And no-one notices that the 429 in that Torino was just getting on its feet at the end of the race. If the stretch was any longer, the Olds would've been toast. That Olds did launch pretty damn hard though.
It just did, and has, lot depends on the driver, the tuning, weather/track conditions. Two beautiful and legendary musclecars, the Olds Rocket 400 was a torque monster of an engine.