Early on Friday morning, I saw it pull in with a group of others like it, like a pack of animals: big tires, blowers, and enough threatening indications to keep all but the most cocky street racer at bay. Beautiful paint. Gorgeous chrome. And out of the pack, the Cougar stood above them all: the classic black body with yellow-into-red flames and two cannons for exhaust sticking out of the back. The pack moved to a shady spot underneath some trees and quieted down for a rest. I wandered over and started aiming the camera around, doing everything but a Steve Irwin impression as I looked the Mercury over. I had been warned months ago that the 2017 Car Craft Summer Nationals were not going to be a duplicate of the Street Machine Nationals, but I still expected to see blower cars, and the Cougar made me happy. This was just like picking up a magazine when I was nine, but in the flesh.

John Ammer is the owner of the big-boy Mercury, and he’s been the owner of the car since 1979. It was his first car, and he hasn’t let it go or go to waste. Instead, he’s turned this Cougar into a dream machine, one that hasn’t forgotten that it’s still, at heart, a street car yet has no trouble trying to rip the tires off of the back if the long pedal on the right gets so much as a wayward glance, let alone a full bootful.

Serving dutifully as the daily driver for years, it took several to transform the car from a standard 1971 Cougar (itself, an overloaded and slightly larger take on the Ford Mustang) to the machine you see here. And it’s been quite a transformation…the Cougar is now sporting a full tube chassis, with a Mustang II-style front suspension and a narrowed Ford 9-inch with coilovers at all four corners. Wilwood brakes do their best to haul down the speeds that the 406 cubic inch 351 Cleveland-based mill can whip up. Even without the eye candy poking through the hood, that alone would make for a very fun time, but the 6-71 blower and twin 850 CFM Demon carburetors just add to the effect.

Small details make a big difference. For example, the blower’s hole through the hood isn’t just a simple hole. A bit of engineering has created a flap behind the blower case that keeps the sheetmetal close when the hood is closed, but when it’s time to lift the hood the flap moves to allow the hood to clear the 6-71. And that’s just one of many details that need to be seen in person to be fully appreciated. Ammer didn’t spend years building this Mercury up for nothing. And he treats it as such, too. The Cougar has been done since 1995, but looking at the car you’d swear otherwise. The paint is deep and free from swirl marks. The interior is top-notch, and there isn’t even a mark on the bars that the passenger has to contort over to get into the car.

With the classic flames, the traditional Pro Street touches, and the fact that it’s a 1971 Mercury Cougar,  you might question just how it is that everything here is working together so well. It’s because everything is dead-nuts right on this machine. Some Pro Street cars tend to look dated to the late 1980s due to color choices, or the interior is full of tweed, or whatever you may have. John’s Cougar doesn’t come off as dated. It comes off as timeless, with every little modification perfectly measured.