When talking about the pioneers of Fastest Street Car racing, the name Pat Musi will most likely be brought up. But even before he made a name for himself as a Pro Street Champion with the NMCA and NSCA circuits back in the 1990s, Musi raced against the likes of Warren Johnson, Bob Glidden, Lee Shepard, and the rest of the NHRA Pro Stock legends of the late ‘70s and ‘80s.

Story by: Fastest Street Car

Now he’s returned to the NMCA wearing a crew chief cap, and has already tuned one of customers, Joe Dunne, into the Scorpion Performance Winner’s Circle. Musi is a smart racer, engine builder and crew chief, and you can bet when one of Musi’s cars shows up to event, the other competitors know it. Talk with Musi for a bit and you can tell he still has the passion for this sport and he even mentioned he’d like to run his rival Tony Christian again in a match race if the NMCA will organize it. Will it happen? We sure hope so.

Interview with Pat Musi

Fastest Street Car: How did your career in drag racing begin and at what point did it escalate into Pro Street type drag racing? Was it a gradual progression?

Musi: “Started racing in 1969, got into Pro Stock in 1974, and Pro Street in 1994.”

FSC: Making a thousand horsepower has become pretty common these days, was there a time in your career where you remember when 1,000 seemed unfathomable?

Musi: “We were making around 790 with a killer 360 inch big-block in the late 1970s in Pro Stock and then when we went to the 500 ci engine, that’s when everyone was trying to make that 1,000 horsepower number. I remember we had like 980 going into the first race at Pomona, but we were right at the 1,000 horsepower mark in ’81. Forget about that, what about the displacement these days? We’re up to 903 cubic inches and we’re working on one now that’s over 1,000 cubes.”

FSC: Do you miss the old days of Pro Street?

Musi: “Absolutely, however, letting the turbos win by the rule book ruined the class in my opinion. Back then, they (the old NMCA) were underestimating the turbocharged combinations and [Bob] Reiger was what I call a ‘rulebook racer.’ He had enough money to look at the rulebook, pick a loophole combination and come out and win with it, he was also good when it came to sandbaggin’ too. Meaning, until we pushed him hard enough [got our cars running quicker], he wouldn’t have to show what he had. My suggestion back then was, ‘why don’t you put enough weight on the turbo cars so we know what they got?’ But we all were fairly certain about what he made. When we barely had 2,000 hp, he had 2,500, and you’re not making up 500 horsepower on the track. And then to top it off, he had a small-block weight break, so he was lighter than us, it was a joke.”

FSC: You’ve been working with Joe Dunne lately, how is that going?

Musi: “He’s one of the guys that really stepped up to the plate and became a customer. He’s a good driver and I really enjoy going to the races with him and his car is fast. We just went to a Pro Mod race, at only 45 pounds lighter than the NMCA Pro Street rules, and went 6.23 at 221 mph. We figured out some suspension issues, I knew something was wrong because we had to take too much power out of it to get down the racetrack. We try to leave with the most power we can, if you have to crutch it, you’re doing something wrong. You have to race the racetrack, so if you have to crutch things for a bad racetrack, sure, but you shouldn’t have to pull power at every race. You have to make the car work with the maximum amount of power available if you want to be fast.

FSC: You actually have been driving a bit yourself lately, right?

Musi: I’m actually building a car that will be heading overseas. I also have another good driving deal for next year. I’m going to race a car at least four races at Curacao Dragway, in the Netherlands and then probably two or three in Aruba. But to just jump into the NMCA Pro Street deal now with all the automatics, turbos, blowers, doesn’t make sense for me. I understand they have to leave it open for the car counts, but it’s not for me. I liked Pro Stock, you don’t have all the gadgets they do in Pro Street now, it was pure, move you foot not your finger

FSC: Are there still some guys in this sport that you would like to line up against one day?

Musi: “Vinny [Budano] got to run me in Atco after a year off and he wasn’t happy. I would love to run Tony again. The thing about me is, some people have said in the past, ‘you don’t want to run this guy, or you’re a cryin.’ I ran Warren Johnson, I ran Don Nicholson, Ronnie Sox, Lee Shepard, I’ve beat them, they’ve beat me, I am not afraid to race anybody, but I refuse to be beat when I’m already beat by the rules. I’d like to have a match race with Tony Christian I think we’d have a big draw.”

Pat Musi recently helped Scorpion Pro Street racer Joe Dunne run an incredible 6.23 at 221 mph…at only 45-pounds lighter than the NMCA rules require.