I used to see a guy at the drag races in phoenix, had a 70-71 gto clone that would run low 12's through mufflers and cheater slicks. It seemed way too quiet to go that fast. He never opened his hood, though. Claimed he had a mild 455 pontiac.
my brother had a 76 GP with the really lo-po 400, like 8:1 compression, and it was pretty damn quick for a big stock as hell heavy ass pig. from a stop i'd could barely take him in with my old 70 cougar that had a stock 351 with only an e'brock intake, carter 600 carb and 2-1/4" dual exhaust with stock manifolds. i'd definitely say that your buddy would smoke your ass and then it hand it to you when you finally got the end of the strip. at minimum i'd say you need at least better heads, different cam, and a better suspension more suited to the drag strip. ditch the swaybars front and rear, run 90/10 shocks out back and some cal tracs bars. you'll need gears and and some sort of locking diff, either a trac-loc or detroit locker and some meaty drag radials or some M/T sportsman pros. up front run the stock suspension but use some 70/30 drag shocks. consider sub frame connectors required equipment as well. alternatively to removing the sway bars you could just disconnect them.
if you really want to beat him consider a 393 or 408 stroker and 150hp shot of N2O.
defenatly going to hold off on that race. like i said before were only doing it for fun, nothing serious. actually i was never planning on racing my car on the track so when i built the engine i leaned towards building a street car with plenty of torque. my next mod on the list was a set off afr 185's.
my brother had a 76 GP with the really lo-po 400, like 8:1 compression, and it was pretty damn quick for a big stock as hell heavy ass pig. from a stop i'd could barely take him in with my old 70 cougar that had a stock 351 with only an e'brock intake, carter 600 carb and 2-1/4" dual exhaust with stock manifolds. i'd definitely say that your buddy would smoke your ass and then it hand it to you when you finally got the end of the strip. at minimum i'd say you need at least better heads, different cam, and a better suspension more suited to the drag strip. ditch the swaybars front and rear, run 90/10 shocks out back and some cal tracs bars. you'll need gears and and some sort of locking diff, either a trac-loc or detroit locker and some meaty drag radials or some M/T sportsman pros. up front run the stock suspension but use some 70/30 drag shocks. consider sub frame connectors required equipment as well. alternatively to removing the sway bars you could just disconnect them.
if you really want to beat him consider a 393 or 408 stroker and 150hp shot of N2O.
That is a lot of work for one race... especially if it's just a driver. I'm under the impression he didn't want to spend that much; which if that's the case then the best bang for the buck a nitrous system (NX or Nitrous Works please!). But you do have a good plan on kicking the crap out of the pontiac
BTW, 90/10's go up front...I'm sure it was just a typo. In the rear & front I'd use something adjustable rather than buy shocks that are non adjustable IMO; not all cars react the same, even tho they are the same, so anytime you can adjust/dial in it's gonna help.