I’m writing this from the driver’s seat of the 1966 Chevelle you see in these pages. Both literally and figuratively. There’s no better place to share this story from. I’ve spent the last 25 years driving this car to school and work, racing it regularly and making change after change to it. This car has been with me through some of my best points in life, and some of my worst. This story really begins in 1986 in Las Cruces, New Mexico. Mike Lane owned this Chevelle, and was trying to build a decent driver out of it.
He had rescued the car from a previous owner who threatened to turn the car into a circle-track racer for the local dirt track if Mike didn’t buy it. Mike and I met through street racing and mutual friends, and I started helping him work on the car when I could. After swapping in several used automatic transmissions, a couple of small-block engines and gallons of body filler and primer, the car was starting to take on a desirable shape.