Nitto Tire 2006 King Of The Street - Royal Rumble

Third Place: Tie - Nate Phillips

There have been KOTS contestants in the past that have been intimidated by shop-built Mustangs, as well as performance-shop owners or workers that participate in the competition. Even though we recognize the benefit of working at a performance shop, it's not necessary in order to build a KOTS-winning Mustang. We don't care who built it or tuned it, we just want to see it, drive it, and watch it go down the track.

One Mustang we couldn't wait to see was Nate Phillips' '03 Cobra. He's one of the guys other KOTS owners worry about. Working at the side of John Urist at Hellion Power Systems in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and having an inside track to the latest turbo-charger technology has its advantages. Leading up to the competition, Nate thought his Cobra would be capable of eclipsing the mark of Michael Palugi Jr., the '05 KOTS winner-and it did, pushing the KOTS horsepower record to 895 hp. Michael's '03 Cobra made 851 hp in the '05 KOTS.

If you haven't noticed by now, Nate was unable to carry the '06 KOTS with that number, and we'll tell you why. First off, Editor Turner and I used Nate's car to get lunch on Sunday of the NMRA World Finals, the site of the '06 KOTS. "That exhaust is going to drive me crazy" were the first words out of Editor Turner's mouth, hurting the Ride and Drive score. Maybe more than the exhaust, the oil leak that sprung from either the cam covers or the borrowed 88mm turbo hurt the car's Ride and Drive score. The oil leak made the car smoke like a steam-powered freight train, especially after we gave it the wood.

The freight-train analogies don't end there, but this is a positive one. Nate's Cobra is fast; this thing will freight-train just about anything on the road. We weren't sure if we were in Nate's Cobra or a Boeing 747 cleared for takeoff. The power was linear, and it kept building into a crescendo, making us look for the end of the runway. But the aforementioned smoke show had us watching the gauges to make sure we didn't lose anything while reentering the atmosphere.

Similar to a few of the other KOTS competitors, Nate was up on the rev limiter to get the car done in time. Being a crew member for John Urist also meant even more time away from the Cobra. Lack of time back home meant testing at Bowling Green just prior to the KOTS competition. Nate disintegrated the factory IRS, which sent him scrambling to find a replacement rear. He ended up at Delk Performance in Lebanon, Tennessee, about an hour-and-a-half south of Bowling Green, Kentucky. Instead of adding another IRS, Nate installed a solid-axle 8.8. That's a big change a day before the competition. During the Ride and Drive, the solid axle was a nonissue. On the track, Nate struggled since he had no time on the new rear setup. Another reason for a poor showing was that he hurt a piston during the Drag Race portion-although he's not 100 percent sure because as of press time, he's been too busy to tear the car apart. He has a couple of smashed spark plugs, so that's his best guess.

Despite the exhaust and the smoke show, we were shocked at how easy it was to drive Nate's car given the amount of horsepower it made. For an 895hp car, anyone who knows how to drive a stick could easily drive it. It features a McLeod Industries twin-disc clutch. The pedal pressure was comparable to that of stock clutch units. The car also possessed a nice solid shifter feel from the Pro-5.0 shifter. All in all, Nate's Cobra wasn't far from winning.

Here's a breakdown of the score: