Welcome to the site.
This is not the time of year to be a BYB as you say. This is the time to plan a build,
because a real build takes months to do, especially if this is your first one.
Research, study, and plan..... look into a build clinic in your area. Or some of the
very good planned ones, mostly in the spring. Since this site is dedicated to
professional style builds, those of the build something to see how fast we can make it,
are not promoted, and not helped about in the process of building as well.
And who says there is not a winter series of racing?