Joseph Belanger and his family found a way to take something old and make it new again. The 1967 Chevy Nova station wagon that Joseph campaigns in the NHRA F/SA class was an older bracket car.

Originally, Joseph’s father purchased the Nova in 2001 as a project for himself. The car was being campaigned at Ohio Valley Dragstrip as a bracket car and it was in pretty good condition, but there was some room for improvement. The Belanger brothers got to work restoring the long top Nova by attacking the interior and body. When Joseph and his family were finished, the Nova was in better-than-new shape.

Joseph’s brother Steven built the 327 cubic-inch small block that’s backed by a TH200 transmission. A full complement of MSD products was used for the Nova’s ignition system. A Racepak data logger records everything that happens on each run. Under the Nova, you’ll find suspension parts from Calvert Racing. This combination has pushed the Nova wagon to a best pass of 10.96 on the F/SA 11.85 class index.

“We got into NHRA class racing because of my dad. It’s just something that we’ve been around as a family and wanted to keep doing it. Racing was also my dad’s way of keeping my brother and I out of trouble, because if we were racing, he always knew what we were doing,” Joseph says.

When Joseph looks back at the Nova wagon project, he loves the fact it has been a family affair. His brother, nephew, and daughter all played a role in getting the Nova finished up and back to the track. The plan is to keep the Nova in the family and allow future generations of Belangers to race the car.