".....The engine he would build would not be in a race car but in a daily driver on pump gas......"

There are a LOT of things that sound good on paper or after a couple of cold ones In real life the guys that have been there done that will often give information that a person may not want to hear but has been proven by experience (what Dave and Pope said above for instance).

Have your buddy look up various combinations and see where the torque peaks fall and then look realistically what the RPM range he will be driving on the street.