Charlie Machado
I just kind of look at God and say, you know, here I go, I'll meet 
you at the finish line.

Cuz you really don't know if you're gonna live through that pass or not.

Nothing's guaranteed about a top fuel motorcycle.

And it's not about fear.

It's real comfortable, real peaceful.

But it's an awesome ride to go two-hundred plus miles an hour in 
seven seconds or less.

And I'm fifty-four years old, and I don't plan on stopping.

I'm not gonna stop racing yet.

I'm having too much fun with it.

Started racing lawnmowers at age six.

My parents were amazed because, at six years old, I would tie my 
wagon to their lawnmower.

And they thought it was funny at first, but when I started breaking 
stuff, they told me to stop.

And I started racing go-carts at age eleven.

I started racing cars at the age of fifteen.

I started racing motorcycles at the age of twenty-five, twenty-six.

And I was running in modified gas classes.

Then I started racing top gas up at, like twenty years later.

I was forty-three.

I started racing top fuel at forty-eight years old.

In the quarter mile on that bike, we were doing two-hundred miles an 
hour in seven seconds, without rolling the front wheel and carrying 
the wheel all the way to the tracks.

That bike there was making four-and-a-half G's at sixty feet.

And it was doing a zero to one-hundred miles an hour in one second 
and fifty-five feet, in four-and-a-half G's.

The eighth mile, which is a little over two blocks, was 4.41 seconds 
at 162 miles per hour.

It's incredible to go that fast because, the G force, and the time 
warp that it feels like; the adrenaline rush makes it feel like a 
slow ride through the park.

And to me, it seems like the faster I go, the more comfortable and 
slower it feels.

[Men talking and laughing]

Charlie Machado
In this shop, we-our mainstream is the restoration and rebuilding of 
Harley Davidson motorcycles.

We also do high performance motorcycles; drag racing, Harley 
Davidsons, and street bikes.

And we also build high performance hot rods, you know, high 
performance street cars engines, and automatic transmissions for cars.

Basically, we can rebuild the engine that people have already, all 
the way to redesigning the engines, increasing the displacement.

And even take it further and design engines where, like the heads on 
a Harley Davidson drag bike have to be CNC machine from solid billets 
of aluminum.

So we can go anything from fifty-five horsepower or less, all the way 
to two-cylinder motors that develop over a thousand horsepower on 
natural methane.

[Music in background]

Charlie Machado
I can see here that he pushed that gear back, he forced it back and 
it slid on the bushing.

I had three sons working with me, and one of them moved to California.

And I have an eighteen-year-old and a twenty-one-year-old.

They work with me now.

They're learning a lot; they know quite a bit for their age, which is 
a good advantage in this business.

[Car engine starting after two tries]

Chuy Machado
I started building this car that way I would have a ride to high school.

And I saved up some money, and I bought these chrome side pipes.

And these, you know, I got the car and they already had nice interior.

I got the car on a deal and it has nice interior.

And that's the AC.

That's the AC unit right there.

And then my brother gave me some ignition lines for it.

And this is my newest thing right here, these chrome fishtales.

We're gonna put spark plugs in them.

That way, when you're going down the road, you can pull the choke.

And that way it puts more gas in the engine.

And then you press a button, and it ignites these two spark plugs, 
and it makes flames come out of them.

So that's what I'm working on right now.

I'm thinking about putting these taillight lenses on it, and having 
three '59 Cadillac taillight lenses right here.

And, I'll put airbags on it; that way you can lift it up and lower it.

And I want to build it to where it will carry a car on the car trailer.

And I got my 1948 Chevy two-door coupe that I'm going to build a 388 small 
block Chevy for.

And I'm going to put that on the trailer, and this is going to pull 
it to the Nostalgia Drags.

And I'm gonna go run with the Continental Club, and I'm gonna be the 
Leisure Brothers.

That's what our club's called, The Leisure Brothers.

But we gotta start getting more cars together.

Chuy Machado
My brother got his '68 Chevy truck.

Our friend's building that '56 Two-Ten Chevy.

And then we got that '66 Biscayne, and then the '59 Cadillac.

My '48s gonna be running.

And then we're gonna get my friend's '59 Cadillac running right here.

And my brother has a '62 station wagon.

Chuy Machado
I'm eighteen now and, I just turned eighteen in October.

So, I'm eighteen, and I just wanna keep going with this stuff 
because, I turned into a gearhead after all these years.

I just love it.

Charlie Machado
It's been good.

It's been good to be able to represent the Hispanic culture.

Especially a race that-there's a few other fast guys like Cruz Pedro Gone.

He's way faster than me, he's three-hundred miles an hour, top fuel dragster.

And I tell people, that's the world's fastest Mexican.

But they say, yeah, but he races cars.

Okay, so maybe I'm the world's fastest Mexican on motorcycles.

And then there's another friend of mine, David Campos.

He rode a streamliner at the Bonneville Salt Flats that went 326 miles an hour.

And I tell people, he's the world's fastest Mexican.

And when you look at going fast, is top speed.

Going in the quarter mile, it's actually a time thing; it's about elapsed time.

So I started telling people, Dave Campos is the world's the fastest 
Mexican and I'm the world's quickest Mexican.

Cuz I did two-hundred in seven seconds.

That's quick; and it's not as fast as 326, but they got all day to get there.

They got like five miles to reach the speed, and then two miles to shut down.

So we drag racers do it all in a very short time.

I consider myself the world's quickest Mexican.

But, the race world continues to call me the world's fastest Mexican.

Don't know why but I guess it's gonna live on.

[Car horn-Aruuga]