The Hand Off

The classic street/strip 1962 Impala has been successful on the strip for 15 years.... and the wins just keep coming

- Toby Brooks

Larry Baker felt it coming. Like an unstoppable freight train, there would be no avoiding it. At best, the Catoosa, Oklahoma native was hoping to contain his affliction on his own terms. But after building and campaigning a 1978 Malibu, a trio of Camaros, and a 1955 Chevy, the entire Baker family had come to the realization that they all had acute and severe cases of Go Fast Fever.

However, with each new build, the complexity and price associated with running a progressively faster car resulted in a painful realization: in order to become more competitive in regional and national events, it would be far more cost effective to purchase a completed car and update it as needed as opposed to piecing together another new car from scratch.

“After we built my dream car—a 1955 Chevy—and campaigned it in Drag Week 2015, we realized that we were not nearly capable of being competitive. We decided the best way to go faster was to find a car and buy it,” he said.

After frequenting Facebook, RacingJunk, eBay, and Craigslist for months, the Baker family finally found a suitable candidate. Inclusion criteria were significant, including a 6.0 cert chassis steel-bodied GM car with turbos or a ProCharger. After narrowing the search to a ’69 Camaro and this 1962 Impala, Larry was able to work a deal with original builder Mike Holderidge who was retiring from competition to transfer ownership of the red Chevy.

Originally built as a rolling business card for Holderidge’s Seymour, Wisconsin-based Race Shop, the then-daily driver was treated to the full-on race treatment, coming together as a 409-powered tube chassis grudge car in 2001.