1979 Ford Mustang - Tubbed & Torqued

Though the Pro Street fad of the late '80s has largely died down, there are still some fine examples running around and, more importantly, some are even being hammered at the racetrack.

Jerry Lescalleet of Boonsboro, Maryland, is one of a small group who actually takes advantage of those huge rear tires and regularly flogs his machine at the dragstrip. "That's what they're built for," he says.

Rather than go through the trouble of back-halving a car himself, Jerry found it easier and cheaper to buy a rolling chassis that already had the rear tubbed and the rollcage installed. The '79 Mustang you see here was that roller.

Jerry had Castle's Body Shop in Boonsboro respray the car's originally red flanks in the vibrant Porsche Red, adding a later LX wing and the 4-inch cowl-induction hoodscoop at the same time.

Not content to employ some girlie small-block, Jerry contacted Phil Benedict in Pennsylvania to assemble a mean 508 big-block. The '70 vintage boat anchor was bored and stroked, filled with Ross pistons and topped off with Ford Racing Super Cobra Jet aluminum cylinder heads and a Crane solid lifter roller cam sporting 0.730-inch valve lift and an advertised duration of 304/310 degrees.

At the time these photos were taken, Jerry was using a Holley 850 double pumper with a Weiand Stealth intake manifold, but he later swapped that duo for a 1050 Dominator and Edelbrock Victor Jr. That change alone netted nearly five-tenths improvement in the quarter-mile.

Five-hundred-plus cubic inches require a rather large exhaust system, so Hooker 2 1/8-inch Super Competition headers were joined to 31/2-inch exhaust pipes and DynoMax Bullet mufflers.