Hello LSXMAG nation, my name is Miles Cook and I am the latest addition to the LSXMAG editorial staff. More bluntly known as “the new guy” I am, in fact, new around here, but I have actually now been a part of the automotive content-producing world for the better part of 25 years.

So where did I come from and how did I end up here? Good question to be sure, and to answer that I’ll try to make the long story on the shorter side but elaborate a little bit more on other things than besides just where I have worked.

For starters, I am a car freak to the absolute core. Since the age of 4 or 5 it was Tootsie Toys, Matchbox cars, Hot Wheels and Corgis in my basket until it was full to the brim. Then in the Chicago suburbs, when my 10-year-older brother got a ’67 Corvette, I was an impressionable 9-year-old, and well, it was off to the races to where I am today; which is to say just as afflicted with GM cars now as I was then. It was 1974 and that silver-with-a-blue-interior ’67 roadster even with just a base 300-horse 327 and a Muncie four-gear was (and maybe still is) about my favorite car of all time.

Oooh tasty. These 2nd-gen CTS-Vs are just beyond cool. And this rare sunroof-delete car is even better. How great is the 556-horsepower supercharged LSA? How about it matches the 2005-06 Ford GT’s 550 horsepower and makes more torque, too. And with coupe, sedan and wagon versions available it’s a tough choice to pass up.

Throughout the 1980s and ’90s, my brother and I furthered our Corvette love with several Mid-Year and Shark-body cars including a pair of ’65 and ’66 roadsters, a ’67 coupe, two ’68s (coupe and convertible), a ’69 coupe, two ’71s (coupe and convertible), and two ’72 coupes.

In the mid ’80s, I also got going on the Ford side of things with a ’66 Mustang fastback. And while that’s a story for another day, I have since owned more than 20 Mustangs along with a liberal sprinkling of ’66-’67 Fairlanes, too.

By the late 1980s and with my college years coming to a close, I needed to start figuring out what I wanted to do for a living, or at least a facsimile of sorts. The lightbulb that went off in my head was to be a writer on a car magazine, keeping in mind those days, there were only print magazines and not much in the way of electronically-generated content like there is today. I became laser focused on this idea and reconciled in my mind that this was the only thing I wanted to do and I never looked back.

English degree in hand, I began knocking on doors until one opened in 1992 where I spent a year working for SEMA (Specialty Equipment Market Association) and writing about the trade side of the automotive-performance aftermarket. While it was okay and the SEMA Show is a truly amazing spectacle that any car nut needs to see, there was little immersion as far as actually being involved with the cars themselves, so I soon moved to a magazine that end-user enthusiasts were more likely to read. That was Turbo & Hi-Tech Performance and while there was a lot of import coverage, there was also fun involvement with cars like turbo Buicks, turbo and supercharged Fox Mustangs, as well as cool GM stuff like the Gen II LT1 that had just gone into production in the ’92 Corvette and ’93 F-body cars (4th-gen Camaro and Firebird).

In 1994, Car Craft magazine was a big deal and it still is in considerable part because my good friend John McGann is the Editor. But to me, 22 years ago, CC’s print magazine (remember there was no Web back then) was a huge deal and when I landed on the staff there, I was in a very similar place to where I have now traveled full circle by way of LSXMAG. And that is being closely involved with V8-powered, rear-drive GM cars that in this case mostly covers the current makes and models.

Mid-Year Corvettes are simply legend, pure and simple. LS swaps are a popular way to go for ’63-’67s that are not rare fuelie or big-block cars. This open-road-racer ’65 coupe would be even more awesome with an LS7 wouldn’t it?

The Gen II LT1 was a big deal in those days, much like the LS3 and Gen V LT1/LT4 are now. So for me, LSXMAG is a homecoming of sorts, because I am once again getting my hands in the GM-hot-rod mix by way of our favorite engines, which include mainly the LS3 and LS7, and now the new LT1 and LT4 that are the current and foreseeable future kings of the performance hill.

While I spent about eight years writing about all things Ford in Super Ford and Mustang Monthly print magazines, I have never forgotten the roots of my formidable years of writing editorial touting the greatness of the GM cars we know and love. In fact, while I certainly don’t know everything single thing there is to know about LS- and LT-series engines, I was involved, to some degree, on the ground floor when the LS1 first came out in the 1997 C5 Corvette and I wrote the introductory story about that car in the print pages of Car Craft.

It was an exciting time to be sure and little did we know that the LS revolution would become the amazing thing that it is today. In the ’80s and ’90s, the pushrod 5.0-liter Mustang revolution was heaven-sent for Ford performance and it might be fair to say that today’s LS boom is even bigger than that. In any case, it has been quite a run for me and I am grateful for the opportunity to continue it in the electronic pages and posts of LSXMAG.

So, in part, enough about me. What about you? What is it that you would like to see in LSXMAG’s posts? I ask that, to some extent, because I am contemplating a vehicle purchase. And, of course, it has to have LS power so I can walk the walk along with talking the talk.

While 5th- and 6th- gen Camaros as well as all C5, C6, and C7 Corvettes are certainly the bomb, I do have one requirement and to me it’s certainly not a bad thing considering the options. Given that my better half is a real-estate agent and needs a four-door car to shuttle her clients around and I also very often have the need for a sedan, it’s hard to throw rocks at any of the choices.

I miss my 2008 Pontiac G8 GT. I might get another one.

They are in chronological order: the ’08-’09 Pontiac G8 GT/GXP, the ’09-’15 Cadillac CTS-V, and the ’14-’16 Chevy SS. I’d skip over all of them and go right to the new 3rd-gen, 2016 CTS-V powered by the otherworldly LT4, but I’m afraid my bank account is a bit too skimpy for what is Cadillac’s latest, true world-beating super sedan. And although I would consider a first-generation ’04-’07 V and their T56 six-speed manuals, I am probably leaning more towards an auto-trans-equipped car for dealing with usually horrendous L.A.-area traffic jams.

I have already owned a 2008 G8 GT and by no means have I ruled out having another one of these quite cool but a bit quirky Aussie-built cars known Down Under as a Holden Commodore. Although a G8 is one of the more affordable options, depending on what would generate the most popular vote, a V or an SS (the current Holden Commodore in Australia) are not out of the question. What would be your choice?

So that’s my story. I look forward to being a part of your story and having that narrative involve the cars that are powered by one of the greatest engines of all time, if not the all-time greatest, our favorite GM LS- and LT- series of naturally-aspirated and supercharged V-8 powerhouses.