Drag-and-drive events are no doubt on the rise, and there are more of them held throughout the year than ever before. Ft. Collins, Colorado’s Kelly Harvey has spent plenty of time on the dragstrip, but saw the drag-and-drive style events as a new challenge. Needing a suitable platform for his first drag-and-drive build, Harvey opted for something a little different and purchased this 1965 Corvette as his foundation.
Harvey has had quite an interesting and diverse history in drag racing, to be sure. Like many teenagers, he started out street racing, but later moved into bracket racing with a small-block-powered dragster. Ready for his next challenge, he stepped up to a blown alcohol combination and raced in the 7.0-second Nostalgia class. From that, he raced a ’41 Willys with a blown Brad Anderson Hemi engine and did some A/Gas racing before moving into the heads-up realm and racing in Outlaw 10.5 competition.
“I raced with the PSCA and eventually won an Outlaw championship in 2016 with a perfect season,” Harvey said of his exploits. “We qualified number one and won every race in the Rocky Mountain Summer Series that year.”
During the 2015 and 2016 racing seasons, Harvey decided to try out the drag-and-drive format and entered a 1955 Chevy at Rocky Mountain Race Week. The shoebox was a solid 9-second performer.
“It was awesome — the people, the places, and the cars were very cool,” Harvey said of the experience. “I was hooked on that style of racing, but I wanted to do it on a higher level.”
After that, Harvey decided to build another race car, and picked up a basket case Tim McAmis-built Chevy Nova that was partially finished. He spent the next two years building it and then went out and collected two more outlaw championships in 2019 and 2020.
“I also tried my hand at some street racing during 2019 and raced with Team Wyoming on “Street Outlaws Fastest In America” with JJ Da Boss — that was fun,” he said of his time on the Discovery Channel reality show.
When Covid hit in 2020, Harvey doubled down on his towing business and sold the Nova to make sure he was able to get through whatever was coming. Once the pandemic was behind him, he decided to get back in the driver’s seat and focus his efforts on the drag-and-drive events.
He then purchased this 1965 Corvette to build specifically for drag-and-drive events, and he was planning on collecting far quicker time slips than 9 seconds at a hit.
“It’s an old NMCA…
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