To De-Smog or not to De-Smog...

Don't just randomly start yanking stuff out of the engine bay. See here. The single biggest improvement you can make is also one of the easiest: bypass the OSAC valve. Presently there's a hose running from the carburetor's spark advance port to the OSAC valve on the side of the air cleaner housing, and from there to the distributor. Instead, run a hose directly from the carburetor spark advance port to the distributor.