GM’s modern pushrod V8 platform, and they host three across the country every year. The LS Fest Texas event started just a few years ago and has been a big hit ever since, with Texas-sized attendance to match the elaborate LS and LT builds that only Texas could think of.

Want to stand out from the crown with your LS swap? you’ll need more than a power adder, you’ll need high attention to the details and craftsmanship.

RIP To The Air Quality

With autocross, drag racing, drifting, the car show, and more at LS Fest Texas, the standout for Friday, which decimated the quality of our eyes, ears, and lungs, was Burnout Wars. This competition pits purpose-built cars and trucks against each other to do one thing and one thing only: absolutely decimate rubber.

Nobody at Burnout Wars cares about how much power you make, how nice the paint job is, or even if it’s a rare or cool car, it’s all about how much damage you can do the rear rubber while putting on a show.

There is no point system for this, like some four-wheeled figure skating competition, it’s all about how wild and crazy your burnouts and donuts are on the small tarmac pad in the parking lot, and if the crowd was wowed or bored by your performance. More smoke than a Willie Nelson and Snoop Dogg concert? Blow both tires to shreds? Maybe even catch fire? Then you might be a contender for first place.

Autocross and Drift

LS Fest Texas is held on the infield of the Texas Motor Speedway. This top-tier facility hosts some of the biggest races of the NASCAR season, but also is home to several events throughout the year, offering its massive facility, multiple large parking lots, and infield track. The big oval is one of the fastest in the nation, but it seems most are unaware of the infield road course.

Texas Motor Speedway is home to one of the fastest tracks in NASCAR, but did you know it also has a 2.324-mile infield road course? For LS Fest Texas, it’s home to both drift and track-cross competitions.

This road course offers up to 15 turns with the ability to close off certain turns to shorten the course from its 2.324-mile full length down to just a half-mile course with 5 turns. For the drift event and one of two autocross courses, LS Fest Texas utilizes a shorter part of this road course for these events.

Road cones have been strategically placed on certain sections of the road course’s turns and straights to “adjust” the layout of the course to make it more challenging for the autocross competition. This adds a level of difficulty for the drivers, as some of the corners are left as-is and others are reshaped by the cones, trying to maximize the best driving line through the course for the best time separates the seasoned veterans from the novice.

Battle scars, aggressive suspension geometry, and the same level of hatred for their rear tires as the guys that compete in Burnout Wars, drifting always brings the noise with straight-piped LSs, both NA and boosted. The higher the horsepower and grip, the faster these guys and gals can slide sideways through the turns. Like the rest of LS Fest Texas, the only brand loyalty is under the hood with LS and LT power plants. You can find just about any brand of car or truck being abused on the course, from Nissans, Toyotas, and BMWs to Mustangs, Corvettes, Camaros, and even a truck or two.

Pit Lane No-Prep

Texas Motor Speedway does not have a drag strip on site, so at LS Fest Texas Events, the team at Holley has to improvise with a little ingenuity. The drag racing takes form as a no-prep eighth-mile event in the pit lane for the NASCAR track.

Normally, this pit lane is home to competitive pit crews setting records for the quickest pit stops in racing history, but Holley allows us hooligans to take it over for the weekend for some challenging dig-racing competition. Racers, over the course of two days, battled high temps and humidity combined with a lack of traction on the unprepped surface, half of the running pack turning an attempt at an eighth-mile pass into a 660-foot smoke-show spectacle.

Speed, Stop, and Steering

The 3S Challenge at LS Fest Texas is a slept-on event. The 3S stands for Speed, Stop, and Steering, and at each event, the layout is slightly different to keep things competitive and interesting. The premise is simple: It’s a 180-degree route in a large parking lot that starts with heavy acceleration, a wide U-turn, and a stop box the size of a deep one-car garage. Think of it as a short and fast version of autocross. It is a race against the clock, like autocross, with hitting cones giving the driver time penalties.

The heat and humidity didn’t stop spectators from coming out and enjoying the festivities. Like LS Fest West in Vegas a few weeks ago, these events grow bigger and better every year with competitive racers and radial LS and LT swapped rides. Holley’s LS Fest never fails to be worth the trip.