Q&A: Robert McAtee
Robert McAtee isn’t racing on a budget, but the Edmond,
Oklahoma-native isn’t about to put hundreds of thou-
sands of dollars into a car, either.
ROBERT
MCATEE
TALKS BIG
POWER AND
REASONABLE
SPENDING
Story & Photos by Kevin Cox
30
STREETRACE
As it is, McAtee’s 2007 Corvette is doing just fine putting
down 950-horsepower and 1,000-foot pounds of torque
to the rear wheels. Its matte metallic look makes it a
head-turner no matter the car’s performance – especially
with the perfect angle in the sunlight – but going 168
mph on the strip is the enticing icing on the cake.
“The car is just a lot of fun,” McAtee said. “It’s not nec-
essarily a budget build, but I wanted to do it reasonably
priced. I didn’t want to spend a fortune trying to build
a full race car. It’s a fun car, a lot of fun and it’s scary
fast.”
Truth be told, McAtee is simply excited to be part of the
street car scene and gets almost as much excitement
watching the heavy-hitters perform as he does compet-
ing. But McAtee also has big plans for his Corvette, which
already has a 408-cubic inch LQ9 engine with a Precision
Turbo 88mm turbo single up front, and a striking bum-
per-exit exhaust. After competing at the Texas Invita-
tional and the Street Car Takeover in Oklahoma City –
taking the runner-up in the series’ unlimited roll race
category “King of the Bakery” – this fall, McAtee is putting
in plenty of work over the winter.
While he won’t be doing any extravagant spending, he
does have plenty of goals for the 2018 season. McAtee
spoke with us about a number of topics, including those
goals, competing without spending a fortune and what
he enjoys most about the street car scene.
Obviously you’ve put money into your car, but you’ve
put together an impressive package without spending
hundreds of thousands of dollars. Is that something
you take pride in?
That’s a huge thing to me. I bought the car with a bad
motor in it for $16,000. I obviously got a deal on it, but
I took the motor out and we just started over. To me,
it’s cool because when people think of a 1,000-horse-
power car that can compete in those big name events,
this might not be the first thing they think of.
Going from (the Texas Invitational) to runner-up at King
of the Bakery (at Street Car Takeover) the next weekend,
to me it’s awesome. People think that guy’s got $100,000
in that car and I don’t – and I won’t. It’s really cool to
be at the point we’re at speed-wise and everything else,
and not be just super in the hole. There’s cars there that
were trapping the same as me, and the car costs more
than what I have in the entire build. I do take a little bit
of pride in that.