Badmaro has a very colorful background. When I was 15 (now 22), my dad made the offer to me that I could have what was once my mom's Camaro, that now sat on the chassis table, waiting to be rebuilt. It had sat there for two years, and they decided that since I was almost 16 and would soon be needing a car, I could put the Camaro to good use. This came with the stipulations, however, that I had to maintain my all 4.0 status and get college paid for and also be 100% involved in the build. This seemed like a more than fair trade to me and was exciting, as I had grown up in the shop and automotive industry, as he builds street cars and race cars for a living, and I always liked being able to help and learn along the way.
Taking this story back further, my idea for the way my Badmaro came to be, originated in part from a previous car we owned. In 2007, shortly after Denny Terzich had won Drag Week with his 7 second 67 Camaro, he called up my dad and wanted to trade the 67 for a 33 Willys Hi-boy my dad had just completed and listed for sale. We traded, and when the car came, I absolutely fell in love with it and it made me love racing and Drag Week, and from that point Drag Week was something I wanted to do. Shortly before we sold it a few years later, we got the custom plate "BADMARO" for it and gave it the nickname. When they sold it, it broke my heart.
Moving back to my Badmaro, when we started on the build in 2012, I decided I wanted my Camaro to be a version of the black 67. Granted, it was going to be nowhere close the the procharged beast that the black car was, as Badmaro was originally built to be my daily driver to high school. It wasn't until dad jokingly mentioned in that summer that we could build the car for Drag Week 2013, and I could take it on it. I jumped on the idea however, and it stuck. The car car was a full build from chassis up, and I was involved with it every step up the way. We kept it fairly simple on the first rendition, power wise, but we did added all of the amenities such as power steering, power windows, AC, stereo, and full interior, which are still in Badmaro today. On the first combination, we built the car with a stock LS1 with Holley Dominator Fuel Injection and a stock 4l80e trans. Badmaro weighed in at 3,800 pounds and ran in the 11s. We only kept this combination for one year prior to making upgrades, but that's a story for another post.
In July of 2013, I turned 16. We finished Badmaro at the end of August 2013. Right after, we rented a local track for a few hours of testing so I could learn the car, learn the concepts behind burnouts/going down the track, and learn being a driver. It was a crash course. Next time Badmaro was out we were headed to Bowling Green, KY where my Dad dropped my Mom and I off to start and finish Hot Rod Magazine's Drag Week. He left us there and we completed the week by ourselves. Since he knew that us going on Drag Week by ourselves was the plan, and neither of us had ever worked with EFI, he told me that since I was going to finish the week by myself, I had to learn Holley EFI since no one would be there to help. So, I read every start guide I could find and created a base tune (not optimal but it worked) that I use and worked with during Drag Week, which is when and how I got started working with EFI. Later that year, still at the age of 16, my dad and I attended Holley EFI classes and were in the first group to be Holley EFI certified.
And I say all of that to paint a picture of Bamaro's, and my own beginning in the current automotive world. The story continues to progress and the car continues to evolve. But, those updates are for a later post.
Just for fun, here is a link to my very first build of my Camaro in 2013. I had forgot about this until now!
https://bangshift.com/forum/forum/bangshift/unofficial-hot-rod-drag-week-board/42767-finishing-up
