Flashing suggestions 2003 Cavalier Strictly Street Race car?

[EDZIP]

Received a call from a neighbor who building a father/son race car for our local dirt track. This is the first year of the Strictly Street class (4cyl). They have a 2003 Chevy Cavalier 2.2 5sp. They began stripping the car down to reduce weight, built a cage and want to run a basic OBD2 managed engine. Haven't seen the car yet but he says after removing some parts it will now start, run for about 5 seconds and shuts down. Going to run over there tomorrow with my scanner to help them get this project going - BUT FOR THE FUTURE:

Looking for suggestions to help set him up and probably someone to flash his PCM (or two). Since it's strictly for the track should it be set up for open loop etc? Won't have downstream O2 etc. Attached a pin-out from my MOTOR MANUAL and it has a bunch to be disabled and I hope to clean up the wiring.

Thanks