Mario Johnson Reveals Spectacular New

Mario Johnson Reveals Spectacular New ’67 Camaro For 4.84 Shootouts!

From the real-deal to the composite replicas, the first-generation 1967-69 Chevrolet Camaro is without question drag racing’s most popular make and model of vehicle, and there are shining examples of this fine muscle car to be found all across the vast straight-line landscape. But one of its newest may just be the finest of them all.

Photos by Mark Menscer

Grudge and no-time drag racing star Mario Johnson has illustrated impeccable taste in race cars, as evidenced by some of the machines he has campaigned previously, including the unmistakable “Ghost” Corvette.

For his return, Johnson and his BMF Racing tabbed John Setzer of Setzer Race Cars to build the Camaro brand-new from the ground up, utilizing a factory steel roof and quarter panels. The car, known as “Lucky Luciano,” is powered by a 11.7-inch deck height, 4.840-inch bore space big-block, measuring 765 cubic inches, built by TRE Racing Engines, and gulping a hefty dose of nitrous oxide. Michael Bunton wired the FuelTech FT600 and FTSpark system, which Kevin Mullins and Ziff Hudson at TKM will help to dial-in. The car rides on Menscer Motorsports double adjustable monotube front struts, and four-way adjustable rear shocks with custom valving on the rear, all with Menscer’s spring package. Menscer did the setup and alignment and scaled the car out, and will be assisting in chassis tuning throughout the shakedown process.

“It’s a very interesting car when you see it in person…it’s got a lot of my tricks built into it, things are built the way I wanted,” Johnson says. “It came out beautiful. Kip at City Garage & Body Shop does all our painting for us. I’m proud of it, and I really like it. Don’t get me wrong, I loved the Corvette, but every new project has something special to it.

“I really honestly do think I have a good eye for a car, especially when you have guys that can take what you’re thinking and bring it out in a product,” Mario continues. “I was involved in this project every step of the way. I try to make it really easy on the builders, because I tell them exactly what I want. I can’t build it, but I can tell them exactly how I want it, and give input and influence it at every step. So I got to see it all come together. It was fun, and it came out great…I just love it. I just hope it’s a top contender in the class, because it would be a shame to look that way and not run.”

Johnson says the car was purpose-built not for grudge racing, but for the 4.84-inch bore-space shootouts.

“I wasn’t going to get back out there, but the 4.840 stuff got started and it looks like it’s going to be real competitive, so that’s what made me want to get back into it. There’s probably 10 cars in this deal that are separated by probably not more than five or six numbers. I feel like the whole field is within half a tenth, so a reaction time is the difference in winning. There’s just a lot of top name guys and racing teams that have 4.84 cars, so it’s going to be a real competitive class, like Pro 275. The nice thing about this is you leave home you know you’re going to run for some very nice guaranteed purses that the promoters are putting up. So I didn’t put it together to go looking for grudge races. But these guys are all natural grudge racers, so you might see betting every round.”

Those are 275 drag radials stretched out on 15×15 RC Comp rear hoops.

The color itself is one of the unique characteristics of Lucky Luciano.

“It’s really not a color,” Johnson says. “In all honesty, it’s four different pearls, without a base coat, that we put together to make a color. So we sprayed nothing but pearls on the car. It got kind of expensive to do it, but it came out great. At some angles it looks like a white, other times it’s a silver, then a titanium-gold’ish color, and sometimes it even has a little blue in it. Every day that I look at it I see a different color, so it’s doing what I wanted it to do. I’m known for base-white type of cars, so I wanted this to be different. Everybody who had their hand in this car locked it out of the park.”

In addition to Setzer, Mullins, Hudson, and Bunton, Johnson credits Cameron’s Torque Converter Services, Menscer Motorsports, RC Components, TRE Engines and his entire BMF Racing group for their part in making his spectacular machine a reality.

Johnson has a race locked in with Jamie “Triggaman” Hawes at Orangeburg, South Carolina August 6th, in what is the planned competition debut of Lucky Luciano.

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About the author

Andrew Wolf

Andrew has been involved in motorsports from a very young age. Over the years, he has photographed several major auto racing events, sports, news journalism, portraiture, and everything in between. After working with the Power Automedia staff for some time on a freelance basis, Andrew joined the team in 2010.
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