Jake and Vlad Tackle CivicX+ Tail of Dragon And We Raffled OFF A TURBO!
Photo courtesy of Tail of Dragon, LLC
27WON gave away what?
Well what can we say, it was an adventure that did not disappoint one bit! If you guys haven’t heard about Tail of Dragon and the annual Civic event held in the area dubbed “Wake The Dragon” .. it’s something like this….Hondas and Acuras from all over the country (and even Canada) drive down to the North Carolina/Tennessee border for full 3 days of spirited driving, car meets, and a host of other activities to celebrate cars, friends, and all things community. It’s an epic way to get together and spend quality time with quality people. Ok, ok,... you get it.
Jake & Vlad at the Tail of the Dragon
First thing to know is….it’s not easy to get to North Carolina from the West Coast!
We always want to show up hard and represent our shop cars, but this was not in the cards. So, the next best thing was to fly. Jake and I hopped on red eye flights to get into Charlotte, NC arriving at about 6am, Friday morning. It’s another 3 hours from there into the mountains to get to the Tail of Dragon area. Luckily, we snagged a nice Accord X rental off Turo that would see us all the way through the weekend. It was equipped with the trusty 1.5T L15 motor we’re very familiar with. It even had some decent Michelin rubber at all 4 corners! And so we set out to the land of 318 curves. Nothing could stop us now.
The Teams Rental AccordX (1.5T)
Friday Afternoon:
We arrived at Fontana Dam, the area we would be staying at for the next 2 nights right after lunch. Right away, you could see pockets of Hondas & Acuras. Slow at first, but then a steady stream began to flow in. Before long, the entire main road filled up with rows and rows of nothing but Hondas and Acuras. We were in heaven. Jake and I spent the next several hours just walking around, admiring all the cars and meeting all of their owners who were telling us stories about their cars and their trips down here. We even spied the Two Step Performance Honda Prelude shop car equipped with our FL5/DE5 BBK. We ended the night back at the main lodge sharing stories well past midnight with other owners. So epic!
Two Step Performance’s Prelude
Saturday:
This was the big day! An early rise for Jake, I, and all of the event attendees as we met at the base of Fonata Dam for the annual group photo and our group drives.
Fonata Dam Group Drive Starting Line
Next, we hit the road for a few hours on the Tail and surrounding roads. The state troopers were out, but luckily some of our group were running radar units so we were well aware of them before they were of us. I can report no speeding tickets were issued to anyone in our group today. As for other groups…well let’s just say I spoke to several fellas that got pulled over and they were not as lucky as we were. The roads were simply thrilling, though. Curve after curve, mile after mile, this area just did not disappoint. After blasting the backroads for a few hours, we headed back to town to get ready for the afternoon's car show and the banquet later that evening.
With the car show underway, Jake and I decided to get to know the owners of these cars a little bit better. We met Kha with his 576WHP DE5, Marty with his FL5 who drove all the way down from New York rocking his new 27WON exhaust and countless other enthusiasts who all had crazy stories of how they wound up at the Wake the Dragon event this year.
With the votes now in and the car show winding down, it was time to migrate over to the main event for the evening. After all, rumors had been circulating all weekend about what we would be giving away at the banquet as our 27WON main raffle prize. We were planning something EPIC! All the other brands had their usual small items to give away.. A gift card here, an intake system there, but not us. We pulled out all the stops this year. We announce we’re giving away a TURBO from our catalog! Mic drop…
Wake the Dragon Banquet & Raffle
Shout out to Michael W. from Tennessee on his raffle win of a brand new Kuro+ turbo at this year's event, a $2500 value! We can’t wait to see how he builds up his Civic Type R with that thing.
Sunday:
Most attendees called it by Sunday. We got up early to get out there and burn some rubber and scrub some corners one final time before our 3 hour drive back to Charlotte.
One Last Blast!
That’s it for 2026 Dragon fam! If you saw or spoke with us at this year's event, drop a comment below! If you missed us, comment down below so we come back next year and we meet up!
Mod on
-Vlad