Text and Photography by Jim Langley

Drew Wallace has a reputation in Northern California for being able to get into a car he has never driven and drive it to record ET's. In fact for most of 2004 Drew was a fixture at Sacramento Raceway's weekend test and tune events. Local Mustang owners frustrated with their lack of ability to turn good numbers would summon Drew to drive their cars down the track. Countless guys went home with record timeslips and the re-instilled confidence in their rides.

Surprisingly, however, in 2004 Drew didn't get much seat time behind his own car. He was busy building up a relatively secret combo. After all, a guy who has driven everyone else's cars has a vested interest in making certain his ride is still the fastest. FordMuscle caught up with Drew, after the car ran 10.90's in it's 2005 debut, to get the story behind the man and his chrome yellow 1994 GT.

Drew purchased the car in 2001, while still in high-school. Living in Idaho he would regularly drive 1000 miles, all the way to Sacramento, for weekend bracket racing and test and tune events.

Caught the Fever? Drew would often drive from Idaho to California just to race at the sea-level Sac Raceway dragstrip.

His first mods were shorty headers, a new clutch and under drive pulleys. In this trim, the bright yellow Mustang knocked off 14.5 second quarter mile runs at 95mph while hitting 2.2 60 foots on rock-hard radial tires. Immediately after graduation he moved to California to be close to his favorite track. An E303 cam was next along with a cat-pipe and the ever-popular Flowmaster mufflers. Not yet fully educated in the true bottlenecks to 5.0 power, he was disappointed to only find an extra 1mph for his efforts. After some advice from fellow racers he installed a Cobra intake, 3.73 gears and drag radials. Now the GT was capable of low 13's at 101mph.

Of course 13's are never enough. So when the lower intake had to come off to repair damaged threads, the decision was made to install a set of Victor Jr. heads that were being saved for a more aggressive build up. Quite a few internet pundits loudly proclaimed the heads as being far too big for such a mild combo, especially in the portly SN95 body. But armed with new heads and a set of ET Streets, the screaming yellow pony would leap deep into the 12's, running consistent 12.4's at Wednesday night bracket events. As this author is well aware, my own Mustang was capable of running almost identical times but only at test and tune sessions where the track crew was much more liberal with the VHT. Drew would do it regularly on slippery Wednesday nights. There is no doubt this kid can drive. As a matter of fact, much like Fordmuscle's own Victor Silva, we have witnessed Drew hop into friends and even complete strangers cars and drive those cars to new best ET's, quite often on the very first run. When asked by the incredulous owner , "How the heck did you do that!?" or "What rpm were you shifting at?" Drew would always reply, "I dunno, I just shift when it feels right." And trust us, those shifts click off in mere milliseconds (watch the video below), even though the hot-shoe swears he doesn't powershift.

Having driven other cars quite a bit faster than his own, Drew knew what he wanted out of his Mustang - to be able to beat the hordes of LS1 powered Camaro's, and Firebirds that had taken the easy route to hit low 11's, namely via a nice shot of nitrous oxide. Drew wanted low 11's naturally aspirated and still be able to drive to the grocery store or go on a road trip in comfort. This seemed to be a tall order considering the General's 5.7L (346 cid) motors' affinity for laughing gas.

Using the complete systems approach, Drew built a carefully thought out 347 stroker using Eagle forged pieces, custom CP pistons and custom HiTech Motorsports hydraulic roller cam. The professionally built

When asked about the AC delete the owner likes to respond "The car goes 120mph in 10 seconds, just roll down the windows!"

shortblock was topped by the owner using the aforementioned Edelbrock Victor Jr. heads and a Victor 5.0 EFI intake. The heads got a "clean up" sanding roll treatment. The fuel system was upgraded to support the stroker and includes 42lb/hr injectors. An 80mm MAF is attached to a huge-by-large, owner fabricated, straight 4 inch inlet pipe that required notching the fenderwell. No restrictions there! The big pipe feeds an 80mm throttlebody attached to the short runner Victor intake. The stock T5 would never hold up to the power of the stroker, so a complete G-Force synchronized kit was installed along with a case girdle to prevent it from spreading as the gears try and push each other apart. The front of the GT was lightened with a Griggs Racing tubular K member and control arms coupled to QA1 coil over struts and springs.

Out back the Ford Trac-Loc has been upgraded to 31 splines and extra clutches and drives Strange 31 spline axles. For arrow-straight launches a Wolfe Racecraft rear anti-roll bar was welded to the chassis and axle tubes. Control arms are Wolfe Racecraft lowers with Steeda uppers. The springs and shocks are surprisingly stock, but obviously work to the tune of 1.4x 60 foots! Adjustable shocks are planned to help tune the launches. The suspension was bottoming out on the hard launches and unloading the tires.

Dressing up for the track means merely changing the wheels to DragLites sporting Mickey Thompson Front Runners and 26x10.5 MT ET Drags. Watch a video of this run.

After over a year of planning and some tuning time, the Chrome Yellow pony and 347 mill made its debut. Running in street clothes, on the 18" Budniks and drag-radials, Drew clicked off a series of low 11's at 123mph on 1.6 60 foots. Confident in the tune and with seat time under his belt, Drew headed back to Sacramento Raceway. This time on a cool and dry day, with the car sporting slicks and skinnies. It was time to go for broke. On only his second run of the day, the hot-shoe nailed a 1.53 60 foot and blasted through the gears to an amazing 10.96 at 124.998mph! So close to that coveted 125mph mark. On the next run the two-step hung up and the rev limiter stayed on the entire way down the track. The rest of the day would have to be run without it. He would showcase his natural driving skills, this time behind the wheel of his own car, as he would garner his second 10 second run with a 1.495 60 ft and hit 10.92 at 123.9mph. And while the incredible number would stand as best ET, the launch would got even better- with a series of 1.477 and 1.462 short times.

So what's in the works for Drew and the '94 GT for the rest of 2005? Well who knows, Drew isn't one to reveal his plans to the competition. All we know is if you happen to be around Sacramento Raceway take caution because you might also catch Yellow Fever.