If you’ve never seen a Holden Barina (or it’s European clone, the Opel Corsa B), here’s all you need to know: it’s a Geo Metro analogy, but smaller. They were sold as the Chevrolet Chevy in Mexico, too. Tiny little things, they are. Tiny, cheap, transportation. You know the kind: you use it until things fall apart, the paint gets bad and the interior gets that “well used car” funk going on. The first sign of trouble, you run the other way and hope that the little four-wheeled speck disappears out of your yard in a hurry. Even if the repair is something stupidly simple, most people would rather just wish the tiny car away. Metros got the raw end of that deal in the States, no question. But what would an Australian do with a Holden Barina that was left to rot?

The overall goal for this car, as you’ll see here, is to run the One Tree Hill hillclimb event. That’s a perfect thing to do with a small, front-driver that’s packing twice the normal horsepower it should have come with (big thanks to whoever shoved a Holden Calibra mill underneath this little jellybean’s hood!) You’ll see the Street Machine guys take the car from it’s pit of despair on a driveway somewhere and get some repairs and modifications done. Just wait until you see what passed for brake pads. Then it’s a trip to Calder Park for some tire-frying dragstrip runs before the Micro Machine gets flung up the hillside, come whatever!