Ok, so talking to this guy that races a Mighty Max on an asphalt oval, I'm still stumped on which direction to go. First, here is what Ray had to say.

"You are assuming right. it is a 2.4 EFI. It seems to run well with the trucks. Here's the low down. when I first got it , the truck had just over 146,000 miles on it. I pulled the head , checked the main and rod bearings. Had the head plained .010 because it had a bad head gasket, Changed the gaskets, added a balance shaft elimination kit, and went racing. I did not bore the engine nor change any bearings. It has been stock minus those changes sense day one. It seems to run ok where I start and I have passed a few trucks in the 5 years that the little guy has been running. With the normal tune ups and oil changes, which now by the way I add a quart about every week to keep it going.I am thinking it burns it but the plug's don't seem to tell that tail. Otherwise it runs pretty strong every week. We did do a compression test a few weeks ago on one cylinder and came up with 149 lbs. The engine is definatly still strong."

Ok, so this tells me that I can run with the other trucks but looking on the site, his truck isn't as competitive as I'd like to see a MM/Ram50. I hope to run towards the front if possible. I don't want to be an "also ran"...so do I rebuild my Starion block (stout bottom end), run a really good carb and pacesetter header? Or should I just go the 2.4 route? I don't know what to expect hp numbers from the Starion block. Can you slightly tweak a 2.4 to get some better numbers? I posted up the track rules on my "newbie" post.