Lee,
yup, our car is about 200 pounds overyour limit, but therefore we have a radiator, transmission and the engine in. A electric motor is not this weight, also the batterie are not this heavy - if you make a quick change for the batteries, you can reduce the weight - two sets of batteries if necessary - if you run national records, you got enough time to charge the batterie in the impound, except if you qualify the last day of the meet.
The other advantage, you need no air box and naca's for the cooling. So the concept of the frame design can be much easier. Due to this that we got the wide engine in - which gave as the "wide" of the car, we got a lot of reinforcements in, which you can't see, to eliminate the weak frame around the engine.
When you build the frame, don't forget the cremona rules, this saves a lot of weight in the frame - a good cremona concept needs 30 percent less tubes.
As I offered before, you can contact me and I will check your ideas.