Street Machines, Pro Street to Pro Touring Part 3
Editor’s Note
In celebration of the Goodguys PPG Nationals 20th anniversary, we are counting down the last twenty recipients of the Goodguys Street Machine of the Year award to show you the cars, but also to chronicle the evolution of modern day Street Machines. Perhaps no other breed of high-performance car has undergone such radical changes. What we used to do with these cars was all about noise, burnouts, straight line acceleration and posing.
As you will see through this 10-part series, Street Machines have changed dramatically beginning in 2000. The name of the game today is a hybrid sports car/muscle car, bred to run hard and fast be it around sharp corners or cracking 170mph on road course straightaways.
These supercars have never been more popular and have spawned an entire cottage industry of performance parts, suspension components, wheels, and tires. Not only do they look incredibly good, they sometimes outrun their looks. You couldn’t always say that!
Come along for the next 10 weeks as we show you the best street machines in the world.
2001 Street Machine of the Year
Ted Richardson
1966 Nova
Much like the Tucker’s ’69 Camaro “Twister,” – Ted Richardson’s blue ’66 Nova was an early Pro-Touring build from the Pacific Northwest shop of StreetWorks headed by Doug Schultz. Completed in a five-week pre-Columbus thrash, the machine was draped in GM Bahama Blue. Schultz and his team (which included young sheet metal ace Ryan Butler who was tragically killed years later) outfitted this evil econobox with Heidt’s AirLift suspension, an early set of big Baer Brakes, Budnik wheels and low-pro performance rubber. The OEM-appearing interior was understated but power was NOT! A 700hp, stroked Chevy small block was force fed with a ProCharger and two giant Holley 850s mounted to an Edelbrock cross ram style manifold. Pro-Touring was still getting sorted out in 2001 and Richardson’s car was a “tweener.” A bad to the bone one at that!
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2002 Street Machine of the Year
Denny Terzich
1956 Chevy
Since he was a teenager, Denny Terzich had a knack for performance cars. He can thank his father for that. In later years, the Terzich clan founded “Pro Rides” which has turned out headline-grabbing cars like “Project Sick Seconds,” and more recently “Project X-Box.” But this ’56 Shoebox was best at Columbus in the summer of 2002. The rocker-dragging stance was thanks to a Fatman front clip, while an early RideTech ladder bar system shored up the business end. It didn’t lack for power. If more is good, “much more” was better in this case. A dressed and detailed engine bay housed a rowdy jewel – an 895hp 572c.i. carbureted big block with a Turbo 400 trans equipped with a Gear Vendors overdrive and 4:56 gears inside a Currie rear end. The channeled body was straight as an arrow with through-the-body exhaust, perfect gaps, two-tone paint and a trick hood scoop with a Bobby Alloway-made blister. Continuing in the Pro-Touring vein, this one had no “meats” either.
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Tune in next week for 20 Years of Street Machines Part 4
In the meantime, check out our previous Street Machine stories.
Part 1
Part 2
