Street Racing Scene

[L78_Nova]

My first powershift.

Somewhere around 1982 (I was 18) at a swap meet, I met Carl a parts manager from a country GM dealer who soon became my “DEALER” and friend. He had built a very nice 66 Nova Super Sport L79 4 speed tribute. Sometime later I visited his town and He took me for an extended ride in said Nova wherein he beat the daylights out of the poor Muncie, powershifting through the gears multiples of times. As I recall it started with missing 3rd on the first pass after which he was mad at it and was teaching it a lesson.

I was shocked he would thrash on this Nice Nova “how can you do that to your car ?!?
He said I have another 327 and a few Muncies in the garage at home. If it breaks I’ll fix it.

Fast forward a year... my buddy and I were out cruising. He had a VERY nice 68 Beaumont SD with a fully worked over 396 that would turn 7500 rpm with the 4.88 gears to match. His car had run 12.0X on slicks at the track. At the time I think my best was around a 12.3x on street tires. Well as luck would have it on the way home we got stopped at a light together. Green hits and we both roll out about 25 ft then like we were reading each others mind it was on ! He had me by a fender and NO WAY was I letting off to shift. It was like Heroin… Hooked for life. I had a fender on him by third and had to lift for upcoming traffic. I’m certain his version of the story is different though.
Good times!!