Where it Started
What started out as a home business moved into a shop and the official opening of Ross Racing Engines in 1975. The elder Lombardi moved the shop to its current location – just a couple miles from the original building – in 1978.
We stress that the goal is the same whether the shop is building a Saturday-night short-track engine, a NASCAR power plant, or a hard-core hot rod engine We treat them all with the same care and attention to detail, We strive for the same quality. Our engines have been endurance tested on dyno’s, racetracks and highways.
Shop owner Tony Lombardi is carrying on an engine-building legacy started by his father, Ross Lombardi, in the 1960s and ’70s. Ross began racing Oldsmobiles around Ohio’s drag strips in the 1960s, winning more than he lost. He soon became known for his engine building skills and quickly built a following of both drag and oval-track racers, not to mention serious street performance enthusiasts.
Since getting out of driving a dirt track car, Tony has found his way back to the roots of Ross Racing Engines: drag racing. In 2011, he built a front-engine dragster with blown ’57 Olds V8 running on alcohol and aimed at the 7.0 Pro class. Though updated in 2015, he still campaigns the car using the same engine. He also built a nitro-burning big block Chevy for the Hilton family’s Great Expectations III dragster, which has traveled all over the country for races and Nitro Thunderfest exhibitions.
