By request wanted to post some info on my daughters $2000 Challenge entry for 2022.
It's a 2013 Taurus Police Interceptor AWD. We bought it off of FB Marketplace from a guy in south Florida who originally bought it at a salvage Copart auction. He was planning on fixing it up, but never got around to it. The car had been in a crash that dented in both rear quarters and broke off the rear wheel on the passenger side. the front bumper had also been torn off on one side. The accident must have been a hard hit, it broke the upper control arm and trailing arm in half. As it turns out, that was a cheap fix as the parts are shared with the Explorer and Taurus, Lincoln, etc. We got those on ebay super cheap. We pulled out the dents in the rear quarters as best we could and then the girls hid the rest of the damage with a $50 set of plastic fender flares and vinyl tiger stripes!
The hardest part was the car had sat for almost 2 years in the guys yard and rats had made a home in the engine bay. They chewed through more than a dozen random wires, so the engine would run on starting fluid but would not "run". We trouble shot the wiring over the course of a weekend, drained the fuel, changed the oil, etc. and by Sunday night it was driving. We got it up on the lift and the girls pulled off the exhaust to save even more weight and give it some character.
To shave weight, the girls took out the spare tire and all the police gear and bracing from the inside. We also relocated the battery to the trunk as it sat ridiculously high and forward in the engine compartment. We used cheap jumper cables for the relocation wiring and made our own T-handle safety cutoff from Amazon parts. The girls found some Mustang wheels on FB Marketplace and we had to add 1.5" spacers to make them fit. For traction, we went with a very expensive set of 275R18 Kuhmo Ecsta V730 tires ($1,300). Due to the massive weight of the car we knew we would need very competent rubber to be competitive at all in the autocross. After getting about 250lbs off the car, we realized the rear was sitting way up in the air. Back on the lift it went and we removed the rear coils and cut them down about 2" in total to get the back end lowered just right.
The girls added a cheap plastic wing to give the car a GT look and they added a $40 center console from Amazon inside to clean up the center tunnel area. The final bit was to install an email E30 tune from Five Star Tuning, who is one of only a couple of companies that tune transverse Ford ecoboost engines. They said the tune should allow it to make about 420 HP, which is 60 over stock. We were hoping for an e85 tune, but they told us that it would require fuel system upgrades that were not in budget. We did not dyno the car, but based on my butt dyno I believe them! Overall the car did way better than expected for a 4000 lb behemoth which is due in large part to it being a police model, AWD, and having good tires. The drag track was very slick during competition, and having AWD was most certainly a game changer. I'm sure there is more that the girls did that I missed, but that's what I can recall for now. Overall this was an easy build on our family and one of our best performing ones to date (this was build number 5). The girls want to bring their car again next May, so we're gonna see what we can do with ~$400 we have left to play with in budget and see if we can get this pig into the high 11's. FULL SEND!
My son and his buddies entered a Mustang last year. My daughter was not going to be outdone by her brother! Actually, she mopped the floor with him, took 4 trophies to his 1! I thought she would have trouble finding friends that wanted to participate as well, but they were all excited to learn about tools, cars, and racing. All of them had just turned 16 and have been driving for only a few months before the challenge. The livery was especially fun for them, that's the first thing they planned. Now that they've gotten a taste, they are super stoked to hit the track again. It was the first time any of them had worked on a car, drag raced, or autocrossed. I can't believe they went 12 seconds first time on a track! We're so proud of them. 
Sorry! Yes, here are some photos of completed project:
