In a motorsport discipline dominated by ground-pounding bent-eights, there’s nothing like a 10,500rpm 2JZ six-pot jammed with 70psi of boost to rattle the cages of the drag racing establishment! And for Gold Coast local Ryan Holz, choosing to power his LC Torana hatch with Toyota’s legendary six was a no-brainer.

First published in the January 2026 issue of Street Machine

“I got into racing a few years back and have always loved the 2J engine; they make insane power and are probably one of the best engines ever built,” Ryan says. “I’d seen a number of Toranas with six-pots doing some cool stuff, and I had a two-door Torana shell that I was keen to do something with, but I didn’t want to go down the path of a Holden six. The Nissan RB30 was pretty cool, but if I was going six-pot, it had to be a 2J.”

Ryan approached Danny Lansdowne and his Spot On Performance team about turning the LC into a killer turbocharged, 2J-powered street car that could also take on Powercruise. True to form, what Danny and the team came up with was really too wild for anything other than track duties!

From there, it didn’t take long to get the boosted, Toyota-powered Torry hauling. The boys campaigned it in that guise for a number of years, running a best of 6.90 at a whopping 206mph.

The cranky 2J up front wasn’t super-exotic. Based around a factory cast block that was mostly filled, the combo featured an offset-ground factory crank, quality rods and pistons, dry-sump oiling and a reworked factory head. The team were not shy with the tune-up, wedging a massive 68psi of boost into the little 3.0-litre six to crank out 2000hp!

“That was a great little motor, but it was showing signs of fatigue, with the deck of the block deflecting and the main caps moving around,” Ryan says. “Despite all this, we still made over 30 passes running 7.0 or better with that deal.”

Eventually, it all went pear-shaped and blew the side out of the deck. It was time to take things to the next level.

“I knew we had to step the game up with whatever my new combination was going to be,” Ryan says. “The old car was too heavy to be competitive, and we needed to go to a billet engine block to make more power.”

As it happened, WA racer Russell Taylor had bought the Doorslammer package of Queensland racer Steve Ham, and Steve scored one of Taylor’s Toranas as part of the deal. Despite being built around 15 years ago in WA with a blown 481X motor and a chassis built by Grant O’Rourke and Geoff Black, it had never been raced.

Ryan bought the car, sold off the blown combo, and the transition to a billet 2J monster began, with the work once again led by the team at Spot On Performance.

Danny’s boys gave the car a big birthday. From the firewall back, it’s a full-chassis, double-frame-rail Pro Mod, and the whole body can be lifted off. Yet despite it clearly being a proper race car, effort was made to keep some semblance of the Torana’s street-car origins.

The wheel tubs had previously filled in the rear windows, which is how they did it back in the day, so they were removed and new quarter windows were added to the to get the car looking right. The steering was changed, the driver’s footwell was extended so Ryan could fit in the car, and mods to the ice box, intercooler, intake and turbo system were carried out. Under the rear end is a four-link with a Race Products floater kit, Menscer shocks, a lot of fancy barwork and an anti-roll bar, along with a very modest-looking 275 radial.

The star of the show is a 2J combo based around a Bullet billet block, filled with a Nitto crank, custom GRP conrods and CP pistons, for a displacement is of 3.2 litres. Incredibly, it still uses a factory cast head, prepared by Colin at Headsense with Top Fuel hoops. Oiling has been upgraded to a five-stage Barnes dry sump that holds 12 litres and keeps things lubed at the massive 10,500rpm shift point.

The Hypertune Pro Series billet inlet manifold runs a 102mm throttlebody, with Deka 2400cc and FuelTech 7200cc injectors feeding each runner via a Kinsler 1300 belt-driven pump and Aeromotive regulator. Hanging off the custom hot side is a Precision Next Gen 98mm turbo and 60mm Turbosmart gate with a five-inch stainless dump pipe.

Other refinements include Strange front struts and brakes, a fibreglass front, and polycarbonate windows replacing the glass.

Despite retaining a steel roof and quarters, this 2000hp+ missile tips the scales at just 2600lb at full race weight, set up with a 53 per cent bias on the nose. “In finished trim, the car was 600lb lighter,” Ryan says.

The LC looks stunning, too, thanks to paint and panel by Spray King Restorations in Warwick and airbrush work by Zealous & Kruik Kustoms.

The Torana’s first outing at the 2025 Brisbane Jamboree saw it run a blazing 6.73@211mph over the quarter, but Ryan’s just getting started. “We really want to be in the 6.40s over the quarter and in the threes over the eighth,” he says.

“The old car was noisy and rattled, so the new car doesn’t seem as fast, as it drives nicer and is a properly set-up race car. There have been no compromises with this one, so we are looking forward to working with something that will react to the changes we make.”

With such a big lung on the small 2J, Ryan hits it with a 150hp direct-port dry nitrous kit, and launches the car on 20psi at 5800rpm. From there, it’s a matter of hanging on, with an air shifter to bang gears with and air ’chutes dumping the laundry when the ride is over. “Making more power is the goal, so turbo size is something we’ll need to address in the near future,” he says.

A project this massive requires a team of good people, so Ryan would like to give a big shout-out to Andy and Danny at Spot On Performance, Jeff Johnson at Power Management Solutions, and his race crew: Michelle, Brad and Chris.