Nitto Tire 2006 King Of The Street - Royal Rumble

King of the Street - Joey Buquoi

Memphis, Tennessee's Joey Buquoi bought his Bullitt in 2002. It ran 14.0s at 101 mph in stock trim, but Joey had big plans. One of the first things he did was add a return-style fuel system. The Bullitt has had a couple different power combinations throughout the years, but the current setup boasts a BB&T Racing-built short-block with Patriot Performance Stage II ported Two-Valve heads with Comp Cams XE278AH cams in place of the stockers. For power, Joey chose a Kenne Bell 2.2 instead of a centrifugal unit for the bottom-end punch with a Nitrous Pro-Flow 150hp kit as a power supplement. "The Kenne Bell has been the best mod I've ever purchased," Joey says. The KB made the same horsepower as his previous centrifugal combination, but with 270 more lb-ft of torque at 3,000 rpm.

With the Nitrous Pro Flow kit on board, the total numbers came in at 702 hp. But when Joey heard he was picked for the KOTS, he knew he had to come to Bowling Green with his A-Game. "We decided to push the combo a bit harder, so I ordered a Reichard Racing 2.70-inch pulley," he says. Dynospeed Racing's Joe Beegle and John Bonner pulled late nights to make sure Joey's Bullitt was ready for the KOTS battle.

Boy, was it ever ready. Even sitting still, the car looks as though it's ready to pounce. Its aggressive stance was unmatched by many other cars in the competition. On the Ride and Drive portion, we could tell right away that it was going to be a top KOTS contestant. We only noticed a slight noise from the aggressive Hawk brake pads and an occasional, ever-so-slight hiccup in the tune. But when Joey's Bullitt made 752 hp on the DiabloSport mobile Dynojet, we couldn't have expected better driveability. One unnerving aspect to the car was the lack of a reverse lockout in the T56. We almost went into Reverse at the start of the Ride and Drive portion-at speed. We had visions of T56 guts all over the road. Yours truly already has a reputation for running over things, so destroying a brand-new transmission isn't something I want to add to the list. But once we drove it a few miles, we got used to the transmission; it became a nonissue.

All in all, Joey's Bullitt scored high in every category-except the Drag Race portion, thanks to the new, still-notchy T56. He had trouble shifting the Bullitt, so the best he could muster was a 12.7 at 103 mph, placing Joey second to last. Fortunately for him, the Drag Race category only counts for 5 percent of the final score, so that event didn't hurt him at all.

"I want to thank Dynospeed Racing, Speed of Sound, and my uncle Sonny for getting me into custom cars as a child," Joey says.

Here's a breakdown of Joey's winning score: