How to prepare my car for the dragstrip?

I think my son and I are ready to prepare my '62 Valiant V8 for the drags, but we're newbs at drag racing. I have learned one thing, however: feather the throttle off the line. You can't steer when you're popping a wheelie.

Am I going to have to install a roll cage? Modify the gas filler? Anything else?

I guess I want to run in Sportsman class??

As you can see, I really don't know my *** from a hole in the ground about drag racing, and I was hoping some of you guys would take pity on me and hold me by the hand.

(Gee, I don't want much, do I?)

OK, so the car really isn't running that great right now. I think it's fouling plugs. At least it runs better when I put in new plugs. It seems to bog down a little bit off the line. And I gotta adjust the 727's linkage to make it shift at a higher RPM. It's got a 360 with 10.5:1 C.R., ported "J" heads, Edelbrock performer intake and an older ThermoQuad with the big secondaries. It's probably running too phat. I guess I'm going to have to learn about re-jetting TQs.

What do you guys do when you need to take your car out for a test run? Where do you go to do it?

retroguybilly