Nuzzo Motorsports / Unichip North America Partnership
January 20, 2006 – Glen Head, NY and Hillsboro, OR
Nuzzo Motorsports, campaigning three MINI Coopers at the Grand Am Cup 200 at
Daytona International Speedway this January, announced a partnership with
Unichip North America, makers of a plug-and-play piggyback engine control
unit (ECU). Nuzzo and Unichip have agreed to a multi-race partnership,
focused on building brand awareness through livery applications and outreach
in the MINI community, as well as performance benchmarking and testing,
using the Grand-Am Cup MINI Cooper S as a marketing platform.
Unichip, a custom-programmable, plug-and-play ECU, allows users to extract
maximum performance out of their cars – and their unique engine
modifications - using an infinitely-tunable interface. The result of
installation and tuning of a Unichip in a given car is a unique calibration
that harnesses the power of all aftermarket modifications to an engine, such
as cold air intakes and modified headers. Totally re-programmable and custom
tunable, the Unichip guarantees car owners maximum performance, while
leaving no electronic footprint detectable by an OEM scan.
Nuzzo and Unichip will work together to develop the perfect engine
performance characteristics of a race-tuned MINI Cooper S, using the same
street-legal product in the race car that customers can buy for their street
cars.
Tony Nuzzo, lead driver and team principle of Nuzzo Motorsports said, “We’re
thrilled to welcome Unichip North America to the team. They’ve got a product
that we believe in, and are eager to use the platform that Grand-Am Cup and
MINI racing provides for getting their name out. We’re looking forward to
working with the proven talent and technology at Unichip. They’ve
demonstrated an enormous depth of know-how when it comes to getting the most
out of the MINIs and we can’t wait to get our cars out competing in Grand-Am
Cup this year.”
Kim Ziebell, Marketing Director for Unichip North America said, “We’re
pleased to announce our support for Nuzzo Motorsports and their racing MINI
Coopers. Racing is a new marketing exercise for us, but we believe that by
teaming with Tony, one of the foremost MINI technical gurus – and the guy
who’s willing to take the fight to the more powerful sportscars out there –
we’ll demonstrate to the enthusiast community the performance aspects of our
product. We’re looking forward to seeing the Unichip brand out on the track
at Daytona, and are excited to do some performance benchmarking in the Nuzzo
MINIs to demonstrate how well our product holds up under the stress of
endurance racing.”
Tony is the owner of Nuzzo Motorsports which is beginning its fourth year
campaigning the MINI Cooper S. Tony began racing in Porsche Club and drove
his first professional race in 2001 in a Rolex Series GT Class Porsche
finishing sixth in class and tenth overall. In 2002, Tony finished Third in
the Drivers Championship in Grand-Am Cup’s STII Class and was named 2002
Rising Star. In 2003 Tony began campaigning the MINI Cooper S in Grand-Am ST
class and in 2005 earned MINI to its first professional podium finishing
third at Watkins Glen co-driving with Steve Pattee.
To learn more about Unichip, visit
http://www.unichip.us
To learn more about Nuzzo Motorsports, visit
http://www.nuzzomotorsports.com