Long Tube Headers’ George Rumore is a strong supporter of the RPM Act. “When we modify a vehicle, we’re actually making it cleaner, helping out with its emissions,” he explained.

Serving our country as well as the high-performance community are sound principles that drive this veteran-owned exhaust components company and led to an industry commitment as a PRI Founding Member.

Regulatory pressures from Capitol Hill and elsewhere have forced the motorsports industry to circle its collective wagons and convince America that it’s a very big business that does, indeed, constitute a considerable chunk of the US economy and therefore is worth protecting for some very practical reasons. Ensuring that its employees have a voice in the ongoing debate over emissions, and racing’s role in it, is something that George Rumore values greatly. As vice president of sales for Long Tube Headers (LTH) in Spartanburg, South Carolina, Rumore is grateful that PRI is in the on-deck circle when regulators are throwing hardball at his chosen business. 

“It’s more for the industry as a whole, even though it trickles down to the Long Tube Headers side, but what’s really exciting to me is that right now, we have a team of boys and girls at PRI who are doing for us what we can’t do for ourselves,” Rumore explained. “I can’t just go up to Congress and fight my point. But knowing that we have a team that has its nose to the grindstone, and that is fighting for us, that’s what makes me excited now, because we’ve never had a team like this one on our side. PRI is an opportunity to be involved in an organization that wants to see our community thrive and grow.”

The growth that Long Tube Headers has experienced has been in its business of building exhaust components for performance cars, most commonly late-model Ford Mustangs, but with similar components also produced for Stellantis and General Motors vehicles. Rumore is a lifelong performance-exhaust guy, having co-founded Long Tube Headers after managerial stints with Kooks Headers & Exhaust and while serving at Stainless Works. LTH, as it’s known for short, is a veteran-owned business with 15 employees, including an onsite engineer. The firm produces lifetime-warrantied tuned headers—and, recently, catalytic-converter packages for high-performance vehicles—that not only are claimed to promote superior scavenging, but also are crafted to be pleasing to the eye, thanks to its in-house Titan finishing process that bonds to the header tubing.

“We’ve been in business as a startup for four years,” Rumore said. “We take pride in the land that we’ve served, and we take pride in doing our business on these shores. One of our philosophies is that everybody prices their products about the same. We look at the down and dirty costs and work to get our products to individuals at a reasonable price.”

Rumore became affiliated with PRI during his earlier employment, and Long Tube Headers now enjoys status as a PRI Founding Member. As Rumore put it, “I’ve been going to the PRI Show for probably 20 years now. What I like to tell people is that for our industry, the PRI Show is like the Super Bowl. When I go to the PRI Show, I’m mainly into looking at new ways of creating greater horsepower, growing our business, and growing our community.”

PRI’s role as an industry advocate in a sometimes hostile regulatory environment is vital to Rumore, who said PRI levels the field for motorsports when compared to other recreational activities that also happen to burn petroleum products. “I guess people tend to think that people like us are just mischievous and just want to run around on the streets causing trouble, when we’re really just passionate about what we do, just like anyone else,” he said. “You see people who are into horses. They drive all over the country, towing these big trailers behind their trucks, just so they can show off their horses.

“Everybody has a niche, and some people don’t like our niche and then get into positions of influence, and that’s how we got into the situation of some people trying to shut our industry down over emissions or the modification of vehicles,” Rumore continued. “That’s why I’m a strong supporter of the RPM Act. When we modify a vehicle, we’re actually making it cleaner, helping out with its emissions.”

Like other companies, Long Tube Headers has also grappled with pandemic-related supply-chain issues, which Rumore said are finally beginning to diminish. He also pointed to part of the company’s product line—aftermarket performance catalytic converters—as discernable evidence that the motorsports industry is, indeed, becoming emissions-compliant.

“We now have a catalytic converter,” Rumore said. “Is it 100% legal? No, because you’re still moving the converter, but at least it shows that that side of the industry is trying to comply. And our converter is CARB-compliant. So we’re out there spending money, trying to please those masses of people.

“My biggest thing now, realistically, is keeping this all alive,” he said. “Seeing this next generation of young enthusiasts and the smaller shop owners coming up, it’s just a matter of trying to keep the enthusiasm and passion for the sport going.”