You might remember Jim Shipka’s Pro Touring ’67 Camaro from our Optima Ultimate Streetcar Invitational story back in the May 2009 issue. Even though he lives in Canada, we sure see him at a lot of events in the south western U.S. It must be the weather. Two weeks later he was back in town and running the car at the Del Mar autocross where he ran a 31.819 on his Toyo R888 tires. Jim’s Camaro was also chosen as a Goodguys Muscle Machine of the Year finalist at the Costa Mesa event. Congrats Jim!

Other highlights include a 502 big-block backed by a 700R4 built by the GM trans gurus at the Toy Shop in Pomona, California. To see more of this ride, visit www.totalcostinvolved.com.

With only 30 miles on the odometer, the guys over at Total Cost Involved (TCI) brought out this recently- built ’69 Camaro owned by Don Oaks. TCI upgrades include their rear four-link and front subframe.

The guys at Spectre Performance like wrenching on and running cars. Maybe even mor than selling parts for ‘em. Back in 2003, they bought this ’70 RS/Z28 off eBay and since then it’s gotten a variety of different guts. Right now it’s sporting a 383 GMPP crate engine with a Richmond six-speed and their own cold air intake system. A Hotchkis suspension keeps the Camaro planted in the curves. The roll cage, along with all the custom aluminum work, was done by Fast Eddie’s Speed Shop in Orange, California. To find out more on this ride and Spectre’s extensive line of goodies, visit www.spectreperformance.com.

Ask any of the autocross combatants which part of the Costa Mesa course was the trickiest and most would have pointed to the finish line. Sure, you could shave off a little time by coming through the traps a little hot, but push too far and you’d wind up uncomfortably close to the water barrier or the bathroom wall immediately beyond it. This certainly favored newer cars that, thanks to ABS, could steer while under hard braking.

If there’s an event that features hard driving, then you can count on Detroit Speed to bring a few cars to demonstrate their products, and Costa Mesa was no exception. Here, Ryan Mathews gives a ride to a potential customer in Stacy Tuckers ’69. The blue first-gen recently received a Mast Motorsports 416-cubed LS3 mill under the hood and turned in a best time of 29.476 seconds.

Still reeling from his defeat at Costa Mesa’s Editors Challenge Cup, Nick Licata was out for revenge. In Del Mar he chose DSE’s second-gen for a best-of-three grudge match against Rupp in his orange ’68 Camaro. Unfortunately for Licata, Rupp was on his grippier street tires. Needless to say, Licata’s quickest lap of 30.423 wasn’t able to beat Rupp’s best run of 30.187. After the defeat, Licata stole Rupp’s Camaro and made a run knocking down an even better time of 30.107. At least this will afford him some solace until next year’s official challenge when he will be driving his own DSE-equipped second-gen Camaro.

The folks from Baer Brakes were on hand showing off their line of hard-hitting brake products including this 6S mono-block caliper. According to Baer, “We offer the only forged monoblock caliper in the world that is specifically designed for road use. Because of its construction, the Baer 6S caliper is the stiffest caliper to ever be offered for road-going use.” Find out more about these bitchen binders over at www.baer.com.

Equipped with some new suspension parts, including a rear sway bar from Hotchkis, Rupp brought out his ’68 project car to try and take home the Editors Challenge Cup trophy. The lead seesawed back and forth between editors, but on the very last lap, Rupp hammered the ’68 to a time of 29.694 on his Kumho XS tires. This was just enough to edge out Super Chevy’s Jim Campisano (29.978) and our very own Nick Licata (30.107), both behind the wheel of DSE’s test cars.

Roy Rozelle of La Palma, California brought his ’69 to the Costa Mesa party and had a blast dodging cones all day. He ran a best time of 32.80 seconds. The Camaro is powered by a 400-inch 536hp small-block and the suspension is upgraded with a host of parts from Global West. Just a few days prior, Roy and his son took the Camaro to the drag strip where it knocked down a 12.60 at 114 mph. This is truly a dual-purpose ride.

Kevin Bradley and the guys at Kreations Auto Body, brought this sweet ’68 all the way down from Rio Dell, California to the Del Mar show. The Camaro is painted in ’08 Mercedes Mocha that has to be seen to be appreciated. Under the hood there’s a 427-inch big-block topped off with an 8-stack Kinsler EFI unit and the trans is a five-speed from Classic Motor Sports Group. Big Wilwood brakes, Rick’s stainless fuel tank, DSE rear suspension, Morrison front clip, and custom leather interior; the list of cool stuff on this ride just goes on and on. Check out more pics over at www.kreationsautobody.com.

Festler Built was also on hand to show off their new goodies, and while most of them fall into the “looks” category, these are definitely performance oriented. Their new line of stainless headers are completely hand-fabricated and come in either raw or polished finishes. Big-block versions feature 2-inch tubes, LS models have 1.75-inch tubes, and their Hugger headers have 1 5/8-inch tubes. Best of all they promise a true “bolt in” fit with both stock and aftermarket subframes.

Since Del Mar is a mere 70 miles south of Costa Mesa, many of the same players were on hand for the autocross action. Here, Kyle Tucker discusses track strategy with his wife Stacy who’s piloting their ’70 Camaro test car. Behind them is our very own project car, Bad Penny, and bringing up the rear is Mary Pozzi in her second-gen. We did some suspension mods to Penny that negated us running our 17-inch track wheels and 180-treadwear Kumho tires, so we ran our 18-inch Forgelines and sticky 100-treadwear Toyo R888s instead, which gave us a slight advantage over the other cars. It was either that or spectate. Watching wasn’t an option for us.

Chad Reynolds, the always entertaining autocross announcer, referred to him as “Red Camaro Sticker Guy,” but in actuality his name is John Parkinson out of Laguna Hills, California. While he didn’t set the fastest time in his ’98 Camaro, his on- and off-track antics won the hearts of the spectators. Unfortunately, he got a little carried away on this run and was given a “time out.” John was back the next day driving in a bit more controlled manner.

Mary Pozzi posted one of the fastest laps of the day at 29.198 seconds. Unfortunately it wasn’t enough to edge out the 28.940 effort set by Mike Hodges in his ’04 Z06. Still, considering Mary was in a 37-year-old Camaro with leaf springs, second place wasn’t all that bad.

We love a nicely-done second-gen and this ’70 definitely got our attention. Kent Maillert brought the Camaro down from Torrance, California, but we couldn’t track him down for more info on the car. In any event, we liked what we saw.

Rick Klein has been working on this ride for over eight years. As he told us, “My sons had stopped racing MX, so there was more time and money for me to play with. The Camaro is a ‘68 RS/SS big-block car that I paid $5,000 for … not running.” At the Costa Mesa event he was parked in the show area, but the autocross looked like so much fun that he decided to come down to Del Mar and knock down a few laps. He managed a best time of 34.085.

When Carl Casanova heard that the Costa Mesa event had a free autocross, he just couldn’t resist coming down from Los Angeles for a few laps. His ’68 RS features a mildly-massaged ’02 LS1 engine topped with a Magnuson MP112 supercharger and a T56 transmission. This combo nets Carl around 500 ponies to the rear wheels while still knocking down 27 mpg. His best lap was a 32.205-second blast.