Exclusive: Porsche And Corvette Tuner LOMA Founder In His Own Words

LOMA RS1 Street for Porsche 911 (997)

One of the great things about writing on this blog as well as TopSpeed.com is all of the great car people you get to talk with. One of those people is Mario Radosavljevic who is the CEO / Founder of sports car tuner LOMA®. In a recent TopSpeed review of LOMA®’s RS1 kit for the Porsche 911 (997), I was able to learn more about Mario and LOMA® as a company.

LOMA® started out as a tuner that made kits for the C6 Corvette, the kits were so successful that it offered the young company a lot of growth. As the German tuner’s profile has grown and they have now added the Porsche 911 to their work. The kits are made in Germany using Carbon Fiber, so it is a natural fit.

Their latest kit, the RS1 turns a standard 997 into a street legal GT3 RSR. The kit widens the rear-engined sports car and gives it a more purposeful look. The engine remains stock (unless you decide to tune that yourself), but a special exhaust system and wider tires are fitted to the car which help to really give that race car feel.

Now that you know exactly who LOMA® is, below is a bit about the company in the words of its founder. Mario’s English is not as good as his German, so the only modifications are minor grammatical or spelling corrections below.

For the start.- My name is Mario Radosavljevic but because nobody can say my familiy name most call me Rados. Thats only to have reduce confusion.

I founded this company in 2008 in Germany and started the production of Aerodynamic parts for the Corvette C6. After presenting the Corvette C6 BlackforceOne at the Essen Motor Show in 2009 with 794 horsepower and a very cool post from Top Gear UK, everything changed. When the 2nd Corvette model came out, the Corvette GT2 based on the ALMS race car, it sold 72 times in 2 years, so far. This kit was 3.6 Inches wider then a stock ZR1.

I received a call from the German GM establishments and they asked me if I would be able to start a GM Germany house tuner and offer parts which can be sold at every GM facility in Europe. After that an Investor Group contacted me and asked if I wanted to sell the company and act as their CEO and create more Aero parts including for the Porsche. After a long hard think about it, I decide to do it. At that point I had been a sponsor of the German Porsche Sports cup for 1.5 years and collected as much experience as possible with the Porsche 997. With Stäbler Rennsport I was in the position to work with a Professional race driver that has had many victory over the years and learned the basics of this incredible car.

The GT3 RS Cup or RSR were always my favorites and so I started the idea of making a street legal race aero kit. It was not as easy as I thought because the Germany Government that gives you the OK for making a street legal car was at first a little bit speechless when they heard my plans. Nobody there could imagine how this should work because for them a race car was something that is far away from any street use at all.

After preparing this over a year the kit is finally out and it is really amazing how customers and partners all over the world have reacted to it. 2 days after unveiling it with our first pictures 6 kis where sold and since then our email account is overflowing. The time couldn’t be better then now to present this performance kit for the street when you know that Porsche returns with their own factory race team after 15 years of absence.

The biggest difference to the race car is, that you can use stock Porsche LED day running lights and headlamps. Front fenders are made completely new in one piece with the extensions. At the rear you have only the extensions together with a front and rear bumper. The biggest effect you feel when you drive the car, because of the much wider track, is the higher performance. It is on a totally different level. Cornering, accelerating and braking are positively influenced by the 4 inch wider track. The use of larger wheels completes this impression. A special LOMA® sport exhaust system
must be installed to have the GT3 RS look on the rear. The LOMA® RS1 Street wide body is the next street legal race kit in our program.

All parts are made from carbon fiber and are available for all 997 Porsche facelift models. Lightweight, performance and an unique look were the goals and I think we have made it. Hopefully, everyone agrees.

Thanks to Mario for taking the time to let me know the history behind LOMA® and I look forward to seeing what is in their future.

What do you think of the RS1 Street kit for the Porsche 997? Let us know in the comments below.

The post Exclusive: Porsche And Corvette Tuner LOMA Founder In His Own Words appeared first on Our Ride Life.