Larry Baker Is Ready For Big Tire Action At Redemption 8.0

Larry Baker cut his teeth in the bracket racing ranks like so many have before him, and that taste of racing was enough to get him hooked and wanting to go faster. Those humble beginnings pushed Baker to seek more speed, and that path eventually brought him to the wild world of No Prep racing. Now, Baker is trying to become a front-runner in the Big Tire class and wants to pick up his first big No Prep win at Redemption 8.0 in his twin-turbo Impala.

Over the past 12 years, Baker has enjoyed racing with his family, and even brought his son Dalton into the sport.

“We eventually moved from bracket racing to index racing and started traveling all over the region to hit bigger events. When you start indexing that much you realize you’re class filler for these Big Tire events, so we spent a lot of time around those cars watching them race. Eventually, we got the fever to race at that level so we made the choice to move up to the heads-up world,” Baker says.

Baker and his family truly enjoy the experiences they have at the track together and No Prep racing makes it that much better for them. “I’ll tell you what man, it’s freaking awesome! My son is my crew chief and we’re always talking about the next race and what we need to do to get ready. Words really can’t describe how much fun it is. Going racing is a huge family event for us and wouldn’t be possible without my wife, Laurie, and Dalton’s wife, Ashton. They put in a lot of hard work with the team, as well,” Baker explains.

When Baker hits the track on any given weekend he’s wheeling his 1962 Impala that’s an original 409 SS car. The stout chassis was built by The Race Shop in Seymour, Wisconsin for Baker. Powering the big-body bowtie is a 515 cubic-inch big block Chevy motor that uses a Brodix block for its foundation. Baker uses a set of BB5 Brodix heads and a cast intake to bring the air into the motor.

Boost comes from a pair of 88 mm Precision turbos that utilize a custom turbo kit built by The Race Shop, and Baker tunes all of that with a BigStuff 3 ECU. Driving the power to the track is a Bruno/Lenco setup, and making sure the car sticks to the racing surface is a full set of Strange Engineering shocks.

Since making the move to the Big Tire world of No Prep racing, Baker has been able to make the finals at several smaller events, and the semi-finals at Redemption 7.0 recently, but he wants more. “We’re looking for a win at Redemption 8.0 because we as a team are very competitive. This season we came in with the mindset that we will win a race and we’re shooting for the series title in Redemption. The goal overall is to win a big race for sure,” Baker says.