European Drag Racing News

Festival of Power coverage.
29th April: We are in place at Santa Pod Raceway to bring you live coverage from the Festival of Power, supported by John Woolfe Racing.

To follow our coverage, go to our event index by clicking here.

Zetterström Announces Global Partnership with Edelbrock and KW Parts.
28th April:

European Top Fuel Record Holder Ida Zetterström has announced a new global partnership between Edelbrock Group and KW Parts (Klintberg & Way Group) to support her efforts in winning the FIA Championship driving for RF Motorsport. Edelbrock Group helped Zetterström in her successful first FIA Top Fuel season in 2022, where the team became the first to clock a 3.7-second pass in Europe and picked up their first FIA event win together at Tierp Arena in Sweden.

For 2023, Edelbrock is expanding its commitment to become a primary partner on her dragster alongside new sponsor KW Parts. The collaboration brings together two powerhouse companies on the side of the RF Motorsport Top Fueler. The Edelbrock Group brands represent nearly 130 years of building the best-known performance parts for racers and enthusiasts. Meanwhile, KW Parts, operating in 37 European countries, is Europe´s leading distributor of OE and aftermarket spare parts and accessories for American cars from the 1900s to today.

Zetterström is excited by the prospects this partnership brings to the team.

“I saw an opportunity to bring together two great companies in KW Parts and Edelbrock in a way where we can all work together to bring business and racing forward; I see this being the start of something really outstanding,” she said.

“Just as their products, the people at Edelbrock Group are top of the line. I feel very proud to represent such a solid and recognizable global brand — a brand I have used and loved for many years — and I am incredibly excited to grow our partnership."

“Welcoming KW Parts as a new sponsor aligns with my love for American cars, but it also represents our mutual commitment to growing drag racing and supporting enthusiasts across Europe. Having two amazing brands show faith in me to represent them at the highest level is humbling. I don’t think I’ve ever been this excited to start a race season as I am this year. I can’t wait to get started.”

Edelbrock Group Vice President of Sales and Marketing Mark Campbell sees the partnership as a win-win.

“This marketing partnership between Edelbrock and KW is an excellent way for Edelbrock to grow our presence in the European market while showing our love and support of all forms of racing,” he said. “We couldn’t ask for a better brand ambassador than Ida to facilitate our message to the European audience. Not only is she a rising star with outstanding talent, but she is also an enthusiast who understands our products. 2023 is going to be a great year for Ida Zetterström racing.”

Last year marked 20 years since Ida’s start in drag racing and her first season in the Top Fuel class. She begins her second full season in the FIA T/F European Championship this year. She will also run a Cannonball-style race at Mantorp Park and several exhibition events throughout the year. The team starts its season off at the Festival of Power this weekend, April 29th - May 1st, at Santa Pod Raceway, followed by the first event of the European season May 26-28, also at Santa Pod Raceway.

Ida's full schedule is:

29th April-1st May Festival of Power, Santa Pod Raceway, UK
26th-28th May, FIA European Championship, Santa Pod Raceway, UK
16th-18th June, FIA European Championship, Tierp Arena, Sweden
28th-30th July, Drag Festival, Mantorp Park, Sweden
5th-6th August, Gardermoen Raceway, Norway
11th-13th August, FIA European Championship, Tierp Arena, Sweden
25th-27th August, FIA European Championship, Hockenheimring, Germany
8th-10th September, FIA European Championship, Santa Pod Raceway, UK

Ida has been vocal about her dreams of racing in the American NHRA series in the future. “I already have my license, which is ready for NHRA racing, and I’m actively striving towards my goal of racing in the USA. I can’t give you any news of me racing there yet but know that it is something I’m working on for the future. Top Fuel and drag racing get my heart racing, and I’m here to stay.”

You can see more of Ida's progress at www.idazetterstrom.com or Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and Youtube.

Midgley tops table.
28th April: UK-based Top Fuel Bike racer Neil Midgley made a stout defence of his UK Championship number 1 plate at the first round of the British Championship at Santa Pod on the weekend of the 7th – 10th April after capturing the number 1 qualifying position and the event win.

The event was unusual in many ways, with spectators discouraged from attending due to the waterlogged parking and camping areas and cancellation of the Pro Car classes, the atmosphere was more akin to a glorified test session and the Top Fuel Bike class the only way in which the relatively small number of attending fans and crews could get their first nitro fix of the year.

The cancellation of the Pro car classes permitted a three per day qualifying opportunity over two days, ample chances to clear the cobwebs and test the developments made over the long cold winter months.

Midgley finished qualifying in number one position of the four qualifying machines, with a modest 6.22 secs @ an early shut off 184.32 mph.

So to race day where he was to face Al Smith on the unique and Phil Baimbridge-conceived `Rocket’ 3-cylinder machine. Midgely got the `rub of the green’ when Smith was disqualified for taking out the top end reflectors when leading after Midgely lifted after experiencing severe tyre shake.

On to the final round and Midgley was up against the multiple British Championship winning number two qualifying rider Steve Woollatt who had dispatched Dutch visitor Rene van den Berg in the first round with a fine 6.08 secs @ 232.59 mph which proved to be the best run in the class of the weekend.

However, Midgley took the win, cutting a light against his opponent and keeping the momentum going after Woollatt had to lift after drifting towards the centreline.

The King Racing / Cannon Motorsports collaboration look forward to building on their early Championship lead at the postponed Festival of Power event this weekend at Santa Pod, UK.

The team are proud to be supported in their world class performances by their blue-chip partners and their products:

APE - The world’s most innovative manufacturer of aftermarket parts for race bikes
COMETIC GASKETS - The Premier Manufacturer of racing gaskets
GATES - The world’s most trusted name in drive belts, hoses, and hydraulics
GOODRIDGE - The most innovative and the best in fluid transfer systems
JE PISTONS - The world's premier manufacturer of high-performance forged pistons
KIBBLEWHITE PRECISION MACHINING - The highest quality valve train components available
KING RACING - The most successful Top Fuel Team in European history
MRE - Leaders in trackside support for drag race components and air shifting systems
MTC ENGINEERING - Manufacturer of clutches for the fastest motorcycles in the world
NGK SPARKPLUGS UK – The world’s number one spark plug manufacturer
PAR WILLEN – Master webmaster and proprietor of HarleyDrags.com
PRO ALLOY MOTORSPORT - The UK’s leading fabricator of alloy tanks, intercoolers, and radiators
PUMA ENGINEERING LTD – Manufacturer of the World’s most powerful motorcycle engines
VANSON LEATHERS - The most iconic brand in motorsport leather goods
WORLDWIDE BEARINGS - The world’s leading supplier of ceramic bearings for racing
ZODIAC - Europe’s largest supplier of performance and aftermarket HD parts

ACU points posted.
28th April: Many thanks to ACU British Drag Bike Championship co-ordinator Ian King for posting the current ACU points after the STP Springspeed Nationals.

You can see the ACU points at this link (pdf format) or via our Points Standings page.

Irish Championship round 2.
28th April:

Promoter of the Irish Drag Racing Championship, Drag Racing Ireland, issued a release on round two of the series which took place last Sunday at Enniskillen Airport.

"Things didn't quite go to plan on the race front with several times missing due to silly errors, nevertheless we reverted to plan B, send the racers down as fast and as hard as we could.

"This turned a minefield into a crazy fast day with some racers getting.upwards of 15 runs, with missing times I thought how can we fix this? Lots and lots of track time, at the very end we had 3 cars lined up with everything broke and raced out.

"A huge thanks to all the racers that stayed even through the timing issues and enjoyed the day, please don't get annoyed at the StraightlinersNI folks, they are working night and day to make racing stay in this country and haven't stopped since Sunday to ensure this never happens again. We will have a new Portatree setup in place and will be upgrading the current setup as a backup. There won't be championship points awarded in an act of fairness, and we have reduced the NI Motorsport Festival cost to £150 for 2 days' racing.

"A big thanks to all the Irish Drag Racing team as usual worked their back sides off to give the spectators an awesome day and I think we pulled that off, HunterWest Mobile Activity Centre never cooled all day. To those that left early I can only apologise, contact us and we will look after you as best we can

You can see the results of recorded runs from Enniskillen at this link on www.irishdragracing.com.

The third round of the Irish Drag Racing Championship takes place at Ballykelly, Tacan, BT499DT on 26th-27th May, including the first ever round of the Irish Drift Championship in the North. You may enter, or buy spectator tickets, by clicking on this link.

Swift snippets.
28th April: Happy Birthday for today to former Funny Car racer Allan Bates, VW Sportsman racer Paul Robinson, Daimler rail crew member Andrew Carpenter and Supercharged Outlaws wife, team member and model Melanie Bond. We hope you all have a fantastic day.

Videographer Simon Letkey has updated a couple of the Youtube channels he works on. The JT Racing UK channel now has videos of site sponsor John Tebenham's Fabulous Lightning McQueen '53 Corvette's passes at Doorslammers during 2019, 2021 and 2022, plus action footage of the Burnout King Ford Pop chasing its first eight second pass. In his VeeDubRacing channel, Simon has posted four videos of action from the GTi Spring Festival involving the Audi RS3s of Dave Henderson and Billy Ferguson, the Golf of Wayne Gill, the Audi Quattro B2 of Kestas Bendikas, and other quick cars from the GTi Spring Festival.

Spitfire Raceway this Saturday.
27th April:

The second event of the 2023 UK season at Spitfire Raceway, Cornwall, takes place this Saturday. Promoter Lee Child writes:

Time to unleash the power at Perranporth this Saturday, 29th April. Trophies will be up for grabs for quickest top ten on the drag strip, best appearing drift car, best of show and best club stand. Trophies will be presented just after 3pm at race control.

All vehicles are welcome at Spitfire Raceway. You can spectate or take part at Spitfire Raceway, spectators are £10 per person on the gate, under 16s go free. You can drag race from £10 after admission; crash helmet and full driving licence are required. There is a Show & Shine competition with no charge after admission.

Gates are open at 8am and track action is from 11am to 3pm. All vehicles have a safety check for drag racing and drifting. There is a drag strip riders and drivers meeting at race control 10.45am.

Don’t forget to you can camp on site. Enjoy the events and the local area.

All 2023 drag and drift events online bookings are now open. No more waiting - book away. Click on the links to make bookings at Drag & Drift and Camping booking.

Spitfire Raceway is located at Perranporth Airfield, Cornwall TR5 0XS. Please respect the surrounding areas and speed limits when travelling to and from this event.

Russo's Rat restored.
27th April: In the VP Lubricants Nostalgia Superstock entry list for this weekend's Festival of Power, there is a Chevelle that will be remembered with fondness by those who saw Top Street in the 1970s, one with an iconic paint job, big block engine, and stick shift. Russo's Rat has quite a racing history, which is about to be extended thanks to owner Chris Goodale of Goodale American Speedshop. Chris writes:

"In late 1968 Frank Russo walked into Dan-Ridge Chevrolet, Connecticut and ordered a new car; that car was a Le Mans Blue 1969 Chevelle SS396 with the highest horsepower engine option that year, the legendary L78 396ci big block Chevy with a solid lifter camshaft and a 4 speed Muncie transmission.

"Destined to be a race car from new, it was raced throughout the north east of USA at numerous race tracks including Lebanon Valley and the legendary Dover Drag Strip. Eventually a 427ci big block was built by extremely famous Truppi King race engine shop and it was raced in SS/E along with many other high horsepower muscle cars of the era. It was so successful it ended up at the NHRA Nationals at Indianapolis in 1970 & 1971 racing against NHRA heroes such as Bob Glidden, Ray Allen, Hubert Platt, Ken Barnhart, Judy Lilly, Jack Werst & Shirley Shahan...

"Eventually, Frank purchased a car built by Sox and Martin and sold the Chevelle to Richard Smith from the UK, and the car was was imported into the UK in 1973. For the first couple of years the car was raced in the UK by Richard, mainly at Santa Pod Raceway. Then it was eventually road registered in 1975 and went through quite a few owners, usually being treated as it always had been, thrashed to within a inch of its life, which is what the car was purchased for in the first place.

"Eventually I acquired the car in 1999 and it was orange with white stripes by that time , and after a series of motors and transmissions along with a repaint to straight black it was running 10.30’s which at the moment is the fastest the car has ever gone. In 2009 it was put back on the street again, received a 454 and a 4 speed, and I ran 11.90’s with the car on occasion but mostly low 12’s which was a lot of fun with the 4 speed.

"The car was then sold briefly and purchased back again with the intention to restore it back to how it was when Frank Russo sold the car. Once the restoration was started in 2021 the car was found to be in about the condition expected for a 53 year old American car that’s been in this country since 1973, a plan of action was set about and parts and panels ordered.

"There is a long list of people that have been involved with the car and, for me, they were the right people to use for the car as they all have a passion for nostalgic race cars and muscle cars in particular:

The whole project was overseen by Dave Billadeau who has made a fantastic job of everything he has done.
Tim Holmes - initial strip / prep and paint
EDA / Ben Rushforth - engine build
Roger Luty - Transmission rebuild
Ash Rawson - full body restoration - Ash is the master of metal
Dave McCallan - roll cage
Brian Whitfield / Roberts Motor Bodies - did the fantastic fadeaway paint exactly as it was back in 1970
Craig Ainge - lettering and signing on the car
James Ellis - lots of tricky stuff as usual
Adrian Runyard - bits and bobs
Matt Bolt - General encouragement
Parts - Goodale American Speedshop
Frank Russo
Paul Smail - Brake pedal restoration
Team Juicylicious

"I recommend any of the above people as they’ve all done a fantastic job!

"Engine is a 548” BBC built by EDA, 10.5:1 compression, Brodix Rectangle Port Cylinder heads, Brodix Intake, Pro System SV1 single barrel carb, GM Bow Tie Block, Scat crank & rods, Mahle Pistons, Custom Bullet Solid Roller cam; it made 750hp on the dyno.

"See Russo's Rat back in competition at Santa Pod this weekend, racing in Nostalgia Super Stock".

Stilwell's thanks.
27th April: Nitro Revival sponsor Geoff Stilwell has written with his thanks to messages of condolence and support received after yesterday's funeral of his son Matthew who passed away on 17th March following a two year battle against cancer:

"After the item went up on Eurodragster.com, my phone was creaking at the seams with people reaching out. It just goes to show what a tight knit bunch this racing family is. So huge thanks to everyone who messaged me."

The photo, taken by Geoff, shows some of the floral arrangements sent in tribute to Matthew. Donations can be made to the Heart of Kent Hospice, Aylesford, where he sent his final days.

Powder Puff Racing and Miss Universe of Drag Racing.
27th April:

Highly recommended reading is Nïamh Frances Smith's latest article in her Raceway Hussy blog entitled Powder Puff Racing and Miss Universe of Drag Racing.

Nïamh writes: Ooooh new article time! And I hope you’ll all love this one as much as I do.

I first started researching this topic two years ago. Yes, back in 2021 I started taking notes and reaching out to people, and I’ve finally sat down and written it in a day.

The article is about the Miss Universe of Drag Racing all-female Pro Stock circuit, which ran from around 1971-‘74. There isn’t a lot of information on the net about this so it was a bit of a challenge, and I believe this is the first piece that actually compiles all the available information in one place (which is exciting)

I’m very thankful to Carol Henson, one of the racers, for taking the time to answer my questions too.

Nïamh will be racing in the Gasser Circus at the NSRA Nostalgia Nationals on 5th-7th May with the new-to-her Nogbad The Bad.

Swift snippets.
27th April: Happy Birthday to nitro crew member Robin Lantz, we hope you have a great day Robin!

Photojournalist Steve Moxley has had his report on the STP Springspeed Nationals senior bike classes and Outlaw Anglia published by US website Tim Hailey's Eat My Ink, which you can see at this link. Steve's report has plenty of photos and detail about the competition.

Matthew Stilwell.
26th April: As some of our race friends are aware, on 17th March 2023, after a two year battle against a very aggressive form of cancer, Geoff Stilwell's son Matthew, who was just 26, lost that battle and passed peacefully in his sleep. He leaves a 4 year old daughter and granddaughter.

Geoff wrote "Matt was an amazing young man. Caring, funny, a brilliant daddy and always thought about others before himself. Never once did he complain during the two years about the pain he was in from all the treatments he had to endure and was so brave.

"Therefore the 7707 Landspeed 2023 season is dedicated to the memory of Matthew.

"I would like to personally thank the LSR Club, the SCTA, Wendell Burns, Charlie Davis and all the 7707 Team for their support over the past few weeks. It is really appreciated.

"So we are looking forward to doing Matthew proud in 2023. See you at El Mirage and Bonneville."

Today Matthew will be laid to rest at 11:00 BST in Maidstone. Our thoughts will be with Geoff at this sad time.

Vehicles wanted for Caffeine & Machine Drag Racing Weekend.
26th April: Thanks to Santa Pod Raceway Track & Events Coordinator Dan Melrose for an announcement about a new event for which drag racing vehicles are invited for display:

"On Saturday and Sunday 3rd and 4th June, Santa Pod Raceway are teaming up with Caffeine&Machine to hold a weekend in celebration of the dark arts of drag racing. Visitors over the weekend will have the opportunity to get up close and personal with some of the viciously quick machinery designed to tear up the drag strip and find out more about just what it takes to propel a vehicle from standstill to a quarter of a mile away in the tiniest few ticks of a clock’s second hand.

"We’re looking for vehicles to go on display in C&M’s iconic Yard (based in Ettington, near Stratford Upon Avon) over the weekend – can you help? You’ll be getting your cars in front of the thousands of people who come through C&M’s front gates throughout the course of a summer weekend, bringing the visual spectacle of drag racing to a whole new audience, and hopefully igniting a few passions for the sport. You’ll also get to experience the magic of a high summer weekend at one of the UK’s most recognisable car culture destinations.

"We’re looking for up to 10 vehicles each day to put on display and want to hear from you! Vehicle passes will be provided for those wanting to participate, with the invitation to bring crew, family and/or guests to the event as well. If you want to get involved, email Dan at dan.melrose@santapod.com with photos and a short writeup on your vehicle. Please note this event is NOT first-come, first-serve, and successful applicants will be contacted in the weeks leading up to the event."

Festival of Power preview.
26th April: This weekend and on Bank Holiday Monday, the rescheduled Festival of Power will take place at Santa Pod Raceway. For many fans, it will be the first race of the year that they will be able to stay over at the track. Here's a preview of the line-up of racing which you can see at our event index.

Top Fuel will be a match race between Susanne Callin with the Slick Tricks Racing against Ida Zetterström from Jomala, Aland Islands. Their races will take place around 14:00 on Saturday, 11:00 and 16:30 on Sunday, and 11:00 and 14:00 on Monday. The Funny Car Cup, reduced to two entries after problems with parts deliveries for the two other teams that had hoped to compete, will consist of Jason Phelps in the Hawk Racing Gladiator Toyota Camry and Kevin Kent in the West Ten Motorsport Chevrolet Monte Carlo. Qualifying will take place at around 11:20 and 17:15 on Saturday, 11:00 and 16:30 on Sunday and eliminations at 11:45 and 15:45 on Sunday.

Motorsport UK Pro Modified also has a short field partly due to a lack of Dutch entries, which will be attending the Main Event and possibly the Doorslammers. Bobby Wallace, Jean Dulamon, 2022 champion Andy Robinson, licencee David Smith and Wayne Nicholson make up the field, meaning three rounds of racing if David can achieve his licence.

The Nostalgia Funny Car Cup is the first time these cars have run in 2023, and we look forward to Tony Betts, Wendy Baker and Tim Garlick, who will be racing for points for the first time in the class's UK history.

Trackworx Comp Eliminator has Dan Williams in his gen 2 Camaro with a repaired gearbox, also Ahmed Jamshaid rejoins the class after his National Finals debut in it, having run strongly at the recent Scott Lewry test day.

Sportsman car classes have a large entry, and we note that Jed Guy will be racing in Richard Tunstall's Jammie Dodger Brogie roadster in Tony Morris Carburetors Super Gas. Peter Walters makes a return to Peter Nee Super Pro ET in his supercharged BBC dragster, and Brian Pateman makes his first outing of the year in his famed 68 Pontiac Firebird, as do Ron Bartlett (Anglia 105e) and Darren Peart (Cortina Mk3). Rene Jaspert will be over from Germany in Super Pro ET with wife Tessa Jaspert in Pro ET in his and hers BMW doorslammers.

In Modurstang Pro ET, Vic Parsons has his first race outing for the year in his repainted Plymouth Belvedere, as does John Dalrymple in his '33 Willys. In Hutchinson & Dibley Sportsman ET Richard Palmer makes his race debut in a Jaguar XKR, and it's the first appearance for James Grew in a VW Toureg and Travis Smith in an Audi S3. Matthew Dowdy will be racing in the senior classes for the first time with The Red Ned Nova (Chevy). Dan Holloway will be returning to the track after engine damage to his Rattler altered thanks to Andy Dibley who has loaned him his red Camaro gen 3 for the weekend.

VP Lubricants Nostalgia Super Stock makes its first appearance of the year, just a week before their first lifestyle competition at the Nostalgia Nationals. Matthew Dowdy will be new to the class, double classing with Sportsman ET, also double classing will be Spencer Tramm (Comp Eliminator), Simon Rickwood, Pete Dodd and Victor Parsons (all Pro ET).

The VWDRC has its first championship round: in VW Pro where there is a strong entry of 16, with newcomer Danielle Coppin in a Golf R, Nigel Gregg with a Golf VR6, Dave Crowhurst also in the list with a Beetle, and Joe Hall in a Golf R. VW Sportsman has a number of debuts in its 25 strong field of entries, Jordan Clark (Laurence's son) in a Golf, Lorraine Large in a Beetle and Andrew Clark (father of Ashleigh and Will) in a Golf.

Outlaw Flat Four has a four car field for its first race of the year with Andrew Burton a returnee in a 2386cc Beetle called Bit on the Side.

In the ACU Drag Bike Championship, there are three Banks Night Club Top Fuel Bikes, with Neil Midgley, Steve Woollatt and Al Smith all entered. There will be seven Taylors Trophy Super Street Bikes, with Dave Smith making his first competitive 2023 appearance. We will see more overseas entrants at the Main Event in FIM-E competition, however in the Leeks Landscape Funny Bike ranks we have Maarten Zijlstra on his new ex Dave Buttery machine, and first time out this year for Eric Richard from France on his new-in-2022 Suzuki machine which has run a best of 6.598 and 199mph. Jordan Kenway also returns following engine damage at the Springspeed Nationals, a great effort to obtain replacement parts and rebuild the engine in just a couple of weeks.

In Suzukiperformancespares.co.uk Competition Bike, Dave Thomas joins the fray for the first time this year. In JKE Race Works 8.50 Bike, Steven Jackson makes his debut on a GSX-R, Patrick Merite makes a welcome return from the Netherlands (double classing in ET Bike too), and it's the first outing for Alex Gordon in 2023. Blood Cancer ET Bike has a debut from Nicholas Playdon on a Kawasaki ZX9R whilst Chantal Van Loon (GSXR) and Jayent Banwari (Hayabusa) are making their way from the Netherlands.

In addition to this the Lucas Oil Junior Dragsters and Eurodragster.com Junior Drag Bikes will have large fields of racers and there will be a wealth of exhibition vehicles and family attractions at SPR. Exhibition vehicles include jets Fireforce 3 and Fireforce 5 (Martin Hill driving), Spiderman (Julian Webb driving), Firestorm (Roger Goring driving) and Oklahoma Willy Jet Bus (Perry Watkins driving).

The Live Action Arena will have Podzilla Monster Truck, a Stunt Display by Terry Grant, Lee Bowers and drift display by Team Maximum Lock. There is a huge variety of entertainment for kids, and bands on Saturday and Sunday nights.

You can see an overall timetable of events by going to this link on the SPR website and come back to Eurodragster.com for up to date results and race commentaries. The event is also live streamed, go to the links on our event index page.

Festival of Power perfect awards.
26th April: £200 is up for grabs at this weekend's FIA/FIM-E Festival of Power courtesy of Eurodragster.com and our sponsors.

This weekend's Eurodragster.com/Bad Habit Racing Perfect Light Award has been reset to £50 after it was won by Lucas Oils Junior Dragster racer Kai Cooper at the STP Springspeed Nationals. The money will be paid to the first racer at the event to record a Reaction Time of 0.000 seconds. The Perfect Light Award is available in all classes during both qualifying and eliminations, but will only be awarded for the first Perfect Light of the event. The Perfect Light Award is presented in association with Cath and Tig Napier of Modurstang Pro ET team Bad Habit Racing.

Decals are not mandatory for the Perfect Light Award but we would appreciate it if Eurodragster.com decals are carried. Eurodragster.com decals are available in Signing On or from Eurodragster.com staff.

The Eurodragster.com Perfect ET Award supported by Andy Hadfield and the Twister Race Team has been reset to £50 after it was won by Modurstang Pro ET racer Jess Bishop at the STP Springspeed Nationals. The money will be paid to the first racer at the event to run +0.000 on index or dial-in. The Perfect ET Award is available in Peter Nee Super Pro ET, Modurstang Pro ET, Hutchinson & Dibley Sportsman ET, B Fast R Super Comp, Tony Morris Carburetors Super Gas, VW Pro, VW Sportsman, Lucas Oil Junior Dragster, JKE Race Works 8.50 Bike, Atlantic Fluid Tech 9.50 Bike, Blood Cancer UK ET Bike and Eurodragster.com Junior Drag Bike. but will only be awarded for the first Perfect ET of the weekend. The Perfect ET Award is presented in association with Andy 'Fadster' Hadfield of the Twister Race Team in memory of his late wife Hayley.

Decals are not mandatory for the Perfect ET Award but we would appreciate it if Eurodragster.com decals are carried. Eurodragster.com decals are available in Signing On or from Eurodragster.com staff.

Bob's Photo Finish Award, which is presented in association with Eurodragster.com sponsor Bob Roberts, will award £50 each to the racers involved in the closest finish of a green light and non-breakout race of eliminations at this weekend's event. At the STP Springspeed Nationals the Award was won by Modurstang Pro ET racer racers Don Scott and Marc Huxley with a finish line margin was 0.0008 seconds or 2 inches.

The closest race will be decided upon distance rather than time since, for example, 0.001 seconds at 230 mph is further than 0.002 seconds at 110 mph. For this reason the official timing data will need to be consulted so the winners will be announced here on Eurodragster.com as soon as possible after the event and the winners will then be contacted for their preferred method of payment. The award will be paid on green light drag races only, and not on bracket races where there is a breakout.

Bob's Photo Finish Award is open to all classes during eliminations only and although Eurodragster.com decals are not mandatory we would appreciate if it they are carried. Eurodragster.com decals are available in Signing On.

Swift snippets.
26th April: Happy Birthday for today to JKE Race Works proprietor and Super Street Bike racer Jake Mechaell, Comp Eliminator racer and recording artist Kev Perkins, long time fan of the site Stephen Billings, former VW Pro racer Danny Wharton and Swedish gasser racer Stefan Flodell. We hope you all have a great day.

Report and images from Dakota Raceway.
25th April: Many thanks to Jerry Cookson for providing a report and photos from Dakota Raceway's drag and drift event last Saturday, and to Carol Jenkinson for sending in a gallery of photos of the NSA motorcycle action. Jerry writes:

The sometimes quiet runway of Devon’s Smeatharpe Airfield once again echoed to the sound of highly tuned engines at the NSA/Straightliners Drag ‘n’ Drift day last weekend. Although certain mobile apps predicted doom and gloom on the weather front the day was a rather subdued affair with a few spits, spots and sun albeit a little drafty round the Knees. The only time the rain did show itself was after the track had closed and all equipment had been safely stowed away.

The National Sprint Association’s championship round attracted an eclectic motorcycling mix of some 40 plus machines. Also Straightliners laid on three class competitions to find the quickest FWD, RWD and 4WD cars of the day that certainly brought up a few interesting challenges and call outs.

With no less than 4 riders solidly in the nines over 4 different classes the screws had well and truly been turned up by mid-afternoon to produce some lively top end charges. Having sat the first round out Black Dragon Motorcycles Pete Ford brought his high revving blown 750cc class Suzuki to the fore and after the obligatory 10.7/130 mph checkout pass Pete began dialling into the conditions to end the day with a blistering 9.232/149.71 mph, although not quite on par with his 9.11 track record, his machine did manage to black stripe its way across the concrete surface for the first 100ft on all of his other 9 second passes.

Although Pete wound up the quickest over the quarter he wasn’t the fastest. That honour belonged to the NSAs flying Welsh wizard Mark Taylor as he blasted his Hayabusa across the line to a maxed out speed of 163.28 mph, and he told me afterwards there was still more to come! By midday and despite gear selection issues everything was pointing in the right direction as he quickly turned the bikes 9.760 into a 9.356 and then a 9.335 to take the Unlimited class win but not quite enough to get within striking distance of his 9.021 class record!

Matching in ETs but in road trim was Steve Everett’s class winning 1300cc Busa. Solidly in the high nines from the start of the day Steve took the silver bullet to the days third quickest 9.664 at 140.39 mph.

Whatever Paul Hayman does on any given surface it has to be fast, and that’s exactly what he did. On three separate occasions Paul launched his 1000cc GSXR as it was being shot out of a cannon. Every one of his nine second passes was without any drama but was arrow straight with a 60ft time of 1.576 by the end of the day resulting in a class win of 9.903 at 136 mph.

Other highlights saw Wild Bunch racer ‘Crazy Chris’ Hartnell taking his first tentative passes with Backdraft Too. Although Saturday’s meet was Chris’ first time ever on two wheels on a drag strip, and with support as always from partner and WB administrator Claire Meaddows, adapted to this new found environment with ease despite his visor misting up on his first timed run. Formerly ridden in NSA competition by Tony Pettitt and before that in the seventies by Mighty Mick Warne as Jus Blue the 400 class Clift Honda, and now complete with its customary metal flake red Backdraft coach work Chris ended the day with a 16.144/86.99 mph and second to Simon Hewer’s KTM 300.

In the Vintage classes Richard von Mach reset the 350 class record with his Arial Arrow by lowering it from a 16.768 set by Richard Morgan to 14.972 while in the Unlimited class Mark Richards took his show worthy 1954 Triumph 500 to the class win over Tony Lockwood’s fast charging Tri/JAP; 14.617 to 15.441 respectively.

The Scooter class with 3 other entrants belonged to Green Light Scooters head honcho Adie Horrocks as he took his class winning Vespa to a 13.260 at 98.71 mph, despite gearing issues, over Nigel Howard with the GLS Renta Ride; 13.727.

Despite the Junior classes being single entry affairs all four comprising of Jorja Cleall, Max & Libby Curtis and Chloe Hayman were giving it large with Jorja resetting her own record on her Peugeot called Midnight.

With a nice mix ‘n’ match entered into the days RWYB for cars, mostly RWD, the quickest FWD was smiling Jim Bradford with his smartly turned out Focus ST at 14.236/105.37 mph. With no less than 11 entered one Rear Wheel Drive topping the time sheets early (12.458) was the race prepped, and possibly Hillclimb VW Golf of Austin Grice. But by midday the VW was on the tow hook with its ET superseded by Kevin Headon’s Pontiac Le Mans with a 12.527/111.34 mph to its credit. However, by late afternoon it all changed again thanks to Dan Wilson’s Antique Toy SBC Wild Bunch slingshot dragster following a hard charging, but bouncy, 11.041/108.48 mph. Second quickest was Kevin Fone’s motorcycle engined rear motored dragster (12.372) and Kevin’s Pontiac at 12.442.

One interesting car that stood out against the Nissans, Mazdas and the Ford Model B of James Bull was Scott Riddell’s ’55 Chevy ‘Shoebox’ for its barn find looks. I asked Scott where it had come from and he told me it was found in a California desert and that the guy he got it off pulled out a couple of sack fulls of pure American sand. Scott, for all intense and purposes, has left all of its original patina as is and the only window that had been wiped was the front wind shield. Everything else looked as it was found and good for 15.2 second quarters.

However, the main interest was with the 4WD category and Nick Martin’s 11.008s performance early doors with the silver grey AMG Mercedes. Then along came Luke Zborowski and his Audi A4 Avant Estate! Straight off the road, the Audi’s 150hp 2.0-litre 35 TFSI equipment banged out a 10.978/130.17 in no effort at all. Nick replied with a 10.896/129.87. Then Luke came back at him with an even quicker 10.825/130.17 pass as the winning run.

Team Dark Horse update.
25th April: Many thanks to team member Rich Bell for updating us on Team Dark Horse, with owner/driver Lee Huxley now racing in Super Pro ET:

With a new 598ci ASD built Big Block Ford powerplant, 2023 sees Team Dark Horse joining the ranks of Super Pro ET. Our first outing of the season was a great success - qualifying number one, running a new PB for the Mustang of 8.6934 and losing a tight 2nd round (7 inches), the weak link in the chain being the old torque convertor. A brand-new replacement is due to be fitted imminently, so the aim for the next couple of events will be to go a little quicker and find some consistency for upcoming rounds and of course The Doorslammers. For a more detailed summary of the Springspeed Nationals you can read the team's Facebook post.

Also new for 2023 are, our illustrated T-shirts, which we are currently taking preorders for. If you’d like one, please let us know within the Facebook comments at this Facebook post what numbers and what size(s) you require or email rich@maplerockdesign.co.uk. The price is £20 per T-shirt. We also have OG Dark Horse Tees and Embroidered Hoodies available.

Drachten revival.
25th April: The Dutch Hot Rod Association and 402 Automotive have announced that there will be a Dragrace Madness race at Drachten Airport on 7th-9th July. The event promoter will be 402 and DHRA will be administering the timekeeping. Our good friend and motorcycle pit reporter Mike Kraaij will be in charged of photo/media work.

The drag racing community in Holland have succeeded in gaining permission to run a race despite reports to the contrary in January. You can read more about which classes are involved and updates for racers at www.dragracemadness.com, from which you can order tickets.

Swift snippets.
25th April: Wild Bunch racer Andrew Clifford wishes his son, crew-chief and (after this week) Bicester Heritage Skills Academy graduate James Clifford a happy 22nd birthday. We all hope you have a great day James.

Happy Birthday for today to Mugridge Motorsport crew member Matthew Seamarks, Old School Stocker racer Andy Lambert, DoYouSee.me head honcho Maikel Gloudemans and Polish FWD racer Paweł Pietrzak. We hope you all have a great day.

A reminder that entry for the NSRA Nostalgia Nationals closes this Friday, 28th April. If you race in Gasser Circus, VP Lubricants Nostalgia Super Stock, Outlaw Anglia, Supercharged Outlaws or Wild Bunch, you should enter at this link at racers.santapodtickets.com. Pre-1973 NSRA Run What Ya Brung tickets for the event and spectator tickets are on sale at santapodtickets.com until the day of the event.

Almost 400 images from Melbourne have been posted by Ashley Booth-Dale to a Facebook album and his Flickr page.

VW Heads Up at GTi Spring Festival.
24th April: Congratulations to Audi RS3 racer Dave Henderson who was winner of the VW Heads Up competition at the GTi Spring Festival held at Santa Pod Raceway yesterday.

Nine cars made qualifying runs in three sessions; qualifying, including those below the 11.99 cut-off went:

Dave Henderson (DH Automotive Audi RS3) 9.1909/154.68
Wayne Gill (VW Golf R) 10.5248/127.58
Chris Waterhouse (Audi S3) 10.5783/138.29
Mark Gunns (VW Corrado) 10.8122/139.98
Paul Jordan (VW Polo) 11.2459/86.20
Bruce Kopasz (Porsche 944) 11.8903/114.78
Sunjay Vara (Audi TT) 12.7295/113.64
Wayne Waterhouse (Audi S3) 12.8234/109.51
Martin Charles (VW Beetle) 16.8559/78.41

In eliminations, after a number of breakages the final came down to #1 and #2 qualifiers Dave Henderson and Wayne Gill with Dave once again coming out on top.

#3 qualifier Chris Waterhouse suffered damage on his second qualifying pass, writing "we set off with the car bouncing and lifting the front wheels up twice then when I was at the top end of 3rd I was losing power with thick white smoke coming from the exhaust. Looks like the nitrous has melted number 1 piston." Chris is looking for a 82.5mm supertech piston and a large port head to make the Festival of Power this coming weekend.

Thanks to VWDRC for information.

Dale runner up at XDA.
24th April: Congratulations to Funny Bike racer Dale Leeks for being runner up in MaxxECU Pro Xtreme at the Xtreme Motorcycle Drag Racing Association Spring Nationals at Maryland International Raceway.

After defeating Ronnie Smith (see picture) in round 1 with a 4.210/176.68 (second run in the linked video), Dale ran a bye run in the semi final to get to the final, where his opponent was to have been Chris Cutsinger, however found breakage that couldn't be fixed in time.

Mugridge Motorsport Youtube.
24th April: Pro ET racer and Junior Dragster crew chief Nick Mugridge has sent a link to his latest Youtube video showing the cars he races and tunes for brother Luke, from the STP Springspeed Nationals event.

Nick says "This is Part 1, from the test day and qualifying. Eliminations in Part 2 will come later". In Part 1, there are videos from the startline and on-board in impressive 4K quality, and Nick explains some of the mechanical adjustments and parts changes he has to make to ensure consistent performance, and what happens when things don't go according to plan. "Bracket Racing is my passion and the videos shine a light on Pro ET and Junior Dragster as being some of the toughest classes in U.K. Bracket Racing."

Swift snippets.
24th April: Happy Birthday for longtime supporter and Pro ET crewman Colin Roaf, Super Pro ET racer John Przybyl and Comp Bike racer Shawn Buttigieg, we hope you all have a great day.

Videographer and car constructor Adam Beard's Twin Engined Corsa (TEC) Youtube channel has evolved into "a community of crazy builds and the mad people who build them", has uploaded footage from the Yam Yam Racing Test Day last Monday, and you can see several of the cars making passes plus enthusiastic, and knowledgeable, commentary from Adam. Also on Adam's channel are a couple of videos on Scott Lewry's new V6 turbo Corsa which ran its first passes last Monday.

Videographer Simon Letkey has posted a number of videos from the STP Springspeed Nationals on his Shift Light TV Youtube channel which you can see by clicking here. Included are Top Fuel Bike, Funny Bike and Super Street Bike and a variety of cars from Super Pro ET, Pro ET, Street Eliminator and Outlaw Anglia.

FIA race suit recertification rules.
23rd April: Thanks to FIA Technical Consultant Frans Steilberg who has issued a notification about driver race suit recertification rules:

The SFI Spec for Driver Suits states that all jacket and pants or driver suits that meet the SFI Spec 3.2A/10 or higher (3.2A/15 or 3.2A/20) must be recertified on a five-year interval. Suits with those higher ratings have SFI patches that indicate the year of manufacture or the year of the last recertification. (Please be aware that the five-year recertification period includes the year displayed on the patch)

Below are the recertification dates for the different year patches currently available:

SFI Patch Insignia	Recertification Time Frame
No date patch	Certification expired on 31. Dec. 2004
2017 date patch	Certification expired on 31. Dec. 2021
2018 date patch	Certification expires on 31. Dec. 2022
2019 date patch	Certification expires on 31. Dec. 2023
2020 date patch	Certification expires on 31. Dec. 2024
2021 date patch	Certification expires on 31. Dec. 2025
2022 date patch	Certification expires on 31. Dec. 2026
2023 date patch	Certification expires on 31. Dec. 2027

For recertification, owners of driver suits should contact the original manufacturer to be informed about their procedures for returning the suits for inspection and recertification.

On driver suits with sewn-in arm restraints, the date stamped on the arm restraints is a reference date for the manufacturer and has no bearing on the suit's expiration date.

JT Racing expands social media presence.
23rd April: Pro Modified/Super Pro ET racer and Eurodragster.com sponsor John Tebenham has expanded his social media presence by establishing a Youtube channel JT Racing UK.

Filmed by VeeDubRacing head honcho Simon Letkey, the initial video posted features JT talking us through the Burnout King Ford Pop at the STP Springspeed Nationals, its specs, and how it ran at the race.

Simon commented "I followed them for the weekend for a behind-the-scenes look on how they prepare for a race event. Issues with the gearbox stopped play, although a fix was tried on the day, with Edge Performance Transmissions putting in a night shift to try and replace the faulty parts. JT will be out again soon for Doorslammers - this time with both the Ford Pop and the Pro Mod!" JT said "Doorslammers four weeks away this weekend, blimey, it's coming round fast."

Viewers are advised to hit the subscribe button, and the notification bell, so you dont miss JT's next video.

Update from Dale at XDA.
23rd April:

Funny Bike racer Dale Leeks posted an update on his qualifying at Xtreme Dragbike Association's race at Maryland International Raceway:

"We went out testing on Friday, it left straight and good but lost a pipe off the turbo on the run which stuck oil under the back tyreat 330ft and it got a bit interesting, but we got it stopped. We decided to sit out the rest of the test session and go into qualifying Friday night.

"Originally it was going to be at 21:15, we got down there and of the two bikes in front of me, one of the guys went down at the top end of the track which is never nice. and they had to get the helicopter in to airlift him out, by the time they had done that it was about half past midnight, we were sitting in the pairing lanes, and the jet lag was getting to me as I had only arrived on Thursday. At 00:30 after waiting for four hours, we discovered the CO2 had leaked out of my bottle, there was a big rush to get to the line. It hurt the transmission as it didn't change gear, there was no boost control, but by the time we came back to the trailer, the gearbox looked ok.

"When we got back to the track on Saturday morning we fired it up and went on the two step - and it wouldn't select first gear. The hospitality from the guys over here is great, we can't thank them all enough, everyone has gone out of their way to help me. It's the first time I've been over to race in the States with my bike here, all the help and support is amazing. We'll have to pull the motor out of the bike to fix the transmisson. The weather's coming in, the qualifier I was supposed to run in has just happened, I've been bumped down to the back of the pack after being third with a sh*t run. That will put me against Ronnie Smith who was #1, he's fast.

"There'll be no more qualifying and the track guys are amazing and they will get this event run. It's super cool, I'm loving every minute of it. The first run I was apprehensive with everything going on. Dan the Man (Wagner - Editor) is the hardest working man I've ever met in my life, I think survives on about three hours sleep. I've got Lowry Callaghan crewing for us and we're pitted near Ronnie Procopio, a hero of mine for years, they're all a super cool bunch."

Good luck and stay safe to Dale for today's eliminations.

Swift snippets.
23rd April: Happy Birthday for today to Santa Pod race director Karl Birkinshaw, who reaches 40 also former VW Sportsman racers Martin Ayton and Andy Agroment. We hope you have a great day.

Robinson Race Cars at Niterra Day.
22nd April: Eurodragster.com sponsor and long term supporter Bob Roberts has written with an account of a promotional event for Robinson Race Cars at their principal sponsor NGK.

April 21st 2023 was Niterra Day. What? Who? Well Niterra is the rebranded parent company of NGK and NGK are major sponsors of Robinson Race Cars and they had requested RRC to show off the Camaro as part of the celebrations. In fact the invite had been extended pre-Covid but it wasn’t until this year that the planets aligned so Andy and Luke could bring up the full rig with the car ready to run.

Sadly the Niterra car park was not long enough for a burnout so we had to settle for firing the car up and making plenty of noise. There was also a top grade race car simulator set up to allow people to “drive” laps of Silverstone in a Ferrari and it was no surprise to anyone that both Luke and Andy both had a try. It seems that real life circuit experience is a disadvantage when first trying the sim.

Gallery from Dakota.
22nd April: Many thanks to Kieran for sending us a gallery of photos from today's action at Dakota Raceway which you can see at this link supported by John Woolfe Racing.

Kieran said "Only a few cars here but loads of bikes for the NSA Sprint." Talking of the NSA Sprint, announcer and editor of The Sprinter NSA club magazine Jerry Cookson will be providing a report on the event in a few days' time.

Pictured: Chris Hartnell on his new Backdraft Two bike which we described in our 19th January update.

Swift snippets.
22nd April: We have quite a list of birthdays for today. Happy Birthday to Dorset Horn racer Dick Sharp, former Funny Car racer Lesley Prior, former Fuel Altered racer Mick Moore, Pro ET racer Ronnie Mercer, Super Gas racer Dan Page and US legend Joe Schubeck. We hope you all have a fantastic day.

GTi Spring Festival preview.
21st April:

The GTi Spring Festival takes place at Santa Pod Raceway this Sunday 23rd April. A feature of Santa Pod's calendar since the late 1980s, the Festival is the first event of the year for Volkswagen Audi Group racers, now including other marques such as Skoda, Seat, Lamborghini, Bentley and Bugatti.

The main track action will be Run What Ya Brung for VAG Vehicles Only. To take part you can still sign up online at santapodtickets.com and buy a £45 RWYB voucher in addition to an admission ticket. Awards will be handed out to 12 categories of vehicle based on marque, capacity, fuel and driver gender.

The Show & Shine has a massive number of awards - we counted 37. For a list of these, see event page on Santa Pod's website.

In addition to these traditional features, there are Club Displays for over 40 VAG clubs, the Dizzy Rascals - a kind of manic combination of sprint and autotest - with a prize for quickest time, Martin Hill in Fireforce 5, and VWDRC Heads Up competition with ten cars entered that are able to go quicker than 12 seconds down the quarter mile.

Admission, only available online, is £23 for adults and £5 for kids aged 5-15, at santapodtickets.com.

Tog's modelling.
21st April: Former editor Tog has written in response to Björn Sundström's post on drag racing models that we posted on Wednesday 19th April:

Not in the Mark Gredzinski or Björn Sundström class but this, from my teens, is a 1/32 scale slot dragster which older readers will recognise as a replica of Trevor Young’s Competition Products Pro Fueller, as they were then known. The dragster was built from scratch with a piano wire frame and sheet plastic and was powered by an Airfix slimline motor. Keen eyes will note a 1/24 scale motor even though the dragster is 1/32.

In the late 1970s and early 1980s there were a number of slot drag clubs; I have fond memories of race events and car shows with the Hull Street Freaks (1/24 scale), Surrey Street Rodders (1/32) and the Humberstone Drag Racing Club (1/16) as well as a guy named Bob Foskett who, if memory serves, also had radio-controlled dragsters one of which pulled a fire burnout on the start line at Santa Pod. The Surrey Street Rodders and Bob Foskett both organised inter-club race events, one of which I can date to early 1982 as I remember that an episode of the notorious TV programme OTT was broadcast on the Saturday night.

Swift snippets.
21st April: Happy Birthday for today to British Drag Racing pioneer Keith Stacey, Sick Week and former Super Modified racer Paul Mander, former Pro Modified racer and Eurodragster.com security consultant Ray White, Sportsman ET racer Troy Attree and German photographer Mathias Schneider. We hope you all have a great day.

Dale Ackworth and Michael Castle of Youtube channel Spotted Motors left their LS twin turbo engined Cortina (pictured in the entrance lobby of the National Motor Museum at Beaulieu) at home for the Melbourne Northern Nationals, and decided instead to race a 2.3l Duratec powered Estate. You can see the entertaining results at this link.

Festival of Power racer announcement.
20th April: Many thanks to Santa Pod Racers Club Secretary Ian Marshall for sending us details of track opening and signing on at the rescheduled Festival of Power being held at Santa Pod Raceway on 29th April-1st May, including scrutineering times.

The main gates to the track will open from 8.00am on Friday 28th April.

Friday, 28th April:
10.00-18.00 Signing on office open
10.00-18.00 Scrutineering for cars and bikes at the scrutineering bay

Saturday, 29th April:
07.00 Signing on open, scrutineering opens for cars and bikes
09.30 Track open for qualifying

Sunday, 30th April:
08.00 Scrutineering and signing on open
09:30 Track open for qualifying/eliminations

Monday, 1st May:
09.00 Scrutineering and signing on open
09.30 Track open for qualifying/eliminations

The detailed running orders and entry list can be seen via our event coverage page.

Ian says "With the new scrutineering protocol is now in place, only the following classes are required to visit Scrutineering, the opening times are as listed above":

VW Sportsman
VW Pro
Outlaw Flat 4
Nostalgia Super Stock
Pro Modified
All Bike Classes

Ian also says "Please note, if this is your first race event in the season and you are running in any Sportsman car class not mentioned, you must visit Scrutineering as per normal. Top Fuel, Funny Car and Nostalgia Funny Car will be scrutineered at your pit bay.

Finally, a reminder about The Main Event entry closing date, which is 28th April, just 9 days away. Ian says "Please get you entries in ASAP as time is moving on."

Straightliners head to Enniskillen.
20th April: This coming Sunday 23rd April, Irish Drag Racing in association with Straightliners returns to Enniskillen Airport from 10:00 to 18:00 for round 2 of its 2023 Championship.

There will be continuous quarter mile track time during the day, with unlimited runs for cars, motorcycles and buggies, with printouts of times supplied by Straightliners. Trade village, food stalls and kid's entertainment will also be on hand. The entry list so far, with entry still open, numbers 85.

You can buy tickets for spectator places (£15, teens £10, under 12s free) or racer entries (£120) at this link. You can contact organisers at Enniskillen airport is located at 62 Killadeas Rd, Enniskillen BT94 2FH.

Principal sponsors for the event are PowerMax Engineering Ltd; associate sponsors are Link, Precision Turbo, Bradley, PowerMax Competition, MCG Auto Styling, Bishop's Chrome Exhausts, and supporters Cano, Kitty's Kitchen, CCTV, MMK Electrical & LED Lighting, and Straightliners N.I.

Leeks racing in XDA this weekend.
20th April:

Regular readers will remember that Funny Bike racer Dale Leeks announced he is shipping his bike (pictured above) to the US for the 2023 season for it to race in both the newly owned Man Cup series and drag bike sanction Xtreme Dragbike racing (XDA).

In a change of plan, Dale will ride in the XDA Platinum General Services Spring Nationals taking place at Maryland International Raceway this weekend. Dale told us "I flew to America Wednesday morning on short notice and I will now ride my bike in the eighth mile Pro Xtreme class at MIR. Let's do this!" Dale's bike was shipped over to Dan Wagner's shop at the start of the year, eventually arriving on 16th March, and US racer Rob Garcia has been helping Dan prepare the bike.

Good luck to Dale, you can follow his progress during the weekend by tuning back here, or read more about the event at www.xdaracing.com.

Classic Car Garage features SPR.
20th April: Many thanks to NSRA committee member Alan Martin for letting us know about a new TV series which will feature the 2022 Hot Rod Drags from Santa Pod Raceway:

The series Classic Car Garage is airing from tonight (Thursday 20th April) at 21:00 on The Yesterday Channel. The Hot Rod Drags, particularly Gasser Circus, will feature in episode 2 of the series.

Producer Paul Windle of ClockWork Films, said "The series is sure to be loved by anyone with a passion for cars and motoring, speed, or people who are into nostalgia".

The series will air on The Yesterday Channel (Freeview 27, Sky 155, Virgin 129, Freesat 159 and the UKTV Play website/app) on Thursdays at 21:00. You may get in touch with feedback on the social media channels of the Yesterday Channel at Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter.

Swift snippets.
20th April: Happy Birthday for today to British Drag Racing pioneer Bruce Brown, who reaches his 80th birthday, Maltese Opel Dragster racer Tyson Debono and former Super Pro ET racer Nigel Turner, have a great day guys.

Kieran's latest upload to his Mk1Kieran Youtube channel is footage of the Yam Yam Racing Drag Club's private test day held at Santa Pod Raceway on Monday. You can see the action by clicking here. Kieran commented "Monday Drag Club is back for 2023! The first of 3 Yam Yam Drag Club events this year and what a day it was. The morning took no prisoners with many breakages but once the day got into full swing we saw some fantastic performances, a few new cars or new to owner cars also debuted at the event as well which is always good to see."

Steve Moxley's report on the STP Springspeed Nationals 8.50, 9.50 and ET Bike classes is now at www.acu.org.uk at this link containing as ever much news from the pits.

Banzai Cobra at Springspeed Nationals.
19th April: Many thanks to Banzai Cobra racer Dave Rudd who has written in with an account of his Springspeed Nationals, racing in Modurstang Pro ET:

Well as long as you don't mention E1, that was a great weekend!

Over the winter apart from the usual servicing and checking we fitted an electric Shiftniod, new 6 point harness and did a couple of tweaks to the rear suspension.

Set up and scrutineered on Thursday at a leisurely pace, as I left it to late and all the test day tickets were gone, our Q1 run was the first run of the year and despite the new Shiftnoid and the shift light not working (so I hit the limiter in each gear) we ran 9.8129, so quite pleased with that as data was pointing to 9.6?

Back in the pits we bypassed the Shiftnoid and got the shift light to work so stayed with the 9.60 dial in for Q2 and ran 9.6249 which put us 5th qualifiers which was the highest I had been in qualifying so far.

Q3 we dialed in 9.61 and ran 9.6120 to put us up to 2nd qualifier overnight, I was buzzing!

Saturday brought somewhat different weather conditions which took us Q4 and Q5 to get to grips with but the last 2 qualifying runs we were back with 2 100ths off dial in but dropped us to no.3 qualifiers going into E1.

Now onto E1, err well not sure what happened as after a check over in the pits and again back home everything seams to be OK with the car! So either my finger slipped off the button or I just lost the plot! To make matters worse I heard Jasons wheels spin up off the line! However all in all not a bad first meeting of the season.

Thanks go to Steph for the start line video of my attempt at another perfect launch with a 0.0031 light and Blackett Photgraphy for the pics attached. And many thanks go to all the staff and crew at Santa Pod who make all this possible, and Eurodragster for the coverage (You're welcome - Editor) and keeping us updated and last but not least my family and friends who all go to helping this happen.

Photo credits: Blackett Photography.

Crail results.
19th April: Crail Raceway in Scotland have posted results on their website from last Sunday's drag and drift event.

The Raceway have invested much time and money in renewing their Portatree timing gear with new software, and times in a sortable format have been posted from last Sunday's event. These can be seen at this link (click on "all entries" and then sort by whichever category you would like to see).

Facebook albums of the event are at the pages of photographers Outside In and by Mike Lundon Photography. Ethan Lisle has posted video of some of the runs at Crail on his Youtube channnel Lisle Motorsport.

The next event at Crail is the Full On Ford day on Sunday 30th April sponsored by Laird Performance. As usual there will be 1/4 mile racing, drifting, show n' shine, trophies, clubs, trade stands and more. Entry for this event is £15 per adult, £5 for 12-16 year olds and FREE for kids under 12. To take part in the action, it's £20 for unlimited on the 1/4mile (this also gives you access to drift oval too if you wish). Gates are open 9:00am and the track is live 10am-4pm

Pictured: quickest time of the day racer W. Smith who ran a 9.75/152.22 on his Kawasaki ZX12R. Photo credit: Outside In.

Modelling in Sweden.
19th April: Thanks to Björn Sundström for writing in from Finnerödja in Sweden. Björn, an enthusiast of the sport at Swedish tracks since 1976, is also an avid modeller and builds race cars to 1/25 scale. The following are photos of his creations:

Björn comments that the altered has a V10 Hemi, whilst the Corvette is a inspiration from Beach City Chevrolet in the 70s. He also sent in photos of re-imagined Vega Pro Stocks that could have graced European strips back in the 70s.

If you're based in Europe and have constructed models of drag cars from back in the day, we'd love to hear from you. And if you want to read about the history of drag racing modelling, an excellent book by Tim Boyd titled Collecting Drag Racing Model Kits can be ordered from all good bookshops.

Swift snippets.
19th April: Happy Birthday for today to Pro Modified crew, sometime driver, and Eurodragster.com sponsor Andrew Wright Jnr, Finnish Super Twin racer Matti Vahasaari, crew member for Huxley Motorsport Richard Bell, VW Sportsman racer Ian Dale and Outlaw Anglia racer Rob Turrington. We hope you all have a great day.

Photojournalist Steve Moxley's report on the senior ACU classes from the STP Springspeed Nationals can be seen at www.acu.org.uk. Included are many snippets of information from the bike pits.

Winners from Melbourne Northern Nationals.
18th April: Congratulations to the winners of eliminations at the weekend's Northern Nationals held at Melbourne Raceway:

Pro Comp Cannonball: Pete Youhill Pontiac Firebird 584ci 5.90/125 (final, unopposed) (pictured)
Pro ET: Mark Briggs (Toyota Supra 2 Ltr) (7.90) 8.24/99 def. Stephen Gilmour (Ford Anglia 100e) (7.90) 8.66/92
Sportsman ET: Pete Eborall (VW Golf Gti 1.8 Ltr) (9.35) 9.32/83 def. David Coombes (Lexus LS400 4 Ltr) (8.68) 8.63/86 breakout
NSCC (Saturday): Damian Halliwell (Chevy Biscayne) 8.23/94 def. Jamie Hughes (Ford Anglia 100e) 8.86/61
NSCC (Sunday): Damian Halliwell (Chevy Biscayne) 8.55/92 def. Nik Gunby (Ford Mustang) 9.00/92

Straightliners No Mercy Shootout: Round 3 contestants: Andy Higham, Terry Mountford, Peter Slater, Phil Gilson; Round 3 winner: David Storrie; Eliminations to be completed at Melbourne Raceway on Sunday morning 14th May 2023.
Scooters No Mercy Shootout: Ade Horrocks (Vespa Primavera 149cc) (8.10) 8.00/88 def. Paul Gurney (Lambretta GP 244cc) (9.54) 9.39/77 breakout
Juniors No Mercy Shootout: Amber-Leigh Caddick (Supermoto 125cc) (14.41) 14.75/45 def. Amy Wolstenholme (Gilera DNA special 70cc) (10.56) 10.54/59 breakout
6.00 index Bike class: Mark Taylor Hayabusa 1300cc 6.48/134, unopposed

Full results are at the Straightliners results repository.

We will publish a link to championship points in due course. The next round of the Straightliners championship will take place on 13th-14th May at Melbourne Raceway, you can get tickets at this link.

Yam Yam Racing Test Day photos.
18th April: The Yam Yam Racing Drag Club held its latest Monday private test day at Santa Pod Raceway today which was streamed by Facebook Group EuropeanFWD thanks to announcer Luke Stevenson. We counted an entry of 86, pretty stout for a weekday testing event.

A Facebook album of photos from today's session taken by Callum Pudge is at this link, Mad Welshman Photography posted a Facebook album at this link and Kieran has promised multiple videos of the event to be posted over the next few days on his Facebook and Youtube channels.

Organiser Scott Lewry said that subject to satisfactory entry numbers there will be another two test days this season on 12th June and 25th September. To apply for entry, join Yam Yam Racing Drag Club to get booked in or message organiser Scott Lewry.

We were unable to assemble full results for analysis, however noted some best times from the video. Ahmed Jamshaid ran his FWD Honda Civic to within 0.1s of his PB with a 8.708@174.38mph (PB on mph), in advance of his first race of 2023, Comp Eliminator at the Festival of Power. Also running was Marc Manning and his Super Pro ET 1934 3 Window Coupe which had run a series of four passes all at 9.3s at over 140mph in Sunday's run what ya brung. Mart Dainty's FWD Nova ran 9.86/149; Allan Duthie ran a 9.95/147 in his FWD Nova; Brad Morgan ran his first ten, a great 10.44@136mph in his FWD Renault 5. Organiser Scott Lewry ran 10.29/137 in his V6 turbo powered Corsa. Scott Collin also brought out his new build ex Paula Atkin Ford Anglia 100e for a checkout pass and ran 10.23/131.

Pictured: Stuart Smith's big block powered Chevy S10 truck. Photo: Callum Pudge.

Dakota drag and drift this Saturday.
18th April: This Saturday, Straightliners travels to the South West for the second 2023 Drag and Drift competition at Dakota Raceway which takes place on 22nd April. You can enter by going to this link on the straightliners.events website.

The event will be run under a run what ya brung format with RWYB entry £30 for 3 runs and £40 unlimited. Prizes will be awarded for the quickest Front Wheel Drive, Rear Wheel Drive and All Wheel Drive cars.

Drag entry costs £60 for each car, with £40 for a passenger. Racers are urged to read the rules on the website.

The event is from 09:30 - 16:00 and you can find Dakota Raceway at Upottery, Honiton EX14 9RF.

Kieran will be attending Dakota Raceway on Saturday and tells us that, amongst the racers entered, Steve Guirey will be testing his rapid Subaru in advance of him running it at the Doorslammers.

Swift snippets.
18th April: Happy Birthday for today to 1964 British International Drag Festival star and drag racing legend Tommy Ivo, German Pro Modified racer Norbert Kuno, Finnish Super Street Bike racer Vesa Ruhanen, Super Twin Top Gas racer Jack Shook, Sports Compact Honda racer Luke White and former Hulk Shogun racer Gary Springford. We hope you all have a great day.

Melbourne Raceway Northern Nationals day 2.
17th April:

Many thanks to former editor Tog for providing us with Sunday galleries of on-track and off-track pictures from day 2 of the Melbourne Raceway Northern Nationals, plus best times by going to our event coverage page at this link supported by John Woolfe Racing.

The results include the quickest pass of the weekend, and new track record by the steam powered rocket bike of Graham Sykes (pictured) who traversed the eighth mile track in 4.66 seconds at 132mph, the first run on the reopened track under five seconds. Many congratulations to Graham on a spectacular achievement.

The event was unfortunately affected by a couple of off-track medical emergencies which resulted in an early completion time, and also a quad bike rider who required transportation to the local hospital for precautionary checks. The quad bike rider was back at the track on Sunday to collect his belongings, a bit battered and bruised but largely unharmed by the incident and we wish him a speedy recovery.

You can also see photos from Melbourne raceway, taken by Gregg Havler, Spotted Motors and others, at the Melbourne Raceway Community Facebook page.

Swift snippets.
17th April: Happy Birthday for today to Nostalgia Super Stock racer Ash Rawson, World's quickest Lotus Elise racer Lee Connor and Super Street Bike racer Pete Field. We hope you all have a wonderful day.

There will be live streaming of the Yam Yam Test Day today at Santa Pod Raceway which you can see by clicking on the European FWD Youtube page. To ensure you get informed of future European FWD videos posted by SPR announcer Luke Stevenson, be sure to hit 'Subscribe'.

Melbourne Raceway Northern Nationals day 1.
16th April: Former editor Tog is situated at Melbourne Raceway for this weekend's Northern Nationals. You can see his galleries of on-track and off-track pictures from day 1 of the event, plus results by going to our event coverage page at this link supported by John Woolfe Racing.

Although the car racing classes could be better supported, and numbers were down due to some mechanical ailments (Mark Flavell had to return to base with front and rear main seals leaking), there was a full 16 bike field qualified for today's No Mercy Shootout with more qualifying today. The National Street Car Club also had nine cars in attendance and carried out their round 1 of racing. For a list of Saturday's best times (pdf format) go to this link.

Pictured: Graham Crook's 1938 Plymouth P5 Coupe, qualified for NSCC eliminations.

Quick times at Agrinio.
16th April: Agrinio Raceway in Greece recently hosted the Panhellenic Dragster Motorcycle Championship Round 1. Many Panhellenic records and personal bests were broken in the 3-day event from 31st March-2nd April.

Thanks to Agrinio Raceway for publishing the best times. In Super Street Bike, Ioannis Lampropoulos on a Suzuki GSXR 1000 ran 7.054 to win the event for Casper Racing and sponsor Mavrommatis; Yiannis Paschalis ran a 7.5 in Real Street, 7.3 for Ioannis Martzaklis for Pro Street2.

Other personal bests were 7.3s for Evangelos Karamatzakis and Spyros Tsiouris in Super Street Bike, both riding Hayabusas. 8.2 of Savvas Tulsizoglu with the Agapidis Race Team's Super Street Hayabusa, the 8.3 of Georgios Kardaras with Dragon's Yamaha TDM in Pro Street 2, and a 10.1 from Dimitris Vailakis with the 125cc C50 of Plemenos in Pro Z (small engined underbone bikes).

You can see the full entry list at this link; final results and championship points are yet to be posted.

The second round of the Panhellenic Drag Racing Championship takes place next weekend at Serres, organised by LENOE. More details can be seen at this link (Chrome browser required for translations).

Kieran's Springspeed videos.
16th April: Kieran was busy at the STP Springspeed Nationals, being a crew member on dad Kev Jenkin's Fraudster Competition Eliminator Escort Mk1, but also taking a series of trackside videos from a variety of classes, which he has posted to his Youtube channel.

Included are action from the Test Day, Street Eliminator, Europe's Fastest FWD Ford from Terry Newton and Fat Pig Racing, Top Fuel Bike, qualifying in Sportsman car classes and Super Street Bike. If you click on the link to view the videos, make sure you hit "Subscribe" and the notifications button to be advised of his future posts.

Pioneer Stories to focus on anniversaries.
15th April:

The British Drag Racing Historians hope you've all enjoyed Series 3 of the Pioneers stories. It will be no surprise to most of you that 19th September 2024 will be the 60th Anniversary of the first British International Drag Festival which was held over three weekends in 1964. The Festival, which featured an assortment of American machines, helped to establish Drag Racing in Britain. It comprised six one-day events starting Saturday 19th September 1964 at Blackbushe Airport in Camberley, Surrey. The Festival then visited four RAF airfields at Chelveston on Sunday 20th, Woodvale Saturday 26th, Church Fenton Sunday 27th, Kemble Saturday October 3rd, finishing back at Blackbushe on Sunday October 4th 1964.

As 2024 will be the 60th Anniversary of the first British International Dragfest, the BDRH's Pioneer Stories Series 4, to be published in Jan, Feb, March will include stories from those who took part in the 1964 Drag Festival, whether as racers or organisers of the events. We very much hope to have a few recollections from some of the American teams who attended as well. Also, we'll be producing a number of special features on the dates which fall on the 60th Anniversary of those events which led up to these key moments in the History of British Drag Racing.

Before these anniversaries though, in July 2023 we will celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the events known as 'The 1973 Petersen Publishing Internationals Series' which Custom Car called at the time 'The Heavy Sound of Summer', before the 60th Anniversary of events leading up to the first visit by American Dragsters to the UK in September 1963.

You can read more about the British Drag Racing Historians by clicking on this link (pdf format).

Swift snippets.
Super Comp and Wild Bunch racer Andy Clifford would like to wish a very happy birthday to "multiple WB/SC nostalgia slingshot driver and top team owner", his dad Terry Clifford. Andy added "I'd like to wish my mum Ruth well. She has been suffering some health problems recently, hence our withdrawal from Springspeed Nationals last weekend. We all love you mum!" We at Eurodragster.com add our birthday wishes to Terry, and get well soon, Ruth.

Happy Birthday for today to Wild Bunch racer and blogger Russ Heaven, Nostalgia Super Stock racer Glynn Boardman, and former Wheelgame Racing crew chief Adrian Spencer. We hope you all have a great day.

Thanks to records compiler Andy Marrs for confirming to us that no new records were set at last weekend's STP Springspeed Nationals at Santa Pod Raceway. Marrs points out "Dániel Donát Lencsés missed out by just 0.12mph in backing up the 226.76, his backup needing to be 224.49 but the closest he got was 224.37".

SPRC points posted.
14th April: Thanks to SPRC Championship Co-ordinator Yvonne Tramm and SPRC webmaster Peter Walters for publishing the the current SPRC championship points to the SPRC website.

You can also see the points from our Points Standings page which can be accessed via our main menu by clicking on News, then Points Standings.

Melbourne Raceway Northern Nationals preview.
14th April:

This weekend, the Melbourne Raceway Northern Nationals features Graham Sykes with his steam-powered rocket bike, attempting to break the four second barrier at the track for the first time since it reopened in 2020. Also racing will be British Drag Racing Hall of Fame member Mark Flavell who will be debuting his Steel River Hot Rod III alky-fuelled Nostalgia Funny Car.

The main competition will be the new affordable bracket racing which is in four categories, Sportsman ET (1/8 mile times of 7.9s and slower), Pro ET (1/8 mile times of 6.90-7.89), Pro Xtreme (1/8 mile times of 5.90-6.89), all with a Sportsman tree, plus Pro Comp run on a heads up basis for vehicles 5.89 and quicker on a Pro tree. Bike racing will include the No Mercy bracket in three categories, bikes, Junior Drag Bikes, and scooters, plus the 6.0 index class, Race Legends (for riders of 70 years and older), Nostalgic Pro Stock, Old School classes (USB Modified, Stock and 2 Stroke), and NSA sprint competition.

It's still not too late to enter, as on-line entry will be accepted without a deadline. Entry for the whole weekend for license holders is £80 for one day and £120 for both days, camping included (£30 and £45 for Juniors); an additional charge of £15 for one day and £30 for each additional class competed in. Spectator admission is £15 for one day and £30 for the weekend including two nights' camping. You can enter or buy tickets by going to this link on the Straightliners website. Spectators may pay at the gate by cash.

The Northern Nationals is round 2 of the Straightliners Championship which kicked off at Santa Pod Raceway on 2nd April.

Melbourne Raceway is making a gargantuan effort to raise funds, which have been added to by Eurodragster.com. Fundraising to extend the braking area has been completed with £45,000 raised, but now Straightliners are raising funds to tarmac the the pits. The aim is to raise £60,000 to complete the next phase, in £5,000 lots. The first patch was raised on 23rd September 2022 and the 2nd patch raised the end of February 2023.

Trevor Duckworth said "Thank you everyone for raising the target for the extra braking area. It was greatly appreciated by the competitors the weekend straight after it was laid. The next targetis for getting the paddock areas sorted out for all vehicles". You may add to the total raised for Melbourne Raceway by clicking here.

Former Eurodragster.com editor Tog will be dusting down his cameras for trackside photography at this weekend's event which you will be able to se via our coverage page supported by John Woolfe Racing.

Craig has positive start.
14th April: JKE Race Works 8.50 Bike racer Craig Wright reports that his season got off to a positive start despite a lack of testing:

We headed to Round 1 with no testing what so ever, but with the many qualifying sessions scheduled, we planned on using the early rounds to get the Bike sorted and get the winters changes dialled in.

As we were blind on what to do or how the bike would react, Jake Mechaell gave us a tune up to use from last year which went 8.68 at 154mph last summer.

Q1 we had a slight shifter issue which wouldn't get the bike out of gear but the 60ft increments looked very promising. Q2 we had resolved the previous issue and went down unchanged. The run was so nice, but we did not expect an 8.31 at 164mph! Considering that was a soft tune from last season! Very Very Happy.

Q3 and we made a little adjustment just to see what it would do and with the ever improving track and conditions it went 8.34 at 161mph. Still happy with the way the bike was reacting we really went for it and took a good chunk out of it which in Q4 awarded us with a 8.43, now we were getting somewhere.

Q5 came and we took out a little more and I was expecting around a high 8.4* but at the last minute we could see the air had gone and the track was super sticky so I was thinking, maybe this won't be too far off actually....8.509 at 157, Yes! To say we were happy is an understatement. What a bike we have now! We ended qualifying in 2nd place which we were over the moon with.

Into Sunday's Eliminations where we faced Patrick Rawnsley on his Super quick Nitrous Kawasaki ZX12r. We knew he'd have alot of MPH on us at the top end so we hatched a plan and stuck with it. We got the win light, with an 8.61, also giving us a Bye in the quarters. On the bye we left the same set up in as round 1 and went 8.63, so we were consistent, and the bike was running well.

Semi Finals we faced last years Chump Dan De'ath who was evidently struggling, so we put a touch more in the bike from the previous 2 rounds hoping we wouldn't be too far off. Long story short, I messed up in Stage throwing him the win light on a plate. Gutted but I won't be making that mess up again.

After last year's struggles, we are absolutely over the moon with the results and the positives massively out weigh the negatives from last week.

We'll take that. Huge thanks must go to my boss at work Jonathan Prout who helped me massively throughout winter, adapting and modifying my wastegate and the way it was set up. Jonny was the crew man behind Kiel Priestman in the record breaking FWD Civic from a few seasons back, his help and knowledge has been mega.

Thanks to our Sponsors, without them this wouldn't be possible:

Also our Class sponsors JKE Race Works and SPS.

Huge thanks to my team. My better half Kat for sticking by me this winter and keeping me going and also been mum at home with Harrison whilst I was spending endless hours in the unit. Also thanks to Andy Head who has come onboard with us this year helping us with everything. My team is awesome.

Thanks to Ian Chrichlow for this chance once again. Also cheers to Jake Mechaell for all his help, advice and knowledge, it's endless.

Finally, thanks for all the positive comments about our new 2023 look. See you in a few weeks for Round 2.

Dial In Day review.
14th April: Santa Pod Raceway's 2023 Dial In Day took place on 19th March 2023. Dial In Day, organised by Santa Pod and overseen by members of the SPRC and a few racers. includes both cars and bikes and is known as the place where many Sportsman ET racers and ET Bike racers learn the ropes before taking part in competition.

Racers attending included Super Gas racer Andy Dibley (Sportsman ET class sponsor) and Sportsman ET racer and Eurodragster.com staff member Kirstie (winner herself in 2016). The class tutorial and startline talk were taken by SPRC secretary Ian Marshall.

Andy wrote "Fantastic day with the Dial-in Day class of 2023! Congratulations to Karl Hollings on winning the event and Andrew Clark coming runner up! Such a tight battle that came down to Karl winning in the Finals against Ruby Huxley.

"Notable mention to Jago Stokes on winning the first round of eliminations for the day. The class just got a whole load of very talented newcomers!"

You can see full results of the Dial In Day at this link. That the Dial In Day is successful at introducing new racers to the sport was proved at the STP Springspeed Nationals last weekend when ET Bike racer John McGill got through to round #4 of ET Bike, and Jago Stokes was able to advance to round #3 of Sportsman ET.

Some family members and crew also take part in the Dial In Day to experience the sport first hand. This year, Lee Huxley's wife Susan, daughter Ruby Huxley, and son Jackson all experienced competitive drag racing for the first time, and Ruby being runner up in the final of elimination no.2.

Swift snippets.
14th April: Happy Birthday for today to Super Street Bike tuning guru Brad O'Connor, Wild Bunch racer Dan Sharp and Nostalgia Super Stock racer, also committee member Chris Goodale. We hope you all have a great day.

The entry list for Doorslammers at SPR is starting to fill up, and one regular contributor has entered with his Pro Mod, stating he is The First of the Fast...If that doesn't tell you who it is, this VeeDubRacing Youtube video will.

Eric Frank.
13th April: We were shocked and saddened to hear of the death of Eric Frank, team member of The Beast dragbike team and former Super Twin Bike racer. Team principal Per Bengtsson wrote:

Racing is life and life is sometimes hard.

Today I must inform you all that our very good friend and long-time team member Eric chose to go his own way. He ended his life two weeks ago and it’s still very hard to accept. For Eric, it was a logical decision, but we have so much more racing to be done...

Eric had his own team in SuperTwin for several years. After he decided to stop racing, I asked if he wanted to join our team, with his mechanical skill and his great sense of order, he immediately fitted in and made the team even better.

Eric has always been extremely dedicated to the team, often worked in the workshop and he was a solid rock at every race, doing the clutch and the bottom end together with Mats. They didn't need to say anything until the bike was ready. Always focused on the next run.

We have experienced so many great adventures together, the Championship win 2011, Mancup races in 2012, 2013, 2017 and the win in 2019. Our thoughts to his two grown sons, his father Göran and brother Ludde, all very dedicated racing fans. Most of all to Nina, his lovely wife and his two bonus daughters.

From Per&Christina, Mats, Putte, Set and L-O.

Photo of Eric at 2008 Gardermoen Spring Nationals: credit Patrik Jacobsson.

M&M Racing's Springspeed Nationals.
13th April: Many thanks to M&M Racing crew Dave Turner for sending in an account of the team's Springspeed Nationals with driver and brother Mark Turner at the helm:

After a very busy winter changing the Supra’s drive train to the new 10:71 blown injected methanol combination (damn, N₂O is expensive), with an eye on the new 7.60 heads-up class, we booked into the test day for the Festival of Power which turned into the Springspeed Nationals.

Mark and Michelle took the car down and set up the pit with help from Ade Cookson and the 2 Kierans, everyone else arrived on Thursday morning nice and early ready to run the car for the first time since testing it in the garage at HQ. John Wright and Rob Karloff were on hand to oversee the tuning of the new combination, so we knew we were in good hands.

Thursday’s testing window was shortened by the weather, and when we warmed up the car, we were getting some popping and missing when the throttle was hit, following discussions with Alan Grimes, we changed the pill in the barrel valve and set off to the pairing lanes for a run, however we had to shut off following two burnout attempts which showed we weren’t getting 2nd gear this was traced to the shift lever setup.

On Friday's warmup, we noticed that we were getting some oil on the bottom of the engine. We stripped down the front of the motor and found two holes in the timing gear cover where the timing pointer would normally mount! A couple of bolts later and some rebuilding, and we were ready to go. The car started first time and Mark pulled round, a bit of a wayward burnout later and we were ready to go, Mark launched the car and kept his foot planted to the planned half track on the check out pass. Short numbers looked good, 1.05 to 60ft and 4.99 @ 108mph at the 1/8th. When we picked Mark up, he was smiling ear to ear and said the car had felt great.

Saturday morning, we were ready to go, warmed the car up but when we hit the throttle it was popping and missing again so we took the decision to sit out first qualifier and try and find what was going on, it was found that we had a few dodgy HT leads, over to cable guy Rob who checked all the leads and remade any he found an issue with. This done, we were ready to go, again car started first time (Ade and Mark getting a handle of starting the methanol blown motor) and Mark pulled round for his burnout, another drifting burnout, we backed up the car making sure it was straight and all was good.

Mark staged the car it sounded so crisp, ready for the first full pass. The light went green and Mark was gone 1.07 to 60ft then a puff of smoke, ET at the 1/8th 4.84 @ 148 and 7.61 @ 173 at the stripe however when we picked up Mark and the car we were greeted by Mark and the safety crew who were keeping an eye on the still smoking car. The tow back to the pits was with a certain amount of apprehension, once in the pit we removed the front end to find that there was a sizable hole in No2 cylinder. We stripped down the motor and it was found that the head gasket had failed causing oil to get into the chamber leaning it out and causing it to flame out.

So, after a weekend of highs and lows, we packed the car up on Sunday and headed home to lick our wounds and figure out a way forward to come back out with a car capable of making laps at 7.60, not the 7.2’s we were looking at from the short numbers of the first half pass.

Thanks to all our sponsors, AD Coach Systems, Ellisons Travel and Motor Max Ltd.

KJT Racing's Springspeed Nationals.
13th April:

Thanks again to Dave Turner for sending in a write up of nephew and Super Gas racer Kieran Turner, who licensed one year ago and has started racing in Super Gas at the Springspeed Nationals:

After an up and down first season running in Pro ET, due to problems with the transmission, which culminated in a trashed box and rebuild at the National Finals last year, the truck's box was shipped off to Hauser Racing for another rebuild and a few upgrades. This was picked up and refitted to the truck the weekend before the Springspeed Nationals. The motor was checked, valve lash checked and the leaking rear end were sorted. After some discussions about what to do this season, and knowing that 9.9’s were possible, the little truck was entered into Super Gas - the lure of a pro tree and heads up racing...

Kieran loaded the truck and followed his Dad down to Santa Pod on Wednesday, ready for Thursday's test day but, unfortunately, the weather had other ideas and all of the morning session was lost to rain. But once the clouds cleared and the track dried, he headed down to the start line with support from Rob Karloff and Shelly Mountain. Kieran burned out and went to stage the car, but again found that the transbrake wasn’t playing ball, this threw Kieran off a bit and he launched before the tree had activated, and then at the top end there was a little smoke, we checked the engine and found that the breathers weren’t breathing, a few holes in the top of the catch cans sorted this issue.

Qualifying for Super Gas seemsed to be a bit of a up and down affair, the first pass was an oh-so-close 9.898, just 0.002 off a Perfect ET, the next was a 9.893, OK, so we needed to figure out a way to slow the truck down. On the last pass of the day, the truck didn’t shift into high gear, so we had a look and found that the shift cable wasn’t pushing the shift arm on the trans correctly, this was traced on Saturday morning to a loose Bowden cable. So, trans fixed, off we went again trying a different pressure in the rear tyres to slow the truck down - which netted a 9.87, again the wrong side! Final qualifying run we fitted a different shift point chip surely that’ll sort it - wrong, another new PB, 9.83 @ 136mph.

We had qualified 13 out of 13 this meant that we would be lining up against none other than last years Super Gas champ Andy Dibley, with no transbrake and the most basic setup of anyone in the class ie no throttle stop we headed down with a plan to lift just before the finish and see what that gave us well Kieran managed to cut a .196 light to Andy’s .106 Kieran lifted just a little too late running a 9.85 @ 134mph Andy taking the win with 9.93. So out in round one but we had a great weekend seeing the truck run better than it had all last year the plan is now to enter a few more event in Super Gas but not until we get to the bottom of the transbrake issues to at least give Kieran a chance on the start. As a side not the truck is currently for sale but until it sells Kieran plans to run it at Santa Pod.

Kieran would also like to say thanks to his Dad and Michelle for all the support in getting him to the track and everyone who helped over the weekend Rob Karloff, Shelly Montain, Ade Cookson, Kieran Barrett and Dave Turner (me).

For pics and video of the truck check out KJT’s Instagram.

Swift snippets.
13th April: Happy Birthday for today to former Top Methanol Funny Car racer Leif Andreasson, former Pro Stock Bike racer Gabriella Nikolovska, multi tasker extraordinaire Herb Andrews, Outlaw Anglia crew and gearbox guru Dave Eady, Outlaw Anglia racer Stephen Brindle and Top Fuel crew member Luke Shakeshaft. We hope you all have a fantastic day.

Photojournalist Remco Scheelings has posted his report on the STP Springspeed Nationals at the Dutch website autosport.nl which can be seen in English with the aid of Google Chrome's translation tools. Remco focuses on Dutch racers and also much else that caught his observent eye.

More photos from the Springspeed Nationals can be seen at the following Facebook links:

Springspeed Nationals racer comments - bike classes.
12th April: In Banks Night Club Top Fuel Bike, Neil Midgley won the race on the Cannon Engineering Lucas Oil Puma machine. Neil ran in the 6s region and was able to stay ahead of the opposition without a full pull. Team manager Chris Hannam wrote: "Just home from a great weekend at Santa Pod Raceway and we won the event, the new Inconel exhaust dropped the ETs, the motor ran flawlessly and the track got better with every run and we’re certainly looking to make some great steps forward, however that’s the good bit.

"Really, we just chased our tails while we are not unhappy, we are not over happy either. I am not a believer in luck and this weekend we were off our A game, but won, and some days you have to win messy but we did and it’s a result. I guess to put it bluntly, we all had a bad weekend and we just had a less bad weekend but, our good friend Steve Woollatt ran a fine 6.08 at a PB speed of 232, so well done Steve.

"So on to the rescheduled Festival of Power at the May Bank Holiday weekend, where we hope to improve our performance, also many thanks for all the support the team gets worldwide and hopefully we can give you all something to smile about at the next event.

"In conclusion the bike ran great , the Lucas oil did it’s job and the motor is all good so thanks to Lucas Oil Products UK for the continued support. The team are also proud to be supported in their world class performances by their blue-chip partners: APE, Cometic GAskets, Gates, Goodridge, JE Pistons, Kibblewhite Precision Machining, Lucas Oil Products, MRE, MTC Engineering, NGK Sparkplugs UK, Par Willen, Pro Alloy Motorsport, Vanson Leathers, Warpspeed Racing, Worldwide Bearings and Zodiac."

Chris adds that the team's previous Top Fuel Twin bike which is still competitive is for sale at a reduced price of £'45,000. You can see full details in our Jeff Bull Performance Engines supported Swap Meet.

For a detailed report on Al Smith's weekend we refer readers to the excellent PBR Top Fuel Bike blog courtesy owner and engineer Phil Baimbridge.

In Leeks Landscapes Funny Bike, the characteristic war of attrition took place, everyone came loaded for bear but unexpected problems occured which left a familiar face in the winner's circle. The class had five bikes present but only four qualified for eliminations. Top qualifier was Lorcan Parnell on the Storm at 6.94/199, who subsequently found breakage in an exhaust manifold pipe in the compound turbo setup, Jake Mechaell from JKE Race Works TIG welded the part together and the bike was reassembled. On race day Roger Moore defeated Lorcan who had another low boost launch and a gearshift problem on the run. Roger, who had a new engine constructed over the winter, ran some PBs, the best a 7.3766/183.49, but suffered a cracked crankcase and oil leak before the final.

There were two Dutch bikes, Mike Olie had self-built his new bike in 2019-20 basing it on a ZX14 EFI methanol engine. His new PB was a 7.04, which was not quite enough to qualify him for entering the FIM-E Main Event. In the first round Mike's bike refused to start against eventual winner Dave Peters. The other Dutch bike rider Maarten Zijlstra had bought the ex Dave Dunlop/Dave Buttery Fastbyme bike but had problems, not being able to make a full pass. Dave Peters once again had the reliability and performance to run a best of 7.3640/171.09 in qualifying and an easy pass in the final which Roger Moore couldn't make.

Taylors Trophy Super Street Bike saw some otherworldly performances. Steve Venables qualified #1 with a near-record and new PB 6.6617/225.90, Alan Morrison Jnr was second with 6.7676/223.30 which was also a new PB. Meanwhile Dániel Lencsés had managed to get a good time of 6.8124/224.37, saying "This weekend was all about testing, as the engine was completely rebuilt over the winter and seems to be working really well so far!"

Bike builder extraordinaire Jake Mechaell was next with a solid 6.8351/216.85. Ross Morrison was next with his first six, 6.9881/212.89 and Alan Morrison Snr had a new PB on his new ex-Steve Howe machine of 7.6823/185.13 as he was adjusting to the class. Only Margot Schmidt struggled for performance, stating "bike went down the track with a few hiccups" in the final session, improving to 8.2911/153.74 in a round one loss to Alan Morrison Jnr.

The semi finals had the quickest four, Steve over Jake and Alan Jnr over Daniel in two classic races, Alan Jnr getting a holeshot win on Daniel, and in the final running a single when Ven was a no-show with scoring to the crank and bearings discovered the tear-down. Alan Jnr said:

"Just arrived home from one of the best weekends away at the track with family and friends. After a long winter away from the track, hours of discussion,travelling and development with Rick we couldn’t be more happy with the results from the 1st meeting of the year! With the weather on our side and a decent track from the crew at Pod, we came away with the win and PB after PB.

"Just wanna say a massive thank you to my guy Rick Stubbins who is a absolute legend and I couldn’t of done it without him, a huge part of our Team! 💙 my wife Shannon Morrison who keeps everyone and everything running so smoothly. It was so nice to see everyone, now just another 2/3 weeks time and off we go again for round 2. I wanna say a massive congratulations to my big bro Ross Morrison who's now in the 6s and I couldn’t be more proud and happy for him after 2 years of blood, sweat and tears and a sh*t load of money. Also pumped for my old man Alan Morrison coming into Super Street and running mid 7s in his 1st event. I will finish with a massive thanks to Leo Lester, Jonathan Hines, Stuart Hines, Martin Hallett, and Bradley O'Connor for their contribution to this weekend.

Suzukiperformancespares.co.uk Competition Bike was a great class, 16 bikes qualified and there were several new to the class. In qualifying, Mark Dainty was #1 on his new Hayabusa, however he was to have an off in eliminations (see separate story above). Sean Mills ran his first 200mph to go second, Graham Dance was third but suffered a broken crank in qualifying and was unable to make the first round of eliminations. Danny Cockerill ran in the class for the first time and was fourth, Paul Hambidge ran his first 200mph, Dutch racer Sigmaro Profas returned after five years off and promptly ran a new PB.

2022 Champion Chris Neary (Hobo Racing) was "fighting a shagged shock" as wife Mandi eloquently put it, John McLean ran a PB of 7.6398, Andrew Christophi (ex 8.50 Bike) had upgraded his bike with a longer swingarm, uprated suspension and engine but suffered a split plenum following a PB of 7.8687. Mick Winyard was running a spare engine, Garry Bowe was struggling with setup, Jasmine Cordelle debuted an ex Mark Smith Pro Stock bike and ran a great 8.2889 in her first event with it, Len Paget played musical motorcycles swapping from a SSB style machine to a PSB after Q1, Anna Sasiak ran a best of 8.6588/160.75, and Aswin Le Noble's bike broke its crank in Q1 and ran a spare subsequently.

In eliminations, Paul Hambidge was the winner with his ninth ACU victory overall and fourth in Comp Bike, well done to Paul for winning some tight races. He defeated Jasmine Cordelle in a close race in round one, Danny Cockerill in another great race in round 2, ran a 7.3259/191.40 against the unfortunate Mark Dainty in the semi final and then saved the best till last with a best of 7.3121/197.26 against Chris Neary in the final. Great to see the class rejuvenated and so competitive.

JKE Race Works 8.50 Bike was won by Dan De'ath who was 2022 Champion, congratulations to him. He told Eurodragster.com: "After some pretty major weight loss over the winter (the bike - Editor) qualifying was proving troublesome and I was close but just couldn’t manage to tame the bike down just enough to hit the 8.50 number or was way off on the good side of the number anyway.

"Race day proved to be a little better though; having raced Ian Chrichlow in round 1, this was a re match of the next race at the National Finals 22 which we didn’t get to run due to curfews, so I was excited for this one and it proved to be very close indeed. The final round against Martin Hallett was an Awsome race and I knew I had to be on my game there, a 0.02 light in a final round was my attack, and chased him down forcing a breakout. To take the win was awesome! Martin had a killer setup all weekend so hats off to him.

"I had a gearbox issue coming into the final round, but with some computer tweaks managed to put a plaster over a broken arm for now. My team name is the Sidechick Busa, a massive thanks to all of my crew, team, friends and family, Brad O'Connor @btc moto and a huge Thankyou to Caitlin Wilson for putting up with me ploughing in the hours in the workshop for the past who-knows-how-many weekends in prep for the start of the season!"

Thanks to Debbie Sawatzki for sending in a review of Atlantic Fluid Tech 9.50 Bike and congratulations to husband Rick for his 31st win in the class after winning the class championship for the 10th time in 2022:

"9.50 maybe a small class but it’s a tight bunch, and it will be difficult to call who could win each round as they are all that good. We have a new racer Zoe Hallett who reached the finals at her first meeting, so definitely one to watch, unfortunately Dave Hall had a small accident with his bike on the start line, all is okay but it meant he could not race on race day. It was overall a great meeting as the weather conditions were so good."

Well done to Blade King, winning Blood Cancer UK ET Bike with a new bike and with a bit of luck after had a problem which rendered the bike immobile at the 330ft mark in round 3 when opponent and fellow JDB graduate Liam Holgate red-lit. Blade wrote:

"We only went and did it after having all the bolts come out of the sprocket carrier in the quarters, we ran the bike back to the pits and with help from a fantastic group of people got it turned around in time to go and break the beams in the semis, and then only went and took the win in the finals, 9.12 on a 9.10 dial in. Huge thankyou to everyone for the help and advice this weekend, couldn’t have done it without my Dad Ollie, as always, doing the most to help and cannot forgot to mention Craig Rukus for making the bike look so gorgeous.

Blade's new bike has a Frank Bros Racing chassis from the US, a Hayabusa engine, a standard Hayabusa lockup clutch, Megasquit ECU, Snitz Box ignition system and ran a best of 9.02/149. For more on ET Bike, see our separate story contributed by Suze Morris.

Eurodragster.com Junior Drag Bike was won by Leah Morrison who qualified #1 with an incredible +0.0084 on dial and then the quickest RTs in rounds 1, 2 and the semi final before a close race had final round opponent Lyra Humber break out. Dad Alan Morrison Jnr wrote: "Massively proud of my two kiddies Leah Morrison and Brad for their performances and achievements from this weekend. A huge well done to all junior racers, the class has grown and the ETs are all so close.

Many thanks to photojournalist Steve Moxley for additional information.

Dainty recovering and planning return.
12th April: We were relieved to learn that Comp Bike racer Mark Dainty is ok after a high speed departure from his new methanol-fuelled machine in the semi final of the Springspeed Nationals. Mark's bike drifted towards the centre line against Paul Hambidge and then pitched him off, both separately going through the finish line at high velocity. Mark told us:

"I am ok, I have torn a hamstring and a bit battered and bruised but nothing broken.

"After a great weekend of pb,s at all sections of the track and a 7.09 and a 7.07 in our first two elimination rounds. We went into the semis and started off well with a 1.20 60ft but lost traction and sent me quite suddenly into the centre of the track, trying to compensate and get straight again our side mount turbo touched the floor and unloaded the front wheel. After coming to a bit of a bumpy stop the medics were there in an instant and precautionary stretchered me into the ambulance and medical centre for a full check over. The whole incident was handled very professionally by all concerned….. the marshals, medics and all staff involved.

"I would like to thank them all very much. Especially those who took care of my partner Hazel who had witnessed the incident.

"The bike is repairable once I am up and about and hope to not miss too many rounds. I would like to thank Phil Cordelle and family who was kind enough to drive our truck home and all our friends who were there to assist, Andy Haley, Dave Bowe, but most of all my apologies to Hazel for the fright."

Mark's bike was built by Jake Mechaell at JKE Race Works, with fabrication by Martin Kerr at Tubeworks Custom Fabrication, help also coming from Richard Kingdon at RKPerformance Parts, Cleston Turner at Turner Technologies, Mark Eavers at Burlow Engineering and Harold Finklemyer at ECS tuning.

We wish Mark all the best for a speedy recovery and return to the track with his great new bike repaired.

The search for consistency.
12th April: Many thanks to ET Bike crew member Suze Morris for sending in an account of partner Phil Pratt's Springspeed Nationals:

With the ET Bike class growing and the racing becoming evermore tighter, 5 Time Narional Champion Phil Pratt decided it was the time to give "Satan's Lady" a bit of an upgrade - not to go quicker or faster, but to provide some much needed consistency. So, at the end of February the bike was loaded for her short journey to JKE Raceworks, returning home a few days later sporting a shiny new MTC Gen2 clutch.

In all of his 24 years racing, maintenance at the track has not been necessary - just run, park, cool down, run again, but now Phil has to get used to measuring stack heights and changing steels or fibers where needed. Following excellent tutelage from Jake Mechaell, it (thankfully) isn't as complicated as we imagined, and we think we've gotten our heads around it really quickly.

Easter weekend was the first proper opportunity to try it out, and we went into it thinking we'd struggle to hit a barn door, let alone a number, so when we hit the track on Friday it was definitely a "lucky dip dial-in". We were aiming for consistency and with 3 runs of 9.063 @ 148mph, 9.064 @ 148mph and 9.061 @ 153mph, we think we found it...all of our 6 Qualifying runs over the 2 days were within 600th of a second of each other!

The biggest change for Phil is now "pinging" the clutch lever on the line, rather than feeding it, and the feel of how differently the bike now reacts. Unfortunately on race day, a -0.06 "premature pingage" in round one lit the red and ended our weekend.

Although our race day itself was short, we couldn't have been happier with how the weekend went, we learned a lot and we're really looking forward to the rest of the season... its going to be fun!

Where normally it's just the two of us in the pits, we must say a big thank you to David Hiley who signed on as "Dial-In Dolly" freeing up Suze to film the runs enabling us to learn more. Also to Phil's childhood friend Andy Bissett who joined us from his home in California to mark 30 years since the Easter when Phil took him to Santa Pod for his first ever drag race. Andy certainly got the bug, going on to work for some great UK teams, including Dave Wilson, before moving Stateside where he eventually landed the role as Clutch Guy for Ashley Force, both on her Alcohol Dragster and then her Nitro Funny Car. Finally, cheers Jake... you're a star!

So all in all, a great weekend for "Team Satan's Lady"... and a solid baseline for the season ahead - a season which will, as always, see us saluting the 92nd Bombardment Group USAAF, especially this year, the 80th Anniversary of their arriving at Station 109, now of course Santa Pod Raceway. Please pop by our pits and help keep the memories of those brave boys alive.

See you in a couple of weeks!

Springspeed Nationals racer comments - car classes.
11th April: We present below racer comments on the STP Springspeed Nationals for car classes, together with photos (all by Julian except where captioned).

Williams Bros Racing co-chief Nic Williams won Track Worx Comp Eliminator. The team posted this report on the class:

It’s so good to see so many of our customers racing at this event and of course the first outing of the year for our team cars this year, Steve Lloyd, Spencer Tramm, Dan Williams and Nic Williams in Comp Eliminator, also Jason Pickett in Pro ET with his 55 Chevy Gasser.

Test day on Thursday was a frustrating day for everyone as the weather only gave us a few hours late in the day and with a few jobs still to do it wouldn’t be until Friday that the cars took to the track.

Friday: With 4 of the team cars entered for Comp Eliminator it was going to be extremely busy for the team. Great debut for Dan Williams with his new ‘70 Camaro going straight under his index of 11.20 with an 11.05 on the cars first ever pass and straight into number 1. Spencer Tramm in his ‘69 Camaro into no.3 and Steve Lloyd no.5. No Nic in the first round as he was still setting up his ‘69 Camaro. Q2 and a huge wheelstand followed by a new PB from Nic Williams, his 9.55 took him straight to No.1 and .844 under index. Spencer up to no.2 pushing Dan down to No.3. Drama in Q3 as Dan launch, went left and slowed and idled to the finish line, on inspection in the pits the transmission had failed so Dan was done for the weekend but what a fantastic car and a combination that the team will only improve on over the season.

Saturday: No changes in positions but Nic was in no mood to miss the opportunity of very favourable conditions and ran yet another PB of 9.506 to extend his lead. He wasn’t done however as the last session of the day allowed him to push the car even harder resulting in an incredible 9.477, oh so close to the outright NHRA class record of 9.46.

Sunday, race day: Unfortunately Nic and Steve raced each other in round 1 with Nic taking the win. Spencer also through so 2 cars into the semi finals. Being number 1 & 2 qualifiers they were on opposite sides of the ladder so couldn’t meet until the final round which they duly did, Nic winning against Kev Jenkins and Spencer doing the same against the fantastic front wheel drive escort van of Terry Newton. The final, 2 WBR team mates, 2 ‘69 Camaros and fair to say Spencer tried everything to win but a 0.00 red light ended his day, so Nic takes the event win and the points lead in the all important championship and what a great way to start the season with VP Racing Fuels International on board.

A great event, great weather, great racing and a great team result.

We should also note the performances of Dave Swift whose AMX is now in A/Nitrous Altered; after a couple of test passes, he switched both stages of the nitrous on and recorded a great 7.2390/190.45. Also, Kev Jenkins had installed a new fuel system with Fueltech ECU and, without dyno time before the event, had to make a number of test passes to dial it in; with a best of 8.7659/157.91 in round 1 on low boost, there is huge potential. Kieran said "We’ve learnt a lot this weekend and looking forward to seeing how much we can progress at the next event at the end of the month."

Terry Newton had a 9.1404/155.19, a new best for a European FWD Ford, with remapping done by Enhanced Turbos; equally impressive was that Terry made five other runs in the 9.1-9.2 area, incredible consistency for a FWD car. Terry attracted more social media interest than any other racer, and you can see three Youtube videos from Luke Stevenson of European FWD documenting in detail the naughty Escort Van's weekend.

Congratulations to Tom Atkinson for winning Peter Nee Super Pro ET in a field of 21 diverse race cars. He posted:

"We only went and did a thing, WIN! What an absotlutely awesome weekend, huge PB’s in ET and speed - 8.30 and 163.6mph, plus our first ever 1.1X 60ft’s! Finished up qualifying 6th, after a little bit of spannering yesterday morning we managed to make it all the way to the finals today to have a super close race with Alan Didwell, great fun!

"Kirstie did a fantastic job qualifying 2nd in Sportsman then making it to the Semi Finals, and well done Andy for runner up in Super Gas! Two weekends off then we get to do it all again, can’t wait."

Cudos to some other racers, Lee Huxley for going #1 with a Perfect ET on this seasoned racer's debut in the class, Mark Turner with a 7.6130/173.00 from his newly supercharged combination on his Toyota Supra, Kieran Astley for repeatedly breaking his PBs in his 361ci LS Turbo dragster, ending with a 7.9540/177.06, a second quicker than his best in 2022, Allan Schofield with a new 8.0536/163.06 PB for him in his repainted Scud altered, Andy Thetford with several 8s and a best of 8.2625/173.64 in The Black Pearl turbo Camaro, Stevie Saunders for getting a full pass in with his new altered 8.4695/157.93 before a broken front spindle gave him an early bath, fortunately without any further damage, and Mark Coulsell with a great new paint job on his 8s slingshot dragster.

FastR Super Comp was won by Richard Tunstall in the RCCS 27T Brogie Roadster. In a six car qualified field he benefitted from Leah Kellett's mechanical woes (a water leak, and one cylinder leakdown by 35%), had a bye in the semi final and was the beneficiary of a Paul Hudson red light in the final. Richard wrote:

"Kevin Cerasale my late step dad built the car and loved Jammie Dodgers, at each event we won last year we celebrated with Jeff and Belinda Bull with toasting a Jammie Dodger, but winning a couple of events in our first season was seen as Jammie and we have been extremely lucky. On race day the car started to play up and we had so much luck to win the race Team Jammie Dodgers, Kev, we had you on our side on race day as you always said I’d rather be lucky than good and we got very lucky. I’d like to thank Rebecca, Jazmine, Max, Jedd and lady Guy (Jemma - Editor) and our sponsors Form and Biscuit AV for all their support this weekend, we had a blast. On to the next race in 3 weeks."

Tony Morris Carburetors Super Gas was won by Stuart Morrice, returning after an incredible 10 years out of the seat (where did that time go?). He wrote:

"What a weekend! From celebrating my daughters 2nd birthday at the track with all our friends and family to qualifying 1st in Super Gas and going on to take the event win. Unfortunately we didn’t get to carry on in Super Pro as we had damage to the sump. Fortunately we managed to get it repaired in time for the 2nd round of Super Gas.

"I would just like to say a big thank you to everyone that has welcomed me back into the seat. Everyone that bought Maeve Easter eggs and birthday presents. Mum and dad for their love of Drag Racing and always getting us to the track, my new crew chief and brother Collin and Jeff and Belinda Bull. Jeff has been supplying us with the power and sharing his knowledge with me for the past 20 years which I am very much grateful for. Whilst refreshing our motor this winter Jeff suggest we updated our BLP alcohol carb to the latest BLP Racing Products billet BX45 4500 alcohol carb. This has been a key feature in this weekend's win. It has proved to be deadly consistent and responsive to the weather and the changes we made over the weekend."

In Modurstang Pro ET there was a massive qualified field of 41 racers going for a 32 car ladder. New girl Jess Bishop proved her mettle in the venerable but still highly competitive Nightmare II dragster, getting her Perfect ET Award in the second qualifying session, in only her seventh run in the car. The car proved deadly consistent and to reach the semi finals in her first race in the class was a tremendous achievement. Harley Jay Darby was also a class rookie and with bests of 8.7862 and 155.27 naturally aspirated, went quicker than dad Lee had without the gas, but tyre issues spelt an early end for the former Junior Dragster racer. Also new were the Hayling Garage team of Stevie Gates and Darren Huxley who both got in the ladder.

In the end it was age, if not treachery that overcame youth and exuberance, with seasoned racer Leigh Morris, whose history goes back deep into the 90s, only securing his place in the ladder in the last session when he went from #35 to #12, in a class when it took a better than 0.01 over dial to get into the top 16. In eliminations, Leigh beat a breaking out Darren Huxley, a red lighting Chloe Wilkins, holeshot Don Scott, a red lighting Tom Watkins, and, in the final, holeshot Neill Watkins. Congratulations to Leigh on his 27th win.

In Hutchinson & Dibley Sportsman ET, Gary Lake was the winner out of 27 qualified cars and five rounds of racing. He wrote:

"Having managed to qualify in 7th by only a few thousandths, (up from 13th in the final qualifier), and so many others being bang on their numbers, we were not confident going into eliminations.

"The car ran well all weekend, except the drive train getting a little hot while we were going through the rounds! Our races with both Holley Walters and Kirstie Tramm were too close to call. In the semi final Kirstie caught and past us at the stripe but lost out to thanks to a 4 thousandth breakout, it’s fair to say we had our fair share of luck on that run!

"That saw us into the final against Michael Franklin who was a well deserved finalist, we knew we had our work cut out! Another close race with us both only 0.04 off our dial in, the final was decided by less than 5 hundredths which was the difference on the tree. Great racing from all the Sportsman ET drivers, we felt delighted and proud to take home the win!"

Plaudits go to Chris Creswell for qualifying #1 with a +0.0042 on his dial-in and to newcomers (in order of qualifying) Richard Palmer, Matt Halsall, Jago Stokes, Bill Wilson, Jack McClure, Susie McClure, Liam Sturman, and Steven Giles.

In Topspeed Automotive Street Eliminator there was a bumper entry of 13 cars. Most were in test mode after winter builds but, as expected, it was Andy Bond who came out top in qualifying with a 7.4914/202.48 ahead of the other two seven second runners Al McSweeney (7.6178/184.32) and Tony Higgs (7.9086/179.25). Sadly three cars had mechanical issues which occured before the cruise, Tony Higgs with a broken lifter, returnee Al Williamson having a differential failure and Graham Smith with a broken gearbox input shaft. You can see pictures from the cruise in our Sunday pit pics gallery thanks to Diana who was in the passenger seat of Mark Sheridan's top end charge special Cuda.

Andy and the Ugly Sister Chevy had the bye in round 1, lifted towards the end but stayed ahead of the turbo LS powered Cortina Mk2 of James Murray, likewise against Robert Slater in the semi final, and kept his foot in it with his best of the weekend, 7.4020/204.22 for the final against Al Mac.

Outlaw Anglia had a reduced field of cars when 2022 Champion Rob Stone suffered a delay getting to the track following his race truck failing its MOT and being detained at the MOT station with the race car still inside. Jon Webster was #1 qualifier with a 7.511/152.08 in the Fast Company Too car, still for sale and a bargain for anyone with the necessary kahunas, as it leaves the quickest of all and was lairy downtrack due to a twisted propshaft/gearbox yoke, which got resolved, and later a rear tyre issue. You can read Jon's detailed account at his detailed Outlaw Anglia Build FB blog.

Jon's tyre problem spelt a no-show against Wayne Power, who then had a bye in the semi final and defeated a troubled Rob Stone in the final for his first win, well done Wayne! Wayne wrote:

"I took the car to John Webster for geometry set up on Wednesday as I’d altered the placement of the lower four link bars, got that done. Over the winter I had installed an ECU to control things on the car, i.e. nitrous and ignition, a work-in-progress by Cal (aka Slick - Editor), moved fuel regulators forward to comply with Motorsports UK rules, new belts, then had a problem with a bent stay bar on rear end causing the axle to move across to the left, sorted that out. Thanks to my crew, Helen my wife, my daughter Ellie, son in-law Jason, and Cal's been helping me out with the setup of the motor.

"It was amazing to get in to the final, just shows slower cars can get there finally. As I was going down the track in the final, I just kept thinking any second, Rob's going to flash by but, luckily enough for me, he had a problem, I was so emotional over the line, what a feeling! I felt so sorry for Rob, such a great guy."

In Lucas Oil Junior Dragster, Kai Cooper achieved a perfect light to qualify #1 and congratulations to him. Harry Redshaw qualified #28 of 30 racers, far off the performance that earned him the 2021 championship as he was getting used to a new setup. However after a lucky race for him when Chevy Checkett broke out with a much better reaction, Harry upped his game and defeated Ellie May Brown on a holeshot in round 2, a red-lighting Max Taylor in round 3, a breaking-out Luke Mugridge in round 4 and a breaking out Mackenzie Love in the final. Harry's RTs were better in rounds 2,3 and the semi final than his qualifying 0.1053. With the points structure, his win puts him in the lead but there will be plenty of racers chasing him for the 2023 trophy. But for now, congratulations to Harry for his second win in the class.

Harry and dad Chris wrote: "What a absolutely amazing weekend at Santa Pod, our first meeting of the year for the Odyssey Battery Drag Racing Team and with both Harry and Damion looking forward to getting back in their hot seats, we were looking forward to a beautiful weekend.

We started our week setting the cars up, with this being Harry’s last year in Junior Dragster, we decided to take his weight bar of the back of his car to see how it performs. As we went around and under the tower ready for our first qualifying run, we were excited to see how the car reacted and what a difference it made, it reacted totally different - and unfortunately Harry red lit, the car was totally different with no weight. Unfortunately harry did 5 red lights before he managed to get a green, so he was back on track.

"We went it race day happy with how the cars were performing and what a day racing it was. Unfortunately Damion got knocked out in round two, but Harry did some amazing driving and managed to get to the finals, it was a absolutely incredible feeling, Harry was so happy. In the final, we were racing against Mackenzie Love and it was a fantastic race, looking down at the winning light in Harry’s lane. "After a very long and hard winter this weekend has made all the work worth it all, it was so nice to see the kids playing with all their friends back at the track and having a good time. All the team want to say a massive thank you to our sponsors at Odyssey Battery for the continued support, they have worked with us for 8 years now and it has been great to do so. It was a amazing weekend and the whole team want to say a massive thank you to all the track crew, without them we could never do what we do they work so hard for the sport we all love. Also we would like to say a massive thank you to Eurodragster for all their coverage (you're welcome - Editor)."

Tomorrow we will bring you racer comments from the motorcycle classes.

What a disaster.
11th April: Eurodragster.com sponsor and curry provider John Tebenham has written in about a less-than-stellar Springspeed Nationals appearance:

"The best laid plans... We were super ready until we had a wiring problem to do with the transbrake. As the car drove properly, but 80% in first and 20% in reverse, to the start line, we screwed the transmission up. We fixed the wiring, but the damage was already done. So a massive shout out to Edge Performance Transmissions. Also to Tony Underhill who was amazing and a man I have a whole new respect for.

Andy Hadfield - what a man. Anybody’s life will be better with him by your side. So let’s move on, gearbox out again for a full rebuild. Getting both my crazy cars ready for the Doorslammers. Well done to the '55 team and crew, getting the hang of it. See you at the Doorslammers, JT.

Dual Fuel Racing's Springspeed.
11th April: Thanks to Steve Mellors for sending us his account of the Springspeed Nationals for the Dual Fuel team of Steve's borrowed Audif S3 identifying as Hulk MX5, running almost a second quicker than Hulk MX5 had ever done, and team mate Carl Magadera and his Tesla Model S.

"What a weekend for Dual Fuel Racing. Hulk MX5 arrived at Santa Pod Raceway on Wednesday, we did what we could before the rain got heavy. After issues with the tuning, we went back to basics and put the stock ECU back into the car. In testing the car was not behaving - we tried to get four passes in so we could review the data overnight and attempt to fix the spinfest off the line, even on a soft launch the wheels spun, however, on the car's 4th pass we got the tyres to hook, that shook the back end to the point it couldn't take it anymore, the arms on the differential snapped followed by a drive shaft.

"Unfortunately, despite the teams best efforts, we couldn't find a diff locally to fix the car, so Travis Smith saved the day letting Steve use his VWDRC VWSP Audi S3. We had 7 qualifying runs and after being joined by Carl Magedera, the 2 Dual Fuel Racing teammates hit the track. Both drivers struggled to dial the cars in due to the track constantly changing (is this correct? - Editor). However both drivers made the top 10 in qualifying, Steve came 3rd, just 0.095 off his dial, yes the ladder really was that close this year and Carl came 9th with a 0.112 off his dial in.

"Eliminations began and unfortunately both drivers were taken out by some very good drivers, first was Carl who was beaten by Peter Walters and then came Steve's run in the Audi against Michael Franklin after a slow start the car flew down the track and despite a 1000ft lift Steve broke out however Michael's run was a strong one and would have been a hard one to beat.

"Hulk MX5 will be returning to Sussex tomorrow thanks to our amazing sponsors over at ABLE Assist Ltd and we will fix the car and make the back end stronger ready for the rescheduled Festival of Power. A huge thank you to our crew Sean O'Dwyer, Luna Stea and Travis Smith, all 3 cars will be back for Festival of Power at the end of the month.

"Thank you to our sponsors MX5 Parts Warehouse, Able Assist Ltd, Printz4u &and Just Send It designs, without you guys we couldn't do this."

Photo credit: Steve Mellors.

Swift snippets.
11th April: Happy Silver (25th) Wedding Anniversary for today to 2022 Comp Bike champion Chris Neary and wife Mandi who kindly wrote in to let us know the good news. Have a wonderful day both.

Happy Birthday for today to former Top Fuel and Pro Modified racer now resident in Florida Jöran Persåker, former Shakespeare County Raceway tech guru Simon Day and future Old School Classic Altered constructor and painter extraordinaire Bryan Whitfield. We hope you all have a great day.

Festival of Power entry reopened.
10th April: Thanks to Santa Pod Racers Club Secretary Ian Marshall for letting us know that Festival of Power entries are to reopen until this Tuesday night only (11th April), to accommodate racers who were unable to enter before the previous closing date.

Entry can be made at this link. The Festival of Power entry list can be viewed at this link.

STP Springspeed Nationals results.
10th April: Congratulations to the winners at the weekend's STP Springspeed Nationals held at Santa Pod Raceway:

Track Worx Comp Eliminator: Nic Williams (10.40) 10.1241/96.65 def. Spencer Tramm (11.55) 11.1362/115.49 DQ red
FastR Super Comp: Richard Tunstall 9.3007/133.75 def. Paul Hudson 9.0256/153.11
Tony Morris Carburetors Super Gas: Stuart Morris 10.0117/146.72 def. Andy Dibley 9.9931/132.45
Peter Nee Super Pro ET: Tom Atkinson (8.40) 8.3763/157.94 def. Alan Didwell (7.62) 7.5922/177.79
Modurstang Pro ET: Leigh Morris (10.04) 10.3575/113.60 def. Neill Watkins (11.27) 11.2928/114.93
Hutchinson & Dibley Sportsman ET: Gary Lake (14.18) 14.2205/94.63 def. Michael Franklin (17.33) 17.3790/80.50
Topspeed Automotive Street Eliminator: Andy Bond 7.4020/204.22 def. Al McSweeney 8.1901/154.68
Outlaw Anglia: Wayne Power 10.6201/123.55 def. Rob Stone 16.3028/58.96
Lucas Oil Junior Dragster: Harry Redshaw (8.31) 8.3637/76.69 def. Mackenzie Love (8.10) 8.0494/80.21

Banks Night Club Top Fuel Bike: Neil Midgley 6.3139/177.85 def. Steve Woollatt 7.0070/136.12
Taylors Trophy Super Street Bike: Alan Morrison Jnr 9.0849/97.71 def. Steve Venables no-show
Leeks Landscapes Funny Bike: Dave Peters 9.7504/87.19 def. Roger Moore no-show
Suzukiperformancespares.co.uk Comp Bike: Paul Hambidge 7.3121/197.26 def. Chris Neary 9.8168/115.95
JKE Race Works 8.50 Bike: Dan De'ath 8.6588/153.69 def. Martin Hallett 8.4896/156.84
Atlantic Fluid Tech 9.50 Bike: Rick Sawatzki 9.7543/130.68 def. Zoe Hallett 9.2842/146.70
Blood Cancer UK ET Bike: Blade King (9.10) 9.1299/135.27 def. Peter Harrison (10.88) 10.9930/120.42
Eurodragster.com Junior Drag Bike: Leah Morrison (11.55) 11.6233 def. Lyra Humber (15.90) 15.8772/46.95

The meeting was held in great conditions, the air was ideally suited for racing, being below sea level density altitude for most of the event, and the track superbly prepared by the SPRC marshals.

The sole incident of the race was when Suzukiperformancespares.co.uk Comp Bike racer Mark Dainty suffered a departure from his bike which had drifted left and then went on its side towards the end of the race with Paul Hambidge. Mark was attended to quickly, was reported conscious, alert and talking to medical staff, and was taken to the medical centre for a precautionary checkup. We send Mark our best wishes for a speedy recovery and hope to see him back at the track soon.

Congratulations to Lucas Oils Junior Dragster racer Kai Cooper who won the Eurodragster.com/Bad Habit Racing Perfect Light Award of £50 supported by Cath and Tig Napier and to Modurstang Pro ET racer Jess Bishop who won the Eurodragster.com/Twister Racing Perfect ET award of £50 supported by Andy 'Fadster' Hadfield.

Congratulations also to Modurstang Pro ET racer racers Don Scott and Marc Huxley who won the Bob's Photo Finish Award of £50 each posted by sponsor and longtime Eurodragster.com supporter Bob Roberts for the closest finish of a green light and non-break out race. Don and Marc's finish line margin was 0.0008 seconds or 2 inches.

Thanks to David Anniwell of the Santa Pod Timing Crew for sending us detailed timing data, including test day results, which we have posted to our timing data area which you can see by clicking on Data, then Timing Data at the top of any Eurodragster.com page. Official results can be seen at Santa Pod's Official Results Site.

You can check out our John Woolfe Racing-sponsored Festival of Power reports, results and galleries by clicking here or by clicking on the Event Coverage link at the top of any Eurodragster.com page. We should repeat our new policy that the watermarked photos from our galleries can be downloaded and may be used in social media posts but please do not crop or modify them, in particular we need the watermark retained.

Please join Simon in thanking Julian and Diana for their hard work over the race weekend.

We look forward to publishing racer comments on the event tomorrow.

Avril Brown funeral streaming details.
10th April: Many thanks to Sam Marston for letting us know the arrangements for streaming the funeral of the late Avril Brown, former Santa Pod Raceway marshal:

The funeral, which takes place tomorrow (11th April) at 11:00 BST at Nene Valley Chapel, can be seen by clicking on this link and entering user name mica8191 and password 730397.

Swift snippets.
10th April: A very happy Pearl (30th) Wedding Anniversary to Super Comp racer Martin Curbishley and wife Ruth, who celebrate today.

Happy Birthday for today to Santa Pod Raceway commentator Colin Theobald, videographer/SPR commentator intern Thomas Cook Abbott, former Funny Bike racer Lizz McCarthy Charman, Wild Bunch racer and historian Mick Gleadow, Junior Drag Bike dad Leo Lester, and Williams Brothers patriach Keith Williams. We hope you all have a nice relaxing day.

Swift snippets.
8th April: Happy Birthday for today to Pro ET and Super Gas racer Simon Gough, Swedish Top Doorslammer racer Caroline Strand and FWD racer and car detective Sean Prout. We hope you all have a great day.

Pro Modified racer Chris Orthodoxou has been in touch to wish a very Happy Birthday to his wife Angella for today, "Chief parachute packer, cordon bleu chef and tea maker for the Apocalypse Viper team." Have a great day Angella, hope to see you back at the track later this year once Chris has his engine back...

EMMA Alert System for SPR racers.
7th April: Thanks to Santa Pod Raceway Track & Events Coordinator Dan Melrose for a reminder about Santa Pod's online messaging service:. "This is a reminder to all racers that the EMMA digital messaging service is currently in use, and will continue to do so for the 2023 season to send out live updates to racers, including class callouts and other updates from the tower. To make sure you’re signed up to receive these messages, go to https://santapodresults.com, use the ‘Live Racer Updates on Discord’ link at the bottom of the page, and follow the prompts."

STP Springspeed Nationals coverage.
6th April: You will be able to follow coverage of the STP Springspeed Nationals by reading our frequently updated live race report, and viewing photos both from the pits and on-track at our event page which you can see by clicking here. Thanks to John Woolfe Racing for their support (read more below).

Once qualifying and racing get underway tomorrow, the Perfect Awards will be up for grabs. The Eurodragster.com/Bad Habit Racing Perfect Light Award presented in association with Cath and Tig Napier of Modurstang Pro ET team Bad Habit Racing stands at £50 for the first 0.000 RT. The Eurodragster.com Perfect ET Award presented in association with Andy 'Fadster' Hadfield and the Twister Race Team in memory of Hayley Hadfield is for a perfect ET to three decimal places for dial-in and index classes other than Comp Eliminator. Bob's Photo Finish Award is awarded to the closest green-light race measured in distance at the finish line without breaking out.

You can also follow the race via Nitro FM which can be listened to via this link or at the track on 96.2 FM. There will also be a live stream on Youtube and Facebook starting tomorrow.

John Woolfe Racing expands online presence.
6th April: Eurodragster.com continues to be supported for Event Coverage and on the front and news pages by John Woolfe Racing and a visit by your editor to the Bedford offices and warehouse of the long-established American Car parts company showed how the organisation and its operations have developed.

Mike Duggan, who has been with JWR since 2011 as an IT consultant, has joined the firm as part of the management team taking an active role in developing the company's online presence and customer service offering. Founder and managing director Dave Riswick whose history with the company now extends to over 55 years, is still active in his contacts with the many suppliers that JWR deals with.

The JWR website has become an online shop from which 4,000 products that are currently in stock can be bought. The number of products on the website is planned to increase tenfold by the end of the year. Mike emphasises that all products on the website are available for immediate dispatch 24/7: "During 2020 when many car events got cancelled and a lot of people stayed at home, we took the opportunity to prepare for the recovery by increasing our stock levels greatly and making it current.

"We stock a wide range of products from Edelbrock, VHT Paint, RPC, Fram, Hedman, Holley, Mr Gasket, Fel-Pro, Dayco, and a large range of American Car books. Our integrated stock system lets customers know how many of a particular item is in stock, and if an item is out of stock an order is created and customers informed by e-mail automatically of when it is back in stock. The online shop enables JWR to be competitive on price with direct suppliers from the US, as well as avoiding the supply chain issues that we expect to continue for another 18 months or more."

Customer service at JWR has also been brought into the digital age. JWR has always been in the forefront of advice on American car parts due to its access to electronic parts catalogues from manufacturers. This has now been added to by a chatbot on the website which is actually operated by a human!

JWR has valued customer loyalty and discounts are available for those with larger spends, which can be made via Google Pay and Apple Pay as well as by traditional credit or debit cards.

More developments will be announced during 2023, in the meantime, a big Thank You to JWR for their continued support of Eurodragster.com. You can contact JWR by going to www.woolfe.uk.

Swift snippets.
6th April: Happy Birthday for today to former Top Methanol Dragster racer Derek Flynn, Top Methanol Funny Car racer Sascha Pretzsch, former Junior Dragster racer Katie Ellis, former Top Fuel racer Kim Reymond, and current Nostalgia Super Stock racer Billy Mills. Have a great day all.

Racers wishing to enter the Tierp Internationals on 15th-18th June can do so at this link, which also contains a link to detailed instructions for racers. The entry deadline is 15th May 2023.

FIM entry online, early discount.
5th April: FIM Drag Racing Commission member Job Heezen has announced that the entry for the 2023 FIM-E European Championship is now online at . www.dragracing.eu. Job says:

"The annual fee is €650 + VAT for the whole season and €350 + VAT for a single event. Please note until 30th April, there is a 20% reduction on this fee so make sure you get your payment out before that date (€520 + VAT or €280 + VAT).

To be eligible for prize and travel money from the Main Event at Santa Pod, the entry-fee has to be paid at least 7 days before the event starts.

Easter Weekend racer update.
5th April: Santa Pod Raceway Track & Events Coordinator Dan Melrose has sent a reminder about track conditions for this weekend's STP Springspeed Nationals:

This is an update to all racers coming to race this weekend at Santa Pod Raceway. Firstly, as a reminder to everyone, all sportsman car classes and all bike classes entered into the original event on the 7th-9th April will remain this weekend. The test day scheduled for Thursday 6th April will also go ahead unaffected. Please note that pre-sales for the test day have currently sold out.

Due to the field conditions, all grass areas are strictly off-limits. We have made adjustments to the pit layout to accommodate racers & crew camping on hardstanding. Camping areas will now be available on the circles where Pro ET would normally pit, as well as the bottom end of the trade area closest to the Barn. Please follow all instructions from security, pit marshals and Santa Pod staff when setting up on site, and be considerate of your neighbours (i.e. don’t take up more space than you need!)

In addition, because of ongoing site works, the main Shower Block in the pits will be unavailable for the next few events. Portable showers will be available behind the Scrutineering Shed toilets and the Fuelers Bar toilets this weekend, with portaloos available in the pits.

STP Springspeed Nationals preview.
5th April: A read of the STP Springspeed Nationals entry list confirms that with 261 entries, there will be a feast of sportsman racing over 7th-9th April for the teams, and fans who can still come on a day ticket basis. Commiserations to racers who would have been at the event but have been thwarted by delayed parts deliveries.

In Track Worx Competition Eliminator the latest news is that 2022 champion Dan Williams Dan Williams will be campaigning this stunning 1970 Z28 Camaro (pictured) for the 2023 season. Dan has been working on transforming this all original 86000 miles car into a NHRA D/Stock legal race car which will see plenty of action in Comp Eliminator. Engine is an in house built LT-1 350, stick shift which Dan swears by and has taken him 18 months to be race ready. It’s still the original paint and interior and we all cannot wait to see this on the 1/4 mile. Neil Melliard has been applying the finishing touches to the artwork, just the race numbers to do and it’s ready. Dan will be testing on Thursday, and Williams Bros invite all to come and see them in the Comp Eliminator pits to get a closer look.

BeFastR Super Comp sees the return to the class of multiple champion Stuart Doignie in a Ford 27T roadster with a 515ci engine, moving up from last year's Pro ET Chevy Nova. Stuart told us "The car previously belonged to Simon Fulton; I still have the Nova and will probably do a few lifestyle events with it this year. We also have a 1963 Corvette nearing completion and hope to test that in the summer." Stuart will be double classing in Tony Morris Carburetors Super Gas as well, bringing memories of his championship run in the Vauxhall VX4/90 which now resides in Iceland.

Also returning to Super Gas for the first time since 2011 is Wayne Hiscock in his 572ci Chevelle, which he ran in Pro ET in recent years. Dan Page is entered in the No Hair Racing Camaro, racing in memory of the much missed Jon Morton, and Kieran Turner joins the class for the first time in his Chevrolet S10 pickup. Following the birth of Collin Morrice's daughter Grace, brother and former Junior Dragster champion Stuart takes the wheel of their Camaro in Super Gas and Super Pro ET this event, with Collin maybe running in Super Pro ET later in the season.

Peter Nee Super Pro ET has a few visitors from other classes, Andy Hadfield in Twister and Rob Brown in Rebel joining from Supercharged Outlaws and Wild Bunch respectively. AC Bell takes over the wheel of the Pontiac Firebird previously raced by dad Ashley, who has a new-to-him Chevelle. Allan Schofield in Scud Drag Racing will be in his ex-Dave Gibbons altered, having sold his dragster to Jess Bishop to race in Pro ET. Mark Turner has installed a supercharger on his M&M Racing Toyota Supra to replace the previous nitrous setup. A late entry is Rene Jaspert from Germany with a BMW E36.

ModUrStang Pro ET has a massive 45 entries which has attracted new sponsor interest thanks to the efforts of co-ordinators Brett Featherstone and John Bean. A welcome return to Hans van der Spek from Holland who we last saw at the 2015 Euro Finals. Darren Huxley moves up to Pro ET from Sportsman ET in his Nissan 180sx built for drifting and undoubtedly with a few tweaks for quicker straight line action. Jake Fronda is debuting his NeeNaw 2.0 Rednek Redemption VW Golf II van (pictured) with a 460 ci engine and gasser stance. Dave Crowhurst has entered his Chevy Camaro following his Subaru engined Beetle showing an alarming tendency for rear wheels shearing off their hubs. Jack McClure is making his competition debut with his show quality Ford 100e, as is Bill Wilson in his Graffiti Racing Ford F100. Harley-Jay Darby is moving into the seat previously occupied by dad Lee in his Chevrolet 3100 pickup.

Hutchinson & Dibley Sportsman ET has Liam Sturman making his racing debut in a Jaguar XK8 (pictured) built with the help and support of David Smith of Powerflow exhausts. Simon Swarbrick (Ford Pop), Caitlin Wilson (VW Beetle), Steven Giles (Suzuki Forester), Jago Stokes (Nissan Skyline) and Matthew Dowdy (Chevy Nova) all make their class debuts, although many of them have raced in other classes; Ozzie Brown returns to racing for the first time since 2020.

Topspeed Automotive Street Eliminator has 13 entries with Al Williamson returning after a single race outing in 2022. In Lucas Oil Junior Dragster, there have been several promotions to quicker cars, to the extent that there is only one Junior Stock entry, that of Teddy Howe who will be getting a handicap start in every elimination race that he runs. Welcome to JD debutants Emmy Crundwell (Violet Haze) and Emily Moore (Miss Hyperactive), both in Junior Modifieds. Outlaw Anglia has six entries with Rob Stone looking to defend his 2020 Motorsports UK title against Eurodragster.com sponsor Jon Webster whose Fast Company Too Pop is still for sale and hence a seven second advertising board...

The motorcycle classes have a large number of changes, debuts and returns too. In Banks Nightclub Top Fuel Bike, possibly one of the longest layoffs in Top Fuel Bike history comes to an end with Jules Boag entered for the first time since 1996 on a brand new bike (ex Pat O'Neill frame and parts of the engine ex Brian Johnson), which ran a best of 6.815/188.19 back in the day. Five competitors mean there will be some nitro fumes at Easter after all.

Taylor's Trophy Super Street Bike has record holder Daniel Donat Lencses from Hungary and new team mate Margot Schmidt from the Netherlands who we can predict will make a major step forward in performance this season. Alan Morrison makes his class debut on a bike purchased from Steve Howe (pictured) over the winter. Leeks Landscapes Funny Bike has Jordan Kenway who moves over from Comp Bike, Dutch visitors Mike Olie (now on a Kawasaki after a blown engine) and Maarten Zijlstra, also Lorcan Parnell's Storm drag bike has additional sponsorship, and new parts, as does the Roger Moore's Box Of Frogs Racing machine.

Suzukiperformancespares.co.uk Comp Bike has class debuts from Mark Dainty, Garry Bowe (both previously Super Street Bike), Jasmine Cordelle, Andrew Christophi (both previously 8.50 Bike), Anna Sasiak (previously ET Bike, on a new machine which Anna tested during), also Adam Burns (ex 9.50 Bike, on a new machine).

In Atlantic Fluid Tech 9.50 Bike, Zoe Hallett (nee Morrison) is making her debut on a Morrison Racing Suzuki GSXR K4.

Ryan Davies is making his debut on Phil Crossley's former Funny Bike in Blood Cancer UK ET Bike. Chris Venn is on a bike we believe was formerly owned by Dave Bartz and Derek Flynn. Ryan Davidson is making his racing debut on a Suzuki GS with a 1640cc engine (largest in class), whereas John Mcgill is racing a Yamaha Vmax of 1340 cc. Casey Holgate moves up from Junior Drag Bike on a Rugrat Racing Honda 400cc Junior Pro.

Finally, Eurodragster.com Junior Drag Bike welcomes the debuts of Jaxon King (pictured), Faith Morrison, Harry Isaacs, Cameron Cordelle and Alia Lester. Good luck and stay safe to all racers this weekend.

Photojournalist Steve Moxley's ACU class preview can be seen at this link, thanks to Steve for providing additional information for our preview.

German DMSB Drag Racing Cup 2023 promoted by DMV.
5th April: Thanks to co-ordinator of the German Motorsport Drag Racing Delegation Andrea Kloss for supplying information on this year's DMSB cup:

In November 2022, the winners of the german DMSB Drag Racing Pokal (Cup) and the winners of the dmsj Junior Drag Racing Pokal (Cup) were honored with their trophy during the DMV Gala of Champions in Suhl Germany. In the meantine, the dates for the DRP 2023 have been set. This year there will be three rounds for the automobile classes, in the absence of national events, there will only be one round this year for the motorcycle classes. First round for the classes Super Pro ET, Super Comp, Pro ET, Super Gas, Sportsman ET and Junior Dragster, will take place on June 24-25th in France, on the quarter mile of the Circuit-de-Clastres in the beautiful Hauts-de-France region. The DRP is happy to be the guest of their French colleagues from the Association-Tropée-Dragster (ATD), who are known for their good organisation and excellently prepared track. The second round will take place from July 29th to 30th, also in Clastres. The third and final round will take place from August 25-27th in front of the big spectator crowd at the NitrOlympX in Hockenheim, which is a special experience for any driver. For Super Comp Bike, ET Bike and Junior Drag Bike the sole round will be held at the NitrOlympX.

The promoter DMV – Deutsche Motorsport Verband would have liked to have announced a fourth round for the automobile classes and thus also a second round for the motorcycle classes. However, since no further national events in Germany were announced this year, the promoter had to be satisfied with three rounds. For 2024, the prospect of further natonal events in Germany is positive, since AMC Dessau has already announced to us that they intend to hold a national event again next year and we are constantly on the watch for new tracks.

New in 2023 is that drivers wanting to particpate in the DMSB Cup, have to register with the promoter beforehand. The promoter DMV made this change in consultation with the DMSB and anchored it into the predicate provisions and regulations, that were published on the DMSB website at the end of 2022. Participation in the DRP continues to be free of charge and the participation in more than one class is also still possible. The Cup also continues to be open to foreign participation. Last year Ronnie Mercer from England won 3rd place in Pro ET and Tim Christensen from Sweden won the Cup for Super Comp Bike with Brad Head being runner-up and in Super Pro ET the runner-up was Thierry Senges from France. In the Junior classes Max Timmers from Holland won Junior Dragster and runner-up was Hugo Lajoux followed by Marie Camilleri in 3rd place. In Junior Drag Bike Wichard Veldman from Holland was runner-up.

Information and registration form for the DRP in english can be found here.

Information and registration form fort he Junior-DRP can be found here.

Festival of Power event entry.
4th April: Santa Pod Racers Club Secretary Ian Marshall has sent a reminder to racers that the entries for the new date of the Festival of Power on 29th April-1st May closes this coming Friday.

Entry for the race includes all of the Pro class entries that were cancelled from the Easter dates - Pro Modified, Top Fuel exhibition, Nitro Funny Car and Nostalgia Funny Car. For these classes as well as others, racers must complete a new entry from as this is a new event and your previous Festival of Power entry does not automatically carry over. For the Pro Teams, if you have already paid the entry fee, that will carry over as payment for the new Festival of Power event.

Paul Manders.
4th April:

We were sorry to hear of the death of former Funny Car racer Paul Manders who has sadly passed away following illness. Paul was the owner/driver of the funny car Time and Motion which ran at Santa Pod Raceway.

Paul is known not just for running his Mustang Mach 1 Funny Car between 1980 and 1982 to a best of 7.53/188mph, but also for keeping it in his collection right up to the time of his death. Although there has been some interest from other racers and fans in getting the car back to the track for display or cackle, Paul was reluctant to bring it out again.

The car was reported to have been imported from the USA by Roy Phelps on Paul's behalf. It was minus the motor and the shell had been badly burnt in a race fire. Roy took the car to Fibreglass Repairs and made a mould from the damaged body, when Paul finally collected the car it was fitted with its new body in primer.

The previous owner of the car was reported as Shirl Greer and the car was originally built by Cecil Hicks, however this was never fully verified as the roll cage had reportedly been replaced with a new one fabricated by Allan Herridge. The non-original engine was also replaced with a Keith Black block, the car retaining iron cylinder heads.

We at Eurodragster.com send our deepest condolences to Paul's family and friends.

Information courtesy UKDRN forum; photo courtesy Alan Hawkins.

Introducing Steel River Hot Rod III.
4th April: Melbourne Raceway will see the debut of British Drag Racing Hall of Fame member Mark Flavell's new Steel River Hot Rod III blown alky nostalgia Funny Car at its opening event on April 15th-16th. As observant readers will have spotted, the new Mustang II Cobra II-bodied car was the subject of our spy picture on 29th March. Mark writes:

"With the rebirth of Melbourne Raceway under the guidance of Straightliners, we also hatched a plan for the rebirth of the once popular Pro Comp class, which evolved into Top Alcohol and then Top Methanol.

"In 2023 Pro Comp will be run as an all run 4 round Cannonball with the two quickest facing off for an overall event Winner. Any and every entry into the class is welcome if you like the format and can run quicker than 5.9 on our 1/8th mile track!"

You can enter Pro Comp at the Straightliners website.

JT's prediction.
4th April: Eurodragster.com sponsor, Super Pro ET and Pro Modified racer John Tebenham has written to us with his prediction of the outcome of Super Pro ET, in which he will be competing in his Burnout King Pop:

We are ready to win this Championship in Super Pro, I have a USA and Australian teams working with us. Luke is on board running it all, and ICE have just finished my brand new engine. We are aiming to win the event. A massive thanks to Keith.

Straightliners SPR round 1 results.
4th April: Congratulations to the winners of the first round of the 2023 Straightliners championship last Sunday, 2nd April, at Santa Pod Raceway:

Class 9.10: Mark Taylor (Hayabusa 1300cc) 9.55/135 def. Chris Jacobs (Suzuki Katana 1360cc) 10.80/131
Straightliners No Mercy Shootout: Dave Grundy (Triumph Street Triple) (10.40) 10.41/126 def. Andy Higham (Deofol 500cc) (11.81) 11.73/106 breakout
Scooters No Mercy Shootout: Mike Pacey (Lambretta 230cc) (14.82) 15.81/82 def. Ade Horrocks (Vespa Primavera 149cc) (12.97) 12.71/104 breakout
Juniors: Amy Wolstenholme (Gilera DNA special 70cc) (16.63) 16.74/70 def. Alfie Barraclough (50cc Special) (19.47) 19.37/56 breakout

Sportsman ET: Peter Lane (Plymouth Barracuda 6.3 ltr) (13.75) 13.84/104 def. David Coombes (Lexus LS400 4 ltr) (12.65) red light
Pro ET: Mark Briggs (Toyota Supra 2 ltr) no time, unopposed.

The racing was held in partly sunny conditions with qualifying being run in the morning and eliminations in the afternoon.

Complete lists of ETs and speeds recorded on Sunday, including RWYB bikes, are available at this link.

Straightliners Championship points are available on the Straightliners results repository. Thanks to Martyn Greathead for posting the results and points.

Swift snippets.
4th April: Happy Birthday for today to Supercharged Outlaws racer and Perfect ET Award sponsor Andy 'Fadster' Hadfield, Pro ET racer Liz Malcolm, Comp Eliminator racer Lloyd Perkins, Dutch racer Ronald Huis and 9.50 Bike racer Rob Stanley, we hope you all have a great day.

Videographer Aidan Galloway has posted footage from Scotland's Crail Raceway event "The Big One" (Willie Robertson Memorial) from Sunday 26th March on Youtube. Included are shots of drag, drift and modified cars at the huge event. Crail's next event is on 16th April and you can see full details at www.crailraceway.co.uk.

STP Springspeed Nationals racer update.
3rd April: Many thanks to Santa Pod Racers Club Secretary Ian Marshall for sending us details of track opening and signing on at the STP Springspeed Nationals being held at Santa Pod Raceway on 7th-9th April, including scrutineering times.

The main gates to the track will open from 8.00am on Thursday 6th April.

Thursday, 6th April:
10.00-18.00 Signing on office open
10.00-18.00 Scrutineering for cars and bikes at the scrutineering bay

Friday, 7th April:
07.00 Signing on open, scrutineering opens for cars and bikes
09.30 Track open for qualifying

Saturday, 8th April:
07.00 Scrutineering and signing on open
09:30 Track open for qualifying/eliminations

Sunday, 9th April:
07.30 Scrutineering and signing on open
09.30 Track open for qualifying/eliminations

The detailed running orders and entry list can be seen via our event coverage page.

Regarding entries for the Festival of Power, which closes for entry this Friday 6th April, Ian repeats the announcement for drivers having to complete the SFI information form for this weekend who are also entering the next event on 29th April-1st May (the Festival of Power, showing on the SPRC website as Springspeed Nationals).

"Car racers will need to complete the same SFI form for both events; there is a small glitch in the system that is being sorted, all entries from Springspeed onwards will in future auto fill the information following the initial completion of the form.

"ACU and Club Bike riders, please note that you are not required to complete the SFI data sheet as part of the entry system, as this information is purely for car entries."

Calling all Japanese drag vehicles for demos at JapShow!
3rd April: Santa Pod Raceway Events Coordinator Max Frost has announced an opportunity for demo vehicles at JapShow:

"Santa Pod Raceway is looking for 8 or so Japanese drag racing vehicles to do demonstration runs at this year’s JapShow on 14th May! If it has a Japanese body and/or a Japanese engine and can run quicker than 11.99, we want to hear from you!

"For anyone interested, please send an application email to Max in the Santa Pod office at max@santapod.com before Monday, 1st May – Including your personal best ET, photos, and a blurb about the car.”

2023 Pro ET sponsorship scheme.
3rd April: Thanks to Pro ET racer and sponsorship scheme co-ordinator Brett Featherstone for a announcement for new racers in Pro ET about the sponsorship scheme, which is additional to Santa Pod's prize giving.

Just to make everyone aware who has entered Pro ET this season, Brett's team Nova Scotia and John Bean's team Shotgun have taken over the reigns of the sponsorship scheme. Any racer wishing to participate in the scheme please contact us as early as possible upon arrival at Santa Pod for this weekend's event for your sticker pack.

As in previous years to show appreciation to all the sponsors, prize funds will only be paid to those running the stickers. There will be trophies only if no stickers are applied. It doesn't cost anything to be part of the scheme.

Trophies up for grabs so far:

Number 1 qualifier: trophy + £100.00
Number 1 off the trailer trophy + £50.00 sponsored by Maverick Diagnostics
Best single reaction time during qualifying trophy
Beating Number 1 in eliminations trophy + £50.00 sponsored by Nova Scotia

We would like to thank the following companies for their continued support during 2023:

Modurstang
B&H Construction
Bean & Ballantyne Properties Ltd
Hauser Racing
Jon Turner Ulphostery
Maverick Diagnostics
Nemesis UK
Supercharged Outlaws
TMC & RDR performance carburettors
Uk scaffolding (SE) Ltd
VP Racing fuels

And new companies for 2023:

Buddy's paint shack
CSK Building Ltd
Independent Scaffolding
S G Commercial Vehicle Repairs Ltd
S.I.B. Plumbing
Three Brothers Brewery

A massive thank you for their contributions, please let them know you appreciate their support.

I am glad to inform everyone that Neil Topliss is continuing Toppos Tenners this season. It would be great to see every racer support this extra fun prize scheme.

The naughty chair will remain, so start getting your best excuse ready for round 1 defeats lol. (I sat in the chair twice last season).

A big thank you to Elaine Southworth@cool engineered art for supplying 12 unique trophies for this season.

We also have a decent supply of the new high quality Pro ET brollies at every event this season while stocks last, price £25.00 each.

Any new racers to the class, please come and say hello.

Stay safe everyone and let's have a great start to the season.

Pioneer stories: addenda to Series 3.
3rd April: Sadly we have come to the end of Series 3 of our pioneer stories, thanks once again to the input from all the pioneers of drag racing involved, and to John Hunt, Nick Pettitt and Mick Gleadow for creating the versions we have published over the course of the last 12 weeks and supplying archive photos.

As will all good books, we have gathered some additional material we present here in the format of an addendum and links:

Our very first story in Series 1, that of UK dragster pioneer Derek Metcalf, now has links to his collection of 300 images, all related to his time racing from 1964. The links, to images on the British Drag Racing & Hot Rodding Archive are on four shared Google Photo pages, page 1, page 2, page 3, and page 4.
Pioneer drag racer John Wright's video gallery at this link, showing John still going strong and working on cars in his mid eighties, has been posted on Youtube and is now linked to from Part 2 of his story;
Following publication of hot rodding and drag racing pioneer Geoff Jago, we received a story from expat Brit Dennis Swift, now based in Australia, who created a Ford Model B hot rod, the body of which was subsequently used by Geoff to create his fibreglass replica of the Model B. Dennis's story can be seen at this link.
We received some additional information from Brian Gibson on the engineering behind Wild Thing and have added it to Part 2 of Brian's story at this link.

John, Nick and Mike are starting work on Series 4, with a number of diamond anniversaries coming up, you can guess at what might be the topics to be covered...

Get well soon Richard!
3rd April: Get well soon wishes to Walters Motorsport/Reloaded crew chief and Super Pro ET sponsorship scheme co-ordinator Richard Walters who has been in hospital for a few days and is currently resting up at home. Son Peter says "It means we won't be racing the dragster this weekend. We're all gutted, especially dad, but health comes first."

STP Springspeed Nationals running orders posted.
2nd April: Many thanks to Santa Pod Racers Club secretary Ian Marshall for sending us running orders for this weekend's STP Springspeed Nationals (formerly known as Festival of Power - see Friday's update).

The running orders, which are subject to the usual caveats about weather and track conditions, can be seen on our event page at this link supported by John Woolfe Racing. Sportsman racers can look forward to seven planned qualifying sessions.

Turnkey six second Jag XKR for sale.
2nd April:

New Pro Modified racer David Smith has placed his Jaguar XKR for sale in our Jeff Bull sponsored Swap Meet pages:

David says "It's a proven car in the USA & Europe, currently running consistent 7.60’s in the UK with a naturally aspirated engine combination. Ran 6.70’s in USA & Europe with one stage of nitrous. This is a huge spec car capable of running in multiple classes. Re-fit a single stage of nitrous and you’ve got yourself a 6 second car!

The car was pro built by ‘Little John Race Cars’ in the USA. The attention to detail on the build of this car is immense: airbrushed dashboard, headlights, grill etc. It has to be seen to fully appreciate the amount of work that’s gone into the build.

"It has a carbon fibre body and interior, chromoly tube chassis/cage tagged to 6.0 and baselined by Robinson Race Cars in 2022, 615cu Shafiroff methanol injected BBC engine fully rebuilt & freshened up August 2022, Reid Powerglide and convertor new in 2022, and many more top parts."

Full details can be seen in the Swap Meet pages. If you're interested, email David at info@smithysspeedshop.co.uk.

Avril Brown funeral arrangements.
2nd April: Thanks to Paul Marston for sending us details of the funeral arrangements for former Santa Pod marshal Avril Brown:

"The funeral arrangements for ex SPR marshal and dear friend Avril Brown have now been finalized. Everyone is welcome to attend and say goodbye to this lovely lady.

The service will be held on Tuesday 11th April 11.00am at Nene Valley Crematorium, 305 Doddington Road, Wellingborough, NN8 2NX. The wake will be directly after at The Stags Head, 1, High Street, Great Doddington, Wellingborough NN29 7TQ.

The Brown family have requested, no formal wear, Race Crew Shirts, and or Race T-Shirts please. No flowers please, but donations to Marie Curie or Hospice at Home, who did a simply wonderful job of looking after Avril and supporting the family throughout this most difficult time.

Swift snippets.
2nd April: Happy Birthday for today to Funny Car crew chief Dave Bryant, Supertwin Top Fuel Bike racer Svein Olav Rolfstad, Pro Stock Bike racer Martin Newbury, 8.50 Bike racer Ivana van den Berg. We hope you all have had a great day.

Swedish Top Alcohol Funny Car racer Ulf Leanders and expat Norwegian Top Alcohol Dragster racer Julie Nataas are in action at this weekend's NHRA Winternationals at Pomona. Ulf qualified 3rd with 5.471/264.60 and runs in the semi finals in today's eliminations. Julie qualified 10th with 5.287/269.03 but went out in round 2 to 2022 Champion Joey Severance.

Day out at Dishforth.
1st April: No Prep promoter Lee Child has written in about a film shoot involving two cars which took place recently:

"Recently on Eurodragster you may have seen a news item requesting cars for a film shoot. The day went ahead and was a great success. Having lost the Elvington airfield for the original location, it did us a massive favour. It forced the situation, to dig deep and the result was we ended up working with the Ministry of Defence with the use of the Dishforth airfield army base.

"I can’t thank the MOD enough for the application, and the licence process approved all in 20 days. A request has been made for a future ¼ mile charity event at Dishforth to benefit the Armed Forces charities. This positive move has also opened connections with other MOD venues.which will slow down the decline of ¼ mile venues across the UK.

"Massive thanks to the MOD, Matt Wright with his jet powered jeep and Rob, Dan Houlston running their 67 American Super Stock Camaro.and with the their awesome safety and rescue services, motorsport services organisation Details will be released soon with the finished production programme that was filmed."

Spy picture.
1st April: The offices of Eurodragster.com received this spy picture without any attached caption. If you know more, or if you would like to send your own spy picture, then drop us a line at editor@eurodragster.com.

Swift Snippets.
1st April: Happy Birthday for today to Wild Bunch and Super Comp racer Darryl Howells, and NHRA and Nitro Revival legend Steve Gibbs. Have a great day both.

Earlier news