Crawford Performance ///
Every result on this page is a matter of published record — checked against a sanctioning body, a factory release, or the press that covered it at the time. Wins, podiums, factory programs, and the cars that made the name. This is the record.
Before the results
An outright class or event win, verified against a primary source or contemporary press.
A podium finish — second or third — recorded as exactly what it was, in the same ledger as the wins.
A factory-backing milestone: Subaru of America money, releases, or livery behind a Crawford program.
A car Crawford built — the Gymkhana cars, the founder's early work. The builds are part of the record.
Every entry names its source: a sanctioning body, a factory release, a team release of the day, or the press that covered it at the time.
Desert Racing · 2017–2019 · Baja by Crawford Performance
The strongest record Crawford has. A Class 5 Unlimited buggy — Crosstrek body, 2.5-litre naturally aspirated Subaru boxer, roughly 300 hp, engine built by Quirt Crawford — campaigned by Grabowski Brothers Racing with Dustin and Parker Grabowski driving, and father Neal in the seat for 2019. Car numbers 5072 and 527 in period sources. Five class wins in three seasons, and the program that made Crawford a factory team for the second time.
Subaru of America, Grabowski Brothers Racing and Crawford debut the car for the 49th SCORE Baja 500. Subaru's own releases describe it as the brand's first factory-supported desert racing effort — its first factory program outside rally and rallycross.
Source: Subaru U.S. Media Center
Dustin Grabowski, car 5072, home in 4:40:32. Subaru's release puts the class margin at over one hour; the official M.O.R.E. results sheet shows second place well behind on elapsed pace.
Sources: M.O.R.E. official results (PDF) · Subaru U.S. Media Center
Dustin Grabowski, car 5072, 5:45:04 — a win by roughly one minute over Derek Pocorena (5:46:15). A close one, not a walkover, and the second of the two desert wins JE Pistons later listed without naming.
Source: M.O.R.E. official results (PDF)
Dusty and Parker Grabowski ran the car's Baja debut — the race the whole factory program was announced around. The win would take two more years to arrive.
Source: The Drive, contemporary coverage
Second in class, as stated consistently in Subaru's own 2019 releases. This is the result JE Pistons described as runner-up at "the Baja 500 last June."
Sources: Subaru U.S. Media Center · JE Pistons
First in class in Best in the Desert's 550-mile Vegas to Reno, confirmed across multiple Subaru releases.
Source: Subaru U.S. Media Center
A Class 5 Unlimited win for the Grabowski Crosstrek — one of the four class wins in JE Pistons' June 2019 tally of the car's record.
Source: JE Pistons, 6 June 2019
Subaru of America renews its support and the car adopts full Subaru Motorsports USA blue-and-gold livery — the colors in the studio photo above.
Source: Subaru U.S. Media Center
Neal and Dusty Grabowski, first in class — the car's first Baja win — in roughly 16 hours, after the crew pulled the car out of a ravine some 15 miles from the finish and sent it home first anyway. It was the only Class 5 buggy to finish. Announced by Subaru on 6 June 2019.
Sources: Subaru U.S. Media Center · Crawford Performance, inside look
Second in class on the car's return to Vegas to Reno, per Crawford's own later summary of the program — the desert program's last result.
JE Pistons (6 June 2019) credited the car with four class wins: McKenzie's 250, PCI Race Radios 300, Sierra LED 250, and the 2018 Vegas to Reno — the first two on official M.O.R.E. results sheets, Vegas to Reno in Subaru's factory releases. The 2019 Baja 500 win made five.
Time Attack · 2006–2010 · Heritage by Crawford Performance
In 2007, by Crawford's own account, Subaru of America came to the shop and asked for the fastest new-age STI in the country. The answer was the pearl-orange 2008 STI the paddock named "Tony the Tiger." The wins below include one taken in a borrowed car that decided a championship.
Dr. Russ Warr in the Crawford STI, 1:55.317, 11th overall — and first in class, beating the Works Evo (1:55.655) that held the class record. The win that started the time attack record, a year before Tony existed.
SOA approached Crawford in 2007 to build the fastest new-age STI; the orange car followed, first driven competitively by Eiji "Tarzan" Yamada, and Crawford puts its peak output at 850 hp. The 2008 team materials list Subaru of America among Crawford's "Skunk Works Partners," alongside Hankook, TEIN, Torco and NGK. In early form the 2008 Long Beach spec sheet lists a six-week-old 2008 STI at 500 hp / 500 lb-ft on a Crawford SR6 billet short block and CP35R kit, Tarzan's best lap 1:31.902 in Unlimited AWD.
Sources: Crawford Performance, company history · MotorTrend, 2008 Long Beach spec sheet
Tanner Foust in the Crawford WRX STI, 1:42.327 — second in class behind Gary Sheehan's GST Motorsports car (1:38.395), run despite a reported rod knock.
James Elterman's own car broke. Crawford loaned him its blue Stage 2 2008 STI, and Elterman won Modified AWD outright — 2:23.930 against a next-best 2:30.942 — a result that secured his 2008 Modified AWD series championship. The release notes it was the blue car's second first-place time attack finish. In Unlimited AWD the same weekend, Tarzan put Tony second at 1:58.929, behind Top Speed's 1:58.540 — the team release blames a gearbox over-rev to 9,826 rpm and bent intake valves.
Tarzan in a 2008 STI on basic bolt-ons and a Crawford ECU tune, 1:37.572 — third in the reported pairing, which Russ Warr won in Joey Leh's Evo IX (1:34.128). The overall winner that day was the Autowave NSX.
The Crawford STI ran 1:45.552 — a few tenths behind the Sierra Sierra Evo (1:45.061) and the FX NSX (1:45.247) at the top of Unlimited AWD.
Sources: MotorTrend, 2009 SLB Finals · MotorTrend, 2010 recap
Tarzan, Unlimited AWD, 1:40.505 — fourth in class behind the winning AMS Evo X. In Modified AWD, Russ Warr's "LIC Performance/Crawford/Toyo" entry ran 1:45.772, also fourth.
One day, one driver, two cars, two class wins. Thomas Smith — a Quirt Crawford protégé, per the team's own release — won Street AWD in the Subaru of Las Vegas / Zenkai Motorsports STI powered by Crawford, 1:56.000, by 0.278 seconds over the Robispec/AMS Evo VIII RS. Then he climbed into Tony the Tiger and won Unlimited AWD at 1:48.714 — second overall on the day and the fastest Unlimited AWD car there, behind only the FX NSX's overall time.
The Zenkai/Modified account credits Tony with a Firebird time attack track record of 1:02.1 — set at night, on a poorly lit track.
Drift & SuperRally · 2009–2011
The program the Heritage story almost forgot. Stephan Verdier's Cooper Tires / Crawford Performance STI — Crawford-engineered, Garrett-powered — gave Subaru something it had never had in Formula Drift, then got converted to a rally car and took the fight to the X Games.
Verdier beat points leader Chris Forsberg, Vaughn Gittin Jr. and Ryuji Miki on the way to the final, then beat Ken Gushi — whose engine failed on the first final run. Contemporary releases call it three firsts at once: Verdier's first Formula Drift victory, the first Formula Drift victory for a Subaru, and the first for Cooper Tires.
Sources: Enkei · Garrett Motion · Formula Drift news
The drift car, converted: Crawford engine and transmission package with the mandated restrictor, tuned by I-Speed USA / William Knose. After the crew repaired practice crash damage — motor, suspension, body — Verdier won his heat outright, leading the whole race against Dave Mirra, Ken Block and Andrew Comrie-Picard. In the final against three Ford Fiestas and an Evo, he ran second mid-race and finished fourth, losing the bronze to Samuel Hubinette in the closing seconds.
Sources: TEIN USA · The Checkered Flag · Autoblog · build detail: MotorTrend
Tanner Foust won AWD overall in a Ford Fiesta, Ken Block second, and Verdier third in AWD in his Crawford STI — the event video's results listing and MotorTrend's scene report agree on the order.
Sources: MotorTrend, Gymkhana GRID · GRID winners list, 2010–2019
Verdier finished third overall in his Crawford-program Subaru WRX STI at the first-ever Global RallyCross event.
Customer Cars · 2008–2011
A Crawford record isn't only the factory cars. Customer engines, customer turbo kits and Crawford tunes won races the shop didn't enter — starting with a SubieFest weekend that put three Crawford stories on one results sheet.
Dr. Russ Warr, LIC Motorsports 2004 STI — Crawford S3RL-i short block, CP35R turbo kit, and Crawford engine-management tuning — won Unlimited Time Attack at 1:22.519, a new SubieFest track record, more than six seconds under the old one. The Crawford release notes only the shop's own Tarzan-driven car had ever lapped Willow faster in a Subaru time attack car.
Second in Street Class in a 2008 Project STI running a Crawford Stage 2 package. Same day, Michele Abbate ran a sponsored Crawford Stage 2 2008 STI "virtually every second of the day," per the release. Tony the Tiger also turned guest-driver demonstration laps that day (Warr, Smith, Ferdie Ang, Verdier) — demonstration, not competition.
Sources: Crawford release, via KAPS · CarReview, Abbate interview
Thomas Smith's Zenkai/Crawford STI won the Friday-night drag segment at 10.87 @ 124 mph, ahead of JC Meynet / UMS, then finished second in autocross and second in time attack (1:03.090).
Sources: MotorTrend / Modified, Tuner Shootout · MotorTrend, Zenkai announcement
The Gymkhana Cars · 2007–2009
Crawford built the cars that made Ken Block famous — brand new, before the cameras. The builds are part of the record, with their numbers sourced like everything else.
Built brand new by Crawford for Ken Block's gymkhana program — roughly 530 hp, engine by Quirt Crawford — and ready before the cameras: the car starred in Gymkhana Practice, filmed at El Toro in 2008, the video that launched the series.
Source: Jalopnik, Gymkhana oral history
Custom-built by Crawford: 2.65-litre engine, 565 hp / 590 lb-ft per MotorTrend's contemporary feature. The Heritage line's Gymkhana exhausts and the Ken Block Spec engines on today's shelf descend from this program.
Sources: MotorTrend, Gymkhana Two feature · KAPS Transmissions
Before Crawford · The Founder's Years
The record starts before the company does — with the founder's years crew-chiefing at the front of American road racing.
Before the name was on his own door, Quirt Crawford was Crew Chief on Ford Saleen's race program with Tim Allen. He also built and operated Nissan NPTI's dyno — then led his own factory program with Subaru.
The team — Steve Saleen and Tim Allen, with Bob Bondurant driving — won the final race of the 1995 SCCA World Challenge season at Sears Point, then took the Manufacturers' Championship in 1996, again in 1997, and both the Manufacturers' and Drivers' titles in 1998, with the marque's return to Le Mans in 1997.
Sources: Saleen, programme history · Saleen Owners & Enthusiasts Club (PDF) · SOEC / Barrett-Jackson summary
Leading Edge was one of Quirt's early companies, working on sand rail motors. Sport Compact Car's 2006 profile credits him with decades on four-cylinder engines — "everything from sand rails to land speed record machines" — and as a MoTeC specialist building pressurised Subarus for road racing and rallying.
Sources: Sport Compact Car profile, via MotorTrend · Leading Edge video, Crawford upload
The Thread · Factory Backing
Heritage proof and Baja proof are the same sentence. A decade apart, the factory backed Crawford twice — once on tarmac, once in the desert — and the ownership thread ties the two programs together.
SOA commissions the STI build that becomes Tony the Tiger; Subaru of America appears in Crawford's 2008 partner materials. Company history for the commission; contemporary team documents for the partnership.
The Crosstrek Desert Racer debuts at the Baja 500 as Subaru's first factory-supported desert effort, renewed in 2019 with full Subaru Motorsports USA livery. The same summer, the programs converge: Crawford's own history records QC Enterprises (formerly Crawford Performance) passing to new ownership under Neal Grabowski effective 1 July 2017, with Quirt Crawford continuing to lead R&D — the desert team's family and the company's new ownership are the same people.
Sources: Subaru, 2017 debut · Subaru, 2019 renewal · Crawford, ownership history
Two factory motorsports programs — 2007 on tarmac, 2017 in the desert. No other aftermarket manufacturer has been factory-backed by Subaru of America. That's the thread through this whole record.
Five Class 5 desert wins. A time attack program that won in 2006, won a championship in a borrowed car in 2008, and won twice in one day in Las Vegas in 2010. The first Formula Drift win a Subaru ever took. A SubieFest track record on a customer engine. Two factory programs, ten years apart, from the same manufacturer.
Our cars are built for drivers. Not focus groups.
Heritage by Crawford Performance
The parts from these cars are still built. Still to the original spec. Still here — organized as Heritage by Crawford Performance: never discounted, and under the Crawford Classic rule, never quietly discontinued.
The flagship built Subaru engine.
Race-proven to 770 hp.
The exhaust note the world learned to recognize.
Still in production.
The original, invented here.
The Baja line — from the car that won the Baja 500.
