[b-man]

I guess I would say I always liked Pontiacs, especially after riding in a ‘66 Tri-Power GTO that belonged to a high school buddy.

I am a first generation car guy/hot rodder, taught myself how to work on them by doing and reading a couple repair manuals.

My dad was an aerospace engineer who considered cars to be appliances and never understood why I was so motivated to work on and modify them in what most might consider impractical ways.

Four cylinder air cooled VWs are where I started, as a teenager I was heavily into street racing as well as racing on 1/4 mile tracks. My first hot street bugs ran 14.30s (1756cc) and later 13.70s (1835cc) so they were plenty competitive while roaming the streets in the late ‘70s. I also had a dedicated 12:1 race gas only 1835cc race car that consistently ran in the 12.40s back in 1981.

By 1989 I had acquired my first Pontiac and haven’t been able to stop ever since. It was a ‘64 GTO cloned from a Le Mans hardtop sometime back in the 1970s. My friend bought it in 1987 and it was clearly a street race warrior, it had a ‘69 RAIII WS engine complete with #48 heads ported by Mondello, clearly stamped above the exhaust crossover on the intake side of the heads. A Saginaw 4-speed and 4.88 gears in the 10-bolt rear let us know this was a purpose built performance car, it was also equipped with 14x7” Chevelle rally wheels of all things.

The GTO came with the H-O Racing engine book and one by Pete McCarthy/John Angeles as well so they definitely were my gurus and influential in my understanding of how special Pontiacs were. Also Purely PMD played a role as well, I still have all of the little booklets that were also included in my GTO deal.

Another big motivator was the pair of #197 455 HO heads that came in the trunk, my friend had recently purchased them from Purely PMD for the whopping sum of $850 which was big bucks at the time. It wasn’t long before I built a 455 to use those heads on, which I bracket raced for a decade of good times with my friends in the Pontiac Drag Days race series from 1993 to 2002.

When I got into Pontiacs I took a 25 year break from VWs but always held onto one that I kept in my garage out of the elements. Have since resurrected that one (‘66 bus pickup) and acquired 2 more, so it’s 3 Pontiacs and 3 VWs now to play with in my retirement that’s not too far in the future.