If you tell them its something absurd like a 12 second car and you run in the 9s, im sure you'll get booted. If you tell them you really DONT know what it will run, but tell them (honestly) the work thats done to it, they can better judge what it will run. If you say it should run 10s and you pull a 9.90 run, all they'll do is tell you to keep it under 10.0 for the day, and give you the license paperwork to fill out. You NEED a valid NHRA license to run quicker than 10.0 (or apparently 135 mph) regardless of competition status.
In all honesty, it makes sense that someone has to proove they can handle the car safely if they're going to be running that fast. The license isn't a hard thing to do, just a few extra bucks a year, plus the membership comes with a 1/2 million dollar insurance policy, which IMHO is well worth it. Its not hard to get, just a physical and a few moderate passes than full runs. I have 4 licenses, so they cant be THAT hard to do
