Andy, Am I wrong to think that maybe the camshaft that made the most power on the dyno
may not be the best choice for a car that might get some (or a lot of) street miles?
Well sure, there is always a trade off involved unless you have some modern tricks such as variable valve timing.
But some times the tradeoffs are easy to live with. In my 470 we started with a 271 duration cam which had the best peak numbers but was soft down low. A cam with 261 duration beefed up the bottom end a bunch but only gave up a few hp up top. For a street car i'd go with the 261 cam. A dedicated race car would probably want the 271 cam but only if it launched off the brake at 4500 rpm or higher. A foot brake car might actually be faster with the smaller cam.
Turns out that the smaller cam plus a bigger carb made more power than the big cam with a small carb. So you can play with the combination too. Another variable is the type of carb. We installed a carb with annular boosters and picked up a ton of bottom end torque. So if you run the big cam and the annular booster carb then you get your cake and eat it to kind of thing.