I run 3.25 gears, and that helps a lot. It also gives me a safe 135 MPH top end, which is about all you'd want to do with that chassis anyway. You gotta be nice with the go pedal, 'cause you'll break loose up to about 60 MPH. If you stomp it at 50 or 55MPH, you'll still break loose. So you have to be nice up to highway speeds, but at least the low gears help some in that respect. It also keeps it streetable, and lets you cruise the highway without being constantly in the redline. Probably helps some on gas too, but I'm afraid that's a losing proposition anyway. You never really consider mileage when you build something like this. It's definitely no economy car, with mileage in the single digits.

Setting up as a quarter-miler, I'd probably choose 4.11 or higher gears and a single plane intake and a cam with longer duration. I'd also choose a lightweight rod and piston so the rod bolts would survive higher RPM. Even the best ARP rod bolts enter the plastic region at about 5200 on a big block Olds with iron rods, so after that, it's just a number of cycles before failure.

I had a larger cam in another big-block Olds I built, and it was still pretty streetable. But I really like a street car setup with a little less gear, especially if it's a big block that can't possibly keep tires under it on the street anyway. The taller gears just make more smoke on the street. So that makes the best cam for me something between 260-280 degrees or so. The combination of the cam and the dual plane intake makes the torque peak broad and full, in the 1500-5000 RPM range. That gives me about 500 HP and 500 ft/lbs of torque, which makes my Cutlass a lot of fun.