Once you learn that it changes the way you build engines. For those that are willing to learn anyway.
I was lucky enough to grow up with a dad who raced an F Stock Barracuda and he took my brother and I to almost every type of Motorsports events you could think of. When we got our dirt bikes he had rules. Grades had to be up, no skipping school and the bikes had to be ready to go or we didn’t ride. When we started out that meant a clean bike (he meant clean too, not some hose job) and a lubed chain. Then as we learned we had more to do. He only did for us what were weren’t capable of, until we were capable.
The biggest thing for me was going to the drag races and seeing the Modified Eliminator cars. I was in the first grade and I was enthralled with the big RPM and the clutches. By the time I could read I was in the National Dragster reading everything but specifically looking a Modified National Records and such.
By the time I was 15 I was planning a Modified car. Of course NHRA killed Modified before I graduated HS, but all the learning I did when I was younger shaped my philosophy for how a race engine should be built.
And some of that translates to street/strip stuff too.
