Four Play

The Perfect Way to Shut a V-8 Muscle Car Guy Up Is With an Unnatural Amount of Boost

- Alex Grant

A bit like the U.S., the tuner scene in Australia is one divided by cylinder count. A clash of forced induction imports versus domestic V-8 muscle cars and that old saying that there’s no replacement for displacement. But Michael Baghdadi reckons he’s found just the right way to cure a lack of engine capacity—and he’s out to fight his corner.

If you’re on the high-boost, low-displacement end of the scene, then Michael is a name that needs no introduction in Australia. Based just outside Sydney, he’s the “Mick” behind Micks Motorsport—one of the country’s go-to workshops for seriously quick imports—and he’s not a guy who’s worried about pushing the limits of mechanical parts. Case in point: all 1,400 bhp of Australia’s fastest SR20, and the S15 drag car it’s fitted to, rolled out from behind these shutters and onto the start line of a 200-mph quarter-mile run not so long ago. These guys don’t take half measures.

Hard-wearing, heavily turbocharged four-bangers might be a specialty, but that didn’t stop Michael’s own project from becoming a challenge. In Australia, quarter-mile events don’t come much more challenging than the Motive DVD Drag Battle—an invite-only, spectator-free weekend held on the rough asphalt of Cootamundra Airfield’s runway. Quick cars here don’t only need huge amounts of power, but they need to be able to deliver it on a road-like surface, and they have to be street legal.