Friendly, affable, and enthusiastic, John Nino is either the most passionate car guy you’ll ever meet or a complete glutton for punishment. Maybe a little nuts. Or all three, really.

That equation—passion, punishment, and nuts—also factors into Nino’s professional career, which has had more facets than the Hope Diamond. Think robotics, chemical engineering, global power systems, private equity, direct and subcontracted manufacturing, and, most recently, medical technologies. And in his spare time over the last four decades, he’s been busy building, restoring, modifying, racing, and/or wrecking cars: muscle cars, sports cars, classics, hot rods, race cars, and other ephemera.