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This 1974 Oldsmobile wears Yellow Blaze Metallic paint tied directly to Hurst/Olds fourth appearance at the Indianapolis 500 that year. Fewer than 1,800 production Indy 500 Pace Car package cars were built, each offered with either a 350 or 455 cubic inch V8. Oldsmobile even supplied Delta 88 convertibles for parade duty around the same event.
The Brothers Collection has quietly assembled some of the most deceptive muscle cars Detroit ever built — a 1969 Mustang 426 Cobra Jet, a big-block 1966 Impala SS 427, even a supercharged 1964 Avanti, all wearing bodies nobody would suspect. Muscle Car of the Week takes viewers through six factory sleepers built to blend in and built to embarrass anything that challenged them. Watch to see which unassuming classic hides the biggest surprise.
Turbo Mustangs, a nitrous-fed S10, a Viper, and a twin-turbo Chevy II all showed up to the same stretch of bare Texas asphalt for one wild night of no-prep street racing. Without a prepped surface to lean on, every launch came down to raw nerve and whatever grip the driver could find on his own. It’s the same chaotic, unscripted energy that turned Discovery’s Street Outlaws franchise into a national phenomenon. Here’s what a real no-prep night looks like when the cameras aren’t running the show.
1971 was Chevrolet best-ever year for truck production, and the C10 pickup was the model buyers wanted most. This street build pairs a 355 small block and roller cam with tasteful two-tone paint over a truck that already had a strong factory foundation. Here is what made the stock 1971 C10 such a good starting point in the first place.
Owners Brian and Pat Kelly restored this 1970 Road Runner from a rattle-can respray back to its factory Lemon Twist Yellow, chasing a feeling Brian remembers from high school. The 383 under the hood was Plymouth answer to buyers who wanted real muscle without Hemi pricing. Here is what the numbers behind that engine, and the Hurst shifter bolted to it, actually delivered.
A 1963 Chevrolet Nova doesn’t usually stop foot traffic at a show packed with wilder builds, but this Pro Touring version manages it anyway. Two-tone paint that shifts with the light, a silver headliner most builders wouldn’t risk, and an LS engine swapped in where a small-block used to sit all add up to a car built to be driven as hard as it’s admired. See what happens when restraint and performance end up on the same build sheet.
A black-on-black 1980 Camaro Z28 with around 19,xxx original miles is a rare window into the last year Chevrolet offered real 350 V8 power in this body style. Emissions rules were reshaping the entire muscle car landscape by 1980, and this engine option barely survived the transition. Here is what made the 350 4-barrel Z28 different from the California-spec cars sitting next to it on the same showroom floor.
There’s an old test for spotting a genuinely serious engine: does it clear one horsepower for every cubic inch? This 1967 Corvette’s 427 doesn’t just pass that test, the 435-horse version blows past it entirely, and Chevrolet’s official numbers were famously conservative to begin with. Between the two available 427s and the race-only L88 lurking behind them, this generation of Corvette hid some of the most underrated horsepower figures of the entire muscle car era.
A 1929 Plymouth street rod that stops people cold, not for its paint but for what’s rumbling under the hood: a diesel engine nobody expects to find in a prewar hot rod. Diesel swaps are rare in this world because none of the easy bolt-in kits exist, which makes builds like this a genuine rarity on any show floor. It’s proof that the most memorable street rods aren’t always the ones running the expected combination.
Pontiac built only 697 Trans Ams in 1969, the model’s very first year on a Firebird. Of those, just 55 came with the rare Ram Air IV engine, and only 46 of those were paired with a four-speed manual like this one. That combination puts this car in one of the smallest production windows in muscle car history. It’s no wonder Ram Air IV Trans Ams from this era routinely bring six-figure money whenever one actually comes up for sale.
1979 was the only year Pontiac forced its last big 400 V8 to come exclusively with a four-speed stick, no automatic allowed. This factory-correct combo gets backed up here with an aluminum intake, Edelbrock carb, and longtube headers that finally let the W72 breathe. Here is why the pairing was never optional.
Ford killed the 289 for good in 1969 and replaced it with a brand-new engine built from scratch at the Windsor plant, one that would go on to power Mustangs for decades. This Cougar wears that debut-year 351 under a triple-black look built to look as serious as the engine sounds. Here is what actually changed under the hood.
Dodge nearly killed off the roadster body style entirely in 1950 before quietly renaming it Sportabout and keeping the convertible alive, barely. Fewer than 3,000 of these left the factory that year, making this ragtop the rarest Wayfarer body style Dodge ever built. Here is the story behind a car most people have never heard of.
When Shirley French graduated in 2004, her grandparents gave her a 1972 Ford Mustang Mach 1 in Grabber Orange with a 351 cubic inch V8 — and more than a decade later, she is still driving it to a weekly car show outside Chicago. The Mach 1 arrived at an awkward moment in Mustang history, holding onto its aggressive looks just as emissions rules began softening horsepower across the industry. Her long ownership is rarer than you would think.
NASCAR’s homologation rules forced Dodge and Plymouth to build two of the wildest street cars Detroit ever sold, the winged Daytona and Superbird. This lineup puts a real Daytona next to two Superbirds, Hemi and 440 alike, side by side. Here is what actually separates Dodge’s original from Plymouth’s answer a year later.