Sounds promising... just keep on writing.
Neat idea with the sign-up sheets too
If you wanted a little more of an I'76 "feel" with the car names here are some ideas:
Mercury = Quicksilver (established by RLF in Kids'n'Vigs)
Oldsmobile Tornado = Ransom Whirlwind (or Hurricane, Twister, etc.)
The Ransom Marshall in Nitro is generally accepted as a GTO, but it also has a lot of similarities to the Olds 442 - and I'82 has established Pontiac as "Potomac".
Ransom fits much better as Oldsmobile than Pontiac, considering that the company was originally founded by a guy named Ransom Eli Olds.