The ambient temps were in the 90s, but the track temps were much hotter when the second round of the 2023 Outlaw Diesel Super Series rolled through Indianapolis on June 2 and 3. The Outlaw Diesel Revenge race, held at Lucas Oil Indianapolis Raceway Park and in conjunction with the Ultimate Callout Challenge for the third straight year, always has a way of attracting a crowd. However, the numbers for 2023 were off the charts. According to ODSS presenter, Firepunk Diesel, 311 tech cards were tallied on the weekend. For any event, let alone a diesel-only drag race, those numbers are downright huge—and we’ve been told this marked the largest racer turnout ever recorded in diesel drag racing history.
As the weekend unfolded, fans and fellow racers alike were treated to a record-setting pass from Mattie Graves, driver of the Hollyrock Customs’ rail. Her Duramax-powered dragster rocketed to a 4.00 at 188 mph, resetting the ODSS Pro Dragster record in the process. Other highlights included Johnny Gilbert and the Stainless Diesel team’s split window, Pro Mod Corvette. In just their second race back from last year’s nail-biting crash, they wound up in the winner’s circle—along with putting up the lowest Pro Mod ET at the event: a 4.17 at 184 mph. But that’s not even a fraction of the story… If you weren’t in Indy, make sure you’re there next time. For now, enjoy this condensed version of what went down at Outlaw Diesel Revenge 2023.
After building a stock-appearing ’18 Ram 2500 that blazed the eighth in the 6.40s (not kidding), Mark Rojee ended up in Rod MacMaster’s old ’07 Dodge running the 5.90 Index class (bottom). Here, he faces off against Brett Marcum, a lights-out driver who’s always a threat to go 5.90x. While Mark’s Dodge is rear-wheel drive and Brett’s is four-wheel drive, these two trucks have one big thing in common: they’re both propelled by common-rail Cummins powerplants from Freedom Racing Engines. Brett would collect enough points on the weekend to remain second in the 5.90 points chase.The ET Bracket and 7.70 Index categories were a big reason why more than 300 tech cards were filled out at Outlaw Diesel Revenge. In ET Bracket alone, there were 75 racers. In 7.70, a strong field of 54 showed up to compete. The eighth-mile action commenced Friday morning and by Saturday night some familiar ODSS faces were collecting trophies. Nick Morris took First Place in ET Bracket behind the wheel of his ’05 Silverado (as well as Fourth Place in 7.70), and Ryan Riddle won the 7.70 Index class aboard his championship-winning ’07 Dodge.Daniel Wint’s ’03 Dodge spent most of its life running up and down the highway, much of that time tethered to a trailer. Then when he took possession of it the miles continued racking up in similar fashion. Now, there are 576,000 miles on the odometer of his rear-wheel drive Ram 2500 and he drag races it. The factory 5.9L common-rail is well-fed thanks to fuel system mods from S&S Diesel Motorsport (including a 12mm CP3) and the Cummins relies on a 63mm Holset Cheetah from Fleece Performance Engineering to build boost. Daniel went a few rounds in the ET Bracket class and even drove the truck to a new personal best: 7.84 at 89 mph.Stainless Diesel has wasted zero time picking up where they left off last season. Despite spending a big chunk of the winter at HammerTech Racecars following a late-season crash last year, the team’s all-billet, Wagler-built Cummins continues to turn out a reliable 2,500-plus hp and the team’s ’63 Corvette keeps making 4.1x passes look easy. Driver Johnny Gilbert steered the Pro Mod ‘Vette across the stripe first in the finals, and in doing so he now enjoys a commanding points lead in diesel drag racing’s second fastest category. A championship would make this the comeback story of the year.It’s a shame we couldn’t watch this truck go down the track. The ’78 F-250 body sits on a ’94 second-gen chassis and it belongs to Jared Jones, driver of the Scheid Diesel dragster. A compound turbo, 12-valve 5.9L with pump work sits under the hood and sends more than 700hp through an NV5600 transmission. And as if the 17×10-inch US Mags didn’t already do it, the camper shell completes the sleeper look. Out on the drag strip and strapped into the rail, Jared would finish runner-up in the Pro Dragster class on the heels of the record-setting Mattie Graves from Hollyrock Customs.There’s something about a ¾-ton diesel on drag radials that always catches our eye. When we first bumped into Lane Wright and his West Texas Chevy he was struggling with a glitchy converter lockup switch—yet he was still breaking way out of the 7.70 dial written on his windshield. When he finally got the switch working, his ’02 LB7 went deep into the 7’s, so we had to move in for a closer look. Long story short, his Duramax is well-fueled and gets the job done with an S372 SXE sitting in the valley and a bit of nitrous on tap. All-In Truck Performance serves as his home shop.Don’t let Lane’s quiet demeanor at the track fool you, he’s about as saucy as they come! Just check out what was hidden in plain sight in the bed of his Silverado. Much better than the Gapplebees reference that made the rounds five years ago. All kidding aside, the squeeze Lane sprays into his Duramax puts the finishing touches on a low-11-second ride. It’s trucks like this that make diesel drag racing so great. At any given event, there are dozens of daily driver-type builds capable of running 12’s, 11’s, and even 10’s.We’d been waiting all winter to see Wyatt Stengel’s 1970 K15 at an ODSS event, and to our surprise he leapfrogged 5.90 and jumped straight into the Pro Street staging lanes. The story on this GMC K1500 runs deep, but in a nutshell this classic 4×4 has been in Wyatt’s family for 50 years and now he’s out here racing it. It sports an LB7 Duramax that Wyatt assembled himself, a 14mm CP3 and 250-percent over injector combo from Exergy Performance (who also fine-tunes the truck’s stand-alone ECU), plenty of nitrous, and a massive T6 flange turbo. A 4L80E sits beneath the fabricated transmission tunnel. It’s exactly the kind of vehicle you might’ve expected the BoostedBoiz to build once they started getting into diesels.
Just as it has in years past, the Outlaw Diesel Revenge event ran side-by-side with Ultimate Callout Challenge—and you can find out who won it all right here.
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