As a kid, John Waraniak, SEMA’s vice president of vehicle technology, never gave much thought to a college education. He did, however, enjoy building fast toys—plundering the neighbors’ throwaways on garbage day and reconfiguring found treasures such as washing-machine pulleys, lawn-mower engines, old wagons and bikes into saleable contraptions. That was the sort of vision and imagination that led him to two master’s degrees as well as engineering soapbox racers, B-2 stealth bombers and Chevrolet motorsports programs.