Restoration shop owner Luciano ‘Lucky’ Lacerda built this 1961 Cadillac Series 62 Convertible specifically to showcase his own shop’s work at SEMA, finishing it in a deep green that stands out even at a packed Scottsdale cars-and-coffee. It’s a deliberate choice in a SEMA field dominated by trucks and muscle cars. Watch to see what a restoration shop owner picks when the whole point is to prove what he can do.
A 1971 Chevy Nova originally left the factory with a base inline-six – this one now runs a 406 cubic-inch small block with a full roller valvetrain and a build claiming 572 horsepower to the wheels. Paired with drag radials instead of slicks, it’s built to be raced and driven home the same day. See why the 406 stroker combination remains one of the most popular small-block builds in drag radial racing, and what it takes to make that kind of power reliably.
Thirty years after Saleen’s race team swept four championships in a single 1987 season, the Championship Commemorative Edition Mustang arrived with a 3.2-liter liquid-cooled supercharger on its 5.0-liter V8, 730 horsepower on the street, 750 in track trim, and a production run capped at just 30 cars starting around $87,000. General Tire came back as a partner and Racecraft suspension returned. Read on to find out what made that season worth honoring.
This Dodge Challenger looks like it just rolled off a dealer lot, right up until it launches. Built to run at Texas Speed Syndicate’s exclusive Quick 30 drag day near Houston, this twin-turbo sleeper makes over 1,300 horsepower and has been recognized as holding the modern Mopar speed record. Twin turbos on a late-model Challenger are rare enough on their own. Read on to see why hiding them under a stock body is the hardest part.
The 2018 Dodge Challenger SRT Demon left the factory with 840 horsepower, a front-wheel lift kit, and an NHRA-certified 9.65-second quarter-mile at 140 mph — numbers that made it the quickest production car ever built at the time. Getting the engine’s full power required a separate $1 unlock. Watch to see exactly what Dodge built when the brief was simply: fastest, no compromises.
A gutted Tesla P100D put up serious money against a field of built Mustangs — a Whipple-blown Terminator Cobra, a twin-turbo coyote swap, two nitrous Foxbodies, and an E85 Nissan GT-R — for a $3,200 pot. Then the track prep became its own argument before a single run went down. Watch to see which combination actually took the money.
That ‘396’ badge on this 1972 Camaro SS is telling a small lie – Chevrolet quietly bored the engine out to 402 cubic inches back in 1970 and just never bothered updating the fender emblem. Add in a 174-day UAW strike that crushed Camaro production that same year, and this clean Graphite Gray Pro Touring build is sitting on a genuinely rare factory foundation. Only 970 Camaros left the line wearing this exact big-block SS package. Read on to find out why 1972 was the end of the road for the big-block Camaro.
In 1969 Chevrolet let a handful of buyers order an all-aluminum, race-bred 427 that needed fuel no gas station actually sold — and it nearly doubled the price of the car it went into. Only 69 Camaros and 2 Corvettes ever left the factory with the ZL1 option. Read on for the dyno numbers, the drag strip runs that outran them, and why this engine’s window of availability was so brief.
A 1972 Corvette build sheet shows a horsepower number for the LS5 454 that looks like a nosedive next to earlier years, and the reason has more to do with how Detroit measured power than with what the engine actually made. This numbers-matching, Bryar Blue example with a Muncie four-speed and original Rally Wheels sits right at that turning point, and an LS6 cam and intake swap wakes it up further. Read on to find out what really happened to the horsepower wars in 1972.
Myron Vernis’s car collection isn’t built around icons — it’s built around the cars everyone else passed on: a French sports car with a very specific seating arrangement, a proto-SUV wearing a plywood roof, and a convertible repeatedly nominated as the ugliest ever built. This uncut follow-up digs into the cars too strange for the first cut. Watch to see what didn’t make it the first time around.
A Dodge Hellcat Charger and a Chevy ZL1 Camaro both rolled into Byron Dragway looking to take down the same Shelby Mustang in one night, and neither one could close the gap. The Shelby answered both challenges with trap speeds over 122 mph, leaving two of Detroit’s most hyped factory muscle cars searching for an explanation. Watch to see how close it actually got.
This 1970 Camaro looks like a factory small-block cruiser until you notice what’s actually under the hood. A modern Ram Jet 350 crate engine and a Tremec five-speed have replaced whatever left the assembly line, turning a classic second-gen body into a genuine driver. Gateway Classic Cars built it to be enjoyed, not just admired. Is that a compromise, or the smarter way to own a muscle car icon?
This 1967 Mustang runs Ford’s dependable 289 V8 backed by the factory three-speed manual, a combination often overlooked next to big-block legends. But the 289’s blend of power, reliability, and that direct three-speed feel made 1967 one of Mustang’s most important model years. Gateway Classic Cars is sharing the images here. Underrated classic, or just a base-model Mustang?
NHRA’s 50 Greatest Drivers list wasn’t slapped together as clickbait – it came out of a genuine blue-ribbon panel debate for the sanctioning body’s 50th anniversary, weighing everything from national event wins to the sport’s technological history. Don Garlits sits at number one, with John Force, Don Prudhomme, Bob Glidden, and Shirley Muldowney rounding out a top five that basically built modern drag racing. Decades later, NHRA even expanded it into a Top 75 list for its 75th anniversary. So who’s your pick for the top spot?