Tom West’s Honda S2000 stormed the TREMEC Stick Shift Shootout at the 2025 Sick on the Green drag race event, overwhelming the field and taking home the shootout title. No ordinary Honda S2000, Tom’s car has a twin-turbocharged LS3 backed back a TREMEC Magnum 6-speed transmission.
“When I first got the car from a friend, he’d already swapped in an LS3-based V8,” explains Tom, “but with an automatic transmission. The car had issues, so I swapped out the auto for a TREMEC Magnum 6-speed. This solved the previous issues and the fun began.”
ABOVE: Tom West and his crew for the Honda S2000 rolled in to Beech Bend Raceway for the TREMEC Stick Shift Shootout at Sick on the Green 2025 with some work to do before qualifying. The tune on the car wasn’t right and it couldn’t make consistent or sometimes even full passes down the track. The car was capable of easily pacing the field, if they could get it dialed in.
Two years ago, Tom had a mishap at a race, and the S2000 became intimately involved with a track’s retaining wall. He was alright, but the Honda needed some work to be track worthy again. During this rehab, the LS3 was upgraded to its current twin turbo setup with 80mm boost-generating Forced Inductions units. The face-plated TREMEC Magnum 6-speed came from Tick Performance along with a Black Magic clutch.
After being disqualified at an event before Sick on the Green for the S2000 not being a “true street car,” Tom decided to build an all-out Cadillac CTS coupe for racing. The Honda was rebuilt, adding the necessary components to satisfy typical requirements for most street car classes.
ABOVE: After some work with the laptop, Tom’s Honda S2000 and its LS3-based V8 was dialed in and firing off consistent 7-second quarter-mile passes. By luck of the bracket and the slowest qualifier having to bow out before the first round from mechanical issues, Tom ended up with a bye run. He still ran full passes though, both high 7-second runs proving the car was deadly consistent, In the final Tom ran a 7.82@180.12 a full second faster than the runner-up he faced.
When Tom’s team arrived at Beech Bend Raceway in Bowling Green, Kentucky, for the Sick on the Green 2025 event, the S2000 hadn’t been dialed in yet. It’s first passes during test-n-tune runs weren’t pretty. With these runs, though the crew had the data needed to get things dialed in for qualifying. The car fired off a 7.78-second quarter-mile pass at 177 MPH that made it number one qualifier for the TREMEC Stick Shift Shootout.
Due to a variety of circumstances, Tom got bye runs all the way to the final round. Even though he could’ve coasted, Tom wanted to make sure the car was truly dialed in and made full passes anyway, with runs of 7.90@179.09 and 7.86@175.46 showing its dominance over the rest of the field.
ABOVE: Tom’s Honda S2000 is equipped with a face-plated TREMEC Magnum 6-speed transmission. Bolted to that Magnum is an LS3-based V8 using a Dart block, steel rods, Brodix BR3 heads and a custom built twin 80mm turbo setup using Forced Inductions turbos and hand fabricated piping.
In the final there were no issues, and the S2000 seemed to effortlessly blast down the track for a winning 7.82@180.12 run; a full second faster than the runner-up.