street car or race car?

Here is a topic that every hotrodder has an opinion about. Whats the difference between a street car and a race car? Obviously if you race a guy and he beats you, he had a race car and your were just driving a street car right? My first hotrod was a 65 chevy truck with a full manual tranny, a 4000 stall convertor, 4.88 gears, no heater, no carpet and mufflers that were deafening. I drove this thing to the track 2 hours away, raced it and drove home probably 20 times. Its all about what you can live with. I was 18 and i only cared about power. I kept a wooden yardstick under my seat to dip in the gas tank to measure how much fuel i had left. I had a rearview mirror to be legal but i had the back window tinted so dark that i couldn't see through it anyways. I used to carry earplugs in my pocket for anything more than a 15 minute drive. I new all of the cops in town by first name. I was lucky that i worked at the garage in town that did all of the maintenance on the police cars. The cops would come in and see me fixing the brakes on their car and think to themselves that they shouldn't give me to much trouble. They would usually just give me a good earfull if they caught me doing something stupid but not give me a ticket. One time I might have been at a big race that wasn't sanctioned and was at a race track that wasn't normally used as a race track and a highway cop came along. He says, Whats going on here? Silence...... Then he says, Well I've got stuff to do and won't be back this way for a couple hours so you should probably wind up this event by then. We say... Yes officer, have a very nice day officer.
  If you want your car to be quick in the quartermile there are a few different ways to do it. The current trend is to stay with a reasonable gear ratio, a mild stall speed convertor and build a really big motor. If you want to build a small motor you will need to rev it way higher and you need the gear ratio and the convertor to go with it. Small stressed out motors tend to self destruct quicker. If you are new to the hobby and your first few attempts at building a motor are unsuccesfull and exspensive you will soon lose your motivation. This is why its good to have a mentor to guide you along.  If you are to proud to ask for help in this hobby it is very unforgiving.  Its good to learn how to do things yourself but sometimes its worth paying someone to do something right.  A good example is head porting.  Before you take a die grinder anywhere near a set of exotic high dollar heads, you need to ask yourself...Why do the pro's charge so much for this service? Is there more to it then just making the ports bigger? Can I ruin my heads or actually make them worse if i port them myself? There is 2 ways to learn this hobby, the easy way or the hard way. The easy way is when someone helps you along and tells you how to do things right. The hard way involves alot of money and a trail of broken parts.  Honestly consider your skill levels and set your goals when tackling a project car. Do you want to run 9's at the track, run race fuel all the time, and attract every cop in town every time you start your car? Or could you settle for setting a goal of 12's in the quarter on pump gas with a car that doesn't need the valve springs changed every time you drive it? Most guys that have been in the hobby all their lives started slow. My very first time at the track the guy running the Christmas tree signaled me with his hand to roll up my window. I thought he was telling me to do a big burnout. I started brake torking my truck to get the tires cookin. The crowd at the track got a good laugh and I looked like a real newbie. The starter was very courteous and politely told me to roll my window up once the smoke subsided.  I ran 16.7 at 80 mph. I had great fun just racing at the track and it was a starting point for me to learn every trick to eventually run 11.9  @  110 mph with that same 65 chevy truck.  The only job where you start at the top is digging graves.
thats all for today