Monday 13th October: Supporting those who support us.

Bennett Racing regularly donates to Macmillan Cancer Support and Cancer Research UK. We also do a lot of fundraising for them at shows and at the track.

Since December 2007, when I was diagnosed with bowel cancer, Macmillan provided me and my family with excellent support and knowledge about the illness and chemotherapy.

The Bennett Racing team are now trying to raise as much money and awareness for Macmillan Cancer Support and Cancer Research UK as we can. Donating through Justgiving is quick, easy and totally secure. It's also the most efficient way to sponsor us. Macmillan Cancer Support gets your money faster and, if you're a UK taxpayer, Justgiving makes sure that 25% in Gift Aid, plus a 3% supplement, are added to your donation.

So please sponsor us now at www.justgiving.com/bennett_racing.

Wednesday 17th September: As far as third.

A long overdue entry for our Blog but we have been totally flat out working on the Topolino or at hospital appointments, the good news is that all my chemo is done with and I am now onto the blood test every three months stage, a huge thank you again to everyone that emailed, phoned or has asked how I have been getting on.

The Open Sport Nationals event was a bit of a let down, unfortunately we broke a lifter link bar but luckily for us the lifter didn't spin as my old man heard it go at the top end and clicked it off straight away, this also meant that it didn't hurt the block which was good, but the cam was scored and we were not happy to run it so packed up on Sunday morning. The two shakedown launches on Saturday were very promising, with a safe baseline tune up in the car we went out and run our first 0.9 sixty foot, but the motor was far too aggressive for the track and it turned right at about eighty feet out, so was off the throttle and coasted through.

The next run we wanted to run to the 330 foot marker but again about eighty feet out the car turned left very hard and once he got it straight, shifted into second and touched the throttle and picked the wheels up at half track, this motor is making upwards of 500 horsepower more than last year's engine. It was at the end of this run that the lifter broke and we were done for the weekend.

Next event was the Hot Rods Drags. For this meeting we took some clutch and timing out and fattened the motor up a little to take some power away, and hopefully get the car straight and off the line. The car had other ideas, on the hit of the first run on Saturday the motor spat both head gaskets out but again dad was off of it very quick and we didn't touch the heads or block. If this had been further into the run then a different story...

We then thrashed all Saturday night striping the motor and then trying to source some O-ring wire, a big thanks to Frank Griffin and Wayne Allman for the wire. We replaced the o right wire in the liners and it turned out that the o-ring wire that the liners came over with was not really up to the job to say the least. Anyway the car was boxed up and finished in the morning and we fired the car up and were ready to run again. First run on Sunday the plan was a very easy checkout pass to make sure that all was ok, launched off idle and ran a slower 1.03 sixty foot, but at least was a bit straighter and off the throttle before the eighth and ran an 8.0 at 123 mph. The afternoon's run was for against Havoc for third. We were glad to be running and as we were still worried about head gaskets we weren't going to do a full pass but run it through first and second and into third to just run through soft. It ran OK in first, short shifted into second, then lifted as turned right, back on it, and into third then a stab of the throttle at about 1000 feet. It ran through with a 7.6 at 150 so we were chuffed.

The next meeting is the National Finals at Santa Pod, looking forward to it.

Wednesday 13th August: ready for action.

Bennett Racing would like to say thanks to every fan, sponsor and racer who has checked out the team web site. We have now had over 102,000 visits and counting and I am chuffed that so many people have the time to look at our site. If anyone has any suggestions of things to add to the site then let me know at info@bennettracing.co.uk. Also a big thanks to Tog and the team for letting us put our news etc. on Eurodragster.

In other news we are entered for the Open Sport Nationals and we can't wait to get the car on the track for some shakedown runs. We have already fired the car at the Damn Yankees show and got all the little problems out the way (not many for once) and even though I will sound over confident the motor sounded very strong and crisp. Now we have the new block and new liners we don't have 70% plus leak downs and with the new blower can make some proper power for this year. If anyone out there has any photos from the Damn Yankees show then please E-Mail me.

The plan at the Open Sport Nationals is to make three shakedown passes on the Saturday so that we are still able to compete properly in the class as fast as we can. In an ideal world what we are aiming for is a six second run on the first full pass.

Sunday 3rd August: A brief history.

As this is our first blog on Eurodragster (thanks to Tog), the best place to start is with a brief history of Bennett Racing. We started racing back in 1981 with a Ford Pop called Phantasm which we raced until 1987 when we imported an NHRA alky funny car called Cape Codder, formally Boston Strangler. We spent a few years building the car up as we didn't buy the motor and since we used small block Chevy power in the Pop the obvious choice was to go big block in what was to become a Fuel Altered. We then competed in Top Alcohol with the other altered of Tony Betts and Mickey Moore/Ollie Burns, we did this for a good few years but due to our extreme budget we were never gonna be a force in the class. We ran an iron 427 block, standard GM forged crank, iron heads, and a blower that probably made about five pounds boost on a good day. Then in the late 1990s, I forget the year now, we started to race in a new class, the Supercharged Outlaws in which we had great success and really enjoyed every single event. Then in 2001 our crank of twelve years had enough and broke in the best possible way, everything out the bottom and it didn't touch our new ally block thank god.

We then didn't have the budget at all to get back out until a new sponsor found at the Xtreme Wheels show in 2005 brought us back out and ready to run in the newly formed NFAA, which so far is best class we have run in. Every single member of every team is always out to help everyone else and with the crap news I had at Xmas with this poxy cancer stuff the support in general has been amazing, not just NFAA racers and crews but fans, sponsors and people from all over world, it's all nice to get and I thank everyone for asking how I am.

Which gets me back to 2008. As a few have seen already the car is a little bit different now and our intention is to run low sixes at 210+ mph. We stepped it up from last year's motor as we knew the class was gonna get faster and that there were the cars and the potential to run fast and consistent, shown by the Wrattens with their 6.46 at Summernats, hats off to them and Charlie for running it, and also to Lawrie Gatehouse and John Wright with the 6.19, that car has a five in it without a doubt.

Anyway I'll keep sending stuff in to Eurodragster.com as usual and if people read it then great if not then at least I'm keeping my brain ticking over while im off work. If there is any thing you wanna ask us then E-Mail info@bennettracing.co.uk.