If you are not going to race, I can understand not wanting a "pro shifted" trans, but I would still use the soft-loc... why not? On my brothers 95% street driven car, he has a soft-loc and it works just fine. I put 13 grams of counter-weight on each lever and 7 turns of base and he has been driving it like that for over 5 years, no issues in a 69 Mach 1 with 750 HP. My car is 95% race and I had the same amount of counter weight on my old soft-loc, with 2 1/2 turns of base and that worked for 1.33 60' times and stayed locked up in high gear at 3540 pounds going over 140 MPH in the 1/4. If your engagement is short then play with your bell crank lengths and get more leverage (slow it down) for more control at the pedal. I've driven mine on the street too, no issue other than without a bunch of counter-weight it will slip if you try and get on it at a low RPM.