Event entry update. 30th April: Entry closes at midday this Wednesday (2nd May) for the Voltz Energy Shots Springspeed Nationals which takes place at Shakespeare County Raceway this coming weekend, Saturday-Monday 5th-7th May. Official entry forms are available on the Shakespeare County Raceway web site at www.shakespearecountyraceway.co.uk. You can check out Version 1 of the official Voltz Energy Shots Springspeed Nationals entry list by clicking here or by clicking on the Event Coverage link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. If you have any queries about event entry at Shakespeare County Raceway then please contact the track at enquiries@shakespearecountyraceway.co.uk or call 01789 720180 (outside the UK +44 1789 720180). Falling back into a Bad Habit. 30th April: One of the undoubtled highlights of this year's Dragstalgia at Santa Pod Raceway will be the return to active service of Robin Read's Bad Habit Daimler-powered dragster. Robin has been in touch with an update on the work to put the nitro-burning dragster back on the track: Mostly everything had survived twelve years in the trailer well and there were no real issues with corrosion inside the engine etc . It is almost certain to say that the motor wouldn't have survived another pass - the gudgeon pin and connecting rod in number six cylinder had been crushed down to the point where there was one millimetre of free play! The cylinder heads are all cracked from the spark plug hole to the valve seats, but that is normal wear and tear on a fuel Daimler. There were problems in the blower, one of the rotors had touched the end case and had "picked up" metal. On reflection we are surprised it ran a 7.11 on its last pass! We are at the stage where the car is completely apart , and we know what we have to do to the various parts. I am enjoying the project but really struggling to find the hours needed; I must have lived, eaten, breathed and slept the car those years ago! We are not having problems remembering about the car and how it is put together, but remembering specific details such as how long had that camshaft been in or when did the Mk 5 heads go on, etc, is frustrating and has taught us that the run sheets need to be more detailed and that we need an engine build sheet. The crew are enjoying thing too. Trying to align everybody's available free time into a useful working period is proving difficult, but it is happening and we have all fallen back in love with the little car. I never stopped loving it, but now have added passion! Stay tuned as we have a detailed interview with Robin coming up very shortly. Come the deluge... 30th April: Glenn and Mandy Ramsden of UK Event Safety have been in touch to thank everyone who worked together to evacuate Santa Pod Raceway on Sunday morning during the incredible weather conditions: Following an extremely busy night during which the security, medical and safety teams worked relentlessly until 04:00 to provide welfare for those who had been 'tent wrecked', a decision was made to curtail the Big Bang event in the interest of public safety. The operation which commenced just after 07:00 ran smoothly with all of the teams on the ground at Santa Pod Raceway coming together, the single focus being to get everyone off the site safely and in as little time as possible. In doing so we had to consider those that may have been suffering with hypothermia, anyone who may have been over the drink drive limit as well as a range of other duty of care challenges and we are pleased to say that everything went as well as can be expected. We would like to thank David Lloyd Jones for his well-considered management decision, as well as the guys from M&S Ambulance (who ran the control centre and dealt with any casualties), Colin Theobald and Nitro FM for communications, Dave Mills, Will and the rest of the day and night crew from Santa Pod Security and probably most of all, the Big Bang VW crowd who were, with only one exception, extremely understanding and helpful having being knocked up by us early on Sunday morning. As always there are a couple of anecdotes, we found a guy who had no idea there had been a problem overnight and wondered why the venue was under water (and probably still hasn't worked it out). Mandy found a guy whose tent was in the middle of what can only be described as a lake at least 6" deep and the tent was still dry inside! Finally the guy who after the explanation "It's for your own safety sir" etc asked if the track would be opening despite the evacuation being ongoing! Swift snippets. 30th April: Not exactly a spy picture, more of an out-of-the-workshop picture: Danish Top Fuel Dragster racer Stig Neergaard sent this shot of two of his three dragsters with the words "Ready to go at the Fast and Furious car show next weekend". It wasn't just Big Bang which was lost at the weekend but also the first round of the ATD French Championship at Mende. Our good friend Pascal Thébault writes that it was not the rain which was the issue but a storm which swept the Massif Central. "The wind strength was inconsistent with the required safety level for any kind of competition", says Pascal. "The ATD look forward to seeing you at the event at Lanas on 2nd-3rd June, hoping that the heavens will prove more merciful." Brett Hawksbee and Danny Allen of Shows-UK are offering the drivers and owners of race cars free entrance to this weekend's RPM – Race Performance & Modified Show if they turn up with their race cars. The show is being held at the Mid Suffolk Showground at Stonham Barns, near Stowmarket, next Saturday and Sunday May although anyone wishing to stay over can come in from 6:00 pm on Friday (4th). All race cars will be displayed on hard standing, so no worries about running slicks on the grass. Both Brett and Danny have a drag racing history and would love to have a display of drag cars to educate the Modified car crowd. Open headers are more than welcome, in fact they are almost compulsory! For more information check out www.shows-uk.com. Many thanks to those who have already sent tributes to Knut Söderqvist, who died on Saturday. You can read the tributes by clicking here or by clicking on the Features, Interviews, Tributes link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. If you would like to send your own tribute to Knut then please E-Mail us at tributes@eurodragster.com. FIE sponsor the Bennetts. 30th April: UK blown-acohol altered team and Eurodragster.com Bloggers Bennett Racing are very pleased to announce their latest sponsor Fuel Injection Enterprises, LLC. Luke Bennett writes: Fuel Injection Enterprises acquired the entire magneto product line from Mallory Ignition last fall and they are now fully up to speed manufacturing all things associated with the Super-Mag and Sprintmag line of products. We will be using a freshly serviced/upgraded FIE Super-Mag on the SuperPower Bantam altered, so pop in our pits for a look at their workmanship. Of course, FIE also continues to service/upgrade any brand of magneto as well as provide fuel system components, mechanical injection tune-ups and flow work. We are very happy to have Fuel Injection Enterprises join Bennett Racing as a sponsor. With their huge product knowledge, we're in good hands and look forward to a long and successful partnership. For magneto ignition or fuel system product queries, visit the Fuel Injection Enterprises web store at www.fuelinjectionent.com/webstore or E-Mail tech@fuelinjectionent.com. 26 miles, or restore a dragster? 30th April: While thousands tramped around the country's capital city in the London Marathon, 22nd April proved to be a very rewarding Work-In Day at Andy Robinson Race Cars with new members of the Allard Chrysler Action Group restoration team joining the regulars. ACAG Chair Brian Taylor writes: The full head count this time consisted of Bob Roberts, Syd McDonald, Martin Dunks, Andy Robinson, Brian Taylor, Paul Stubbings, Chris Eames and Ed Wimble. It was the largest team so far and we now have the new stainless steel blower pipes fabricated by Lloyd Allard installed. Rapid progress was made on several fronts. It was the first Work-In Day for Paul and Ed. Paul's initial encounter with drag racing was at the first Cannonball meet at Santa Pod in 1981 but he waited until 1992 before participating with Wendy Baker eventually in the driving seat. Via a series of cars including a Rover V8 slingshot, a blown Chevy powered Econo Funny Car, a blown Top Alcohol rail and a Fuel Altered, his career is currently focused on the blown Mustang II Nostalgia Funny Car Time Warp. He also helps out on the Tech Crew when not running the Mustang. The name Ed Wimble - Mr Ed - will be familiar to many readers. He has been into hot rod building since 1958 and living in Brixton he soon became aware of the Allard Chrysler being built in the early 1960s at Adlards in Clapham. Entering his Model T 'Outlaw' at Crystal Palace shows in the early 1970s was probably the first time he came to the public's notice and he went on to become a major force in custom painting (he will be signwriting the Allard Chrysler dragster) and traditional hot rod building – even designing for Boyd Coddington in California including the famous Alumatub. In the late 1990s Ed designed Boyd's new wheel range. From 2002 he has been involved in developing the New Stromberg 97 carburettor. The main aim of this Work-In was to get the car back up on its own wheels to make it easier to move around and provide a solid base for the electrical, hydraulic and fuel systems to be completed. The rear axle was installed and this enabled Chris to complete the mechanical controls and cockpit gauge links. Rather than send the gauges to Smiths, Chris serviced them himself. There are two gear levers to the left of the steering wheel. The main gear selector is the long lever close to the steering wheel while a short stubby control enables reverse to be selected when forward gears are disconnected. The second master cylinder was installed. The part re-furbished front-end components were retrieved from Dave Davies by Syd McDonald. Paul Stubbings supported by Syd and Ed re-assembled these components on the chassis – excluding the brake calipers because we needed to extract the pistons and check the seals. Chris will do this at Beaulieu using the hydraulic rig because compressed air failed to move them at Andy Robinson Race Cars. The original wheels were re-fitted to the car with new Dunlops up front and the Inglewood Cheater slicks on the rear. We had hoped to complete the steering but a couple of the side-mounted steering rods presented problems and needed serious thread cleaning. Ed Wimble took these away to carry out this work. Chris and Bob fitted the starter motor and remote filter mount to check clearances. Martin completed plans for the fuel system and took measurements for all the hose requirements. The system includes a filter and a shut-off valve. Some of the tank fittings need threads tidying up so we are looking for a set of BSP dies. We also had a chance to consider the chrome plating requirements. There is a lot of it shown in original photos. We are considering a copper flash nickel plate finish on the components not normally visible although clearly plated in early photos (parts of rear axle, etc). We will use chromium plate on the more visible and accessible parts such as the steering and suspension. Syd provided his usual excellent food - he should have his own TV programme - and as a reward he was the one who sat in the cockpit to check the newly-installed controls. The next Work-In Day will only require a small group – probably Andy, Chris and Bob - to look at the clutch/flywheel and starter release bearing set up. The steering links should be ready for installation during that day. We will then look at all the cabling and by the time we gather for the next full team Work-In Day in late May we will really be on the last legs. We plan to take off the rocker covers to check the valves and the sump to check the bottom end before moving on to the first test fire-up on methanol. Web site updates. 30th April: Our good buddy Patrik Jacobsson has updated his Racebilder web site with pictures from this weekend's Test and Tune at Malmo Raceway. You can check out Patrik's pictures at www.racebilder.nu. Knut Söderqvist. 29th April: We were very sorry to hear from Mark Bodimeade (aka Animal) of the death of Knut Söderqvist in an accident at his home in Thailand yesterday (Saturday). Knut first came to prominence in the late 1970s when he imported a US Funny Car which was driven by Harlan Thompson. Knut and Harlan's racing relationship lasted for several years and was rekindled as recently as 2006 when Harlan drove one of Knut's Top Fuel Dragsters in Bahrain. Knut helped to keep European Fuel racing going through some bad times and in later years, through his rental cars, he helped some of Europe's Top Fuel stars to make their names. He kept a legendarily large supply of spares, acquired from his racing contacts in the USA with his unwavering sixth sense for a good deal, and his trailer often resembed an Aladdin's cave. In addition Knut's company Carbon By Design was responsible for some revolutionary developments in injector hat design with some of the US' most prestigious teams vying to purchase each variant as soon as it emerged. Knut had a cheerful and healthy disregard for authority and his sense of humour was legendary. His best friends will tell you that his fuse could be short on occasion but he was invariably just as quick to recover his good humour. Knut was a solid supporter of Eurodragster.com and could always be relied upon to provide "Bullshit" - his words - and quotes which never failed to raise a smile. When recognising your News Editor's number on his mobile he would answer "Bullshit department speaking". When Knut retired to Thailand European drag racing lost one of its real characters and Fuel racing one of its biggest proponents. Our deepest sympathies to Knut's family and friends. We have set up a tribute page to Knut which you can read by clicking here or by clicking on the Features, Interviews, Tributes link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. If you would like to send a tribute to Knut then please E-Mail us at tributes@eurodragster.com. Big Bang called off. 29th April: Today's (Sunday's) Big Bang at Santa Pod Raceway has been called off due to the bad weather. Please do not attempt to travel to Santa Pod today and if you are already Santa Pod then the organisers are asking that you leave the facility as soon as possible. Malmö Test and Tune webcast. 29th April: Malmö Raceway is holding a Test and Tune this weekend and Sten Brunnström tells us that a live webcast is available. You can tune in to events at Malmö at www.ustream.tv/channel/malmo-raceway. Swift snippets. 29th April: We would like to say a big Happy Birthday to UK Junior Dragster racer Thaliah Gibb. Have a good day Thaliah. A Happy 16th Birthday for yesterday to UK Junior Dragster racer Brad Jackson. Hope you had a good birthday Brad. Event entry update. 28th April: Next Friday, 4th May, is the closing date for standard-priced entry to the FIA Main Event, which takes place at Santa Pod Raceway on 1st-4th June and which is a round of the FIA and UEM European Championships, UEM Funny Bike Cup, and certain UK National Championship classes. You can download Pro and Sportsman entry forms from the Santa Pod Racers Club web site at www.eurodragster.com/sprc; FIA and UEM registration and entry forms are also available from the Speedgroup web site at www.speedgroup.eu. You can check out Version 5 of the official FIA Main Event entry list by clicking here. 17:15 Ian tells us that SPRC have a problem with E-Mail access due to a computer fault but that this should be sorted quite soon. So if you have E-Mailed SPRC in the last couple of days and not received a response then please be assured that you are not being ignored and that you will get a reply as soon as possible. If you have any queries about FIA Main Event entry then please contact Santa Pod Racers Club on 01933 313625 (outside the UK +44 1933 313625). Swift snippets. 28th April: Further to Monday's Swift Snippet, photo-journalist Stefan Boman writes to confirm that Frøya's Paul Ingar Udtian still plans to contest Top Fuel Dragster at the FIA Main Event in a new McKinney dragster supplied by Stig Neergaard. "The team will go to the Main Event but there could be an issue if the opportunities to upgrade Paul's licence are affected by bad weather", says Stefan. "Paul's Top Methanol Dragster is for sale and before it's sold and a main sponsor secured he cannot say whether he will drive a full season in 2012, but he is working on it." ACAG seek BSP dies. 28th April: Bob Roberts tells us that as the Allard Chrysler Action Group are progressing with work on the Allard Chrysler Dragster they are turning their attention to the fuel system but need the help of Eurodragster.com readers: We have the original tank which we've tested and found to be sound, but some of the fittings need the threads tidying up. Several have BSP thread form so we need to borrow a set of BSP dies to ensure we do the best possible job. Is there anybody out there in Eurodragster.com Land who has a set and would be willing to lend them to us? If so then please contact me at roberrl-1@robinson-race-cars.co.uk. Tune in to tomorrow's update for a detailed report on the ACAG's last work day. Crewless and clueless! 28th April: The big comeback for Steve and Babs Saunders and the UK's Hi-Speed-Gas Super Pro ET team started at the 2010 FIA Main Event but was completed at the 2012 Auto Trader Easter Thunderball. Babs writes: A blocked fuel filter at the 2010 Main Event gave us melted pistons, torched cylinder heads and bent valves, basically undoing all the good work that Kenny and the lads had done to refresh our motor at EDA. With low funds and even lower enthusiasim, we didn't really know where to turn. Crew chief Peter Nee stepped up to the plate, rebuilding the short motor with parts gathered up from the shelves in our garage. Dave Powell of Performance Unlimited repaired and rebuilt the heads. Steve, Pete and Tom re-assembled and re-fitted the motor. Next time out, due to limited funds, was the following year at the 2011 FIA Main Event. This time, the gear box decided to digest itself and have the converter for dessert! Back home we pulled the gearbox and took it straight over to Mark Flavell for a strip-down and inspection. The only word Flav could come up with was "Carnage!". The whole gear set was totally destroyed. Flav set about rebuilding the box using his spare gear set. The converter was sent to Van Matic for a rebuild. We refitted the box to the Zephyr, but when we came to fit the propshaft we descovered that there was a slight turn on the output shaft splines meaning that it was starting to twist. So once again we pulled the box and took it back to Flav. We then set about trying to figure how to fit our old output shaft to his spare gear set. At this point I put my hands up and suggested to Steve, would it not be better to just sit out the rest of the year until we could build up the funds for a new gear set. If we screwed Flav's spare set then we would end up having to find the funds to buy two sets. Then guess what? Santa delivered Steve a shiny new 1:82 straight cut gear set from JW in Rockledge, FL. Real cool guys to deal with. Poor Flav had to rebuild the box for us once again. Work carried on with the Zephyr, Steve trying to do in two months all the little jobs that he has had two years to do. Typical or what! In January of this year, Steve realised that the SFI dates had run out on the box. Arrrghh! So singing Do the Hokey Cokey we pulled the box out yet again and stripped it bare. This was when we find a broken thrust washer. Andy Robinson at Andy Robinson Race Cars was good enough to find time for us to take our bits down to be certified. Back home poor Mr Flavell rebuilt the box yet again with the new thrust washer. Now we had to find out why it was broken. A lot of cups of coffee and head-scratching later, I suggested to Steve to phone Stan Atkin for his advice. After twenty minutes on the phone Steve appeared to have a smile on his face for the first time in a long long time. Four hours' work later Steve was back on the phone to Stan to thank him for his help and advice and to tell him he was a star. So onto the 2012 AutoTrader Easter Thunderball at Santa Pod, the resumption of our Crewless and Cluless comeback tour! Pete out with work commitments, Tom laid up poorly, Charly busy at university sitting her Finals, Johnny holding the fort at home looking after poorly dog Kym. My last words to Steve, as we set off at 6:45 am on the Thursday morning were "Have you checked everything?". "Of course I have", he said. After a clear journey down, we were at last in the pits. Awning up, caravan in position then unloaded the car off the pick-up. Steve's face then said it all: he had only forgotten to fasten down the rear deck lid, which must have taken flight on the motorway as it was missing! After the initial panic from us both I knew just the man! Flav and his crew were coming down the next day to help Gary and Jayne Kay. So a quick phone call to Flav, with measurements (For the deck lid - Ed), and he brought down a sheet of aluminium cut to size, which fitted perfectly and got us out of a fix once again. We were now fired up and ready for the third qualifying session. With help from Steve and Mally, we made our first pass in a long time, and everything held together. The car launched like it never had before. Everything worked great, except the driver! On Sunday, having got through to round one, we were paired against Rod Harrison in his beautiful Stardust dragster. We had no crew at all. Pete Snow of Jayne's crew volunteered to give us a helping hand. Wandering through the pits came an old pal Aide, his brother Tom, and friends. We soon press-ganged them into crewing for us as well. On the track our usual short and sharp burnout returned. As I brought Steve up to the line, poor Rod was shut off. Steve was lucky to have a solo run. Now, with no pressure, he could get his act together. The Zephyr launched wheels in the air, 8.78 and arrow-straight. Guess what? A certain person now had a smile on his face at last. It all now seems worthwhile again. A big Thank You to Pete and Tom for helping to get the car ready for this season and also again, along with Colin and Ian Johnson, for all their help on the new truck. Team Flavell for helping to keep our enthusiasim going. Pete Snow for his help on the line and not forgetting his help packing up in the rain. All of Santa Pod's track crew for their tireless efforts to keep the race meet going. To Tog and the team and the Eurodragster.com webcam, meaning the guys back home could sit in the warm and dry and watch all the action on their big screens (Thanks, you're welcome - Ed). It was really great to see everybody again and also to see a lot of new faces in Super Pro ET. Roll on the Main Event! Syko on the record hunt. 28th April: After twelve months out of action due to an incredible engine explosion at the begining of last year as well as work commitments, Graham Sykes is planning to put his crazy Syko three-wheeler to some good use by establishing six National Land Speed Records at Elvington on 13th-14th May. Graham will be establishing the new ACU three-wheeler class records up to 5000cc on the Syko, which sports a 4000 cc V8 running on Avgas. "The new engine which I have built is a different concept to the old engine this time relying on horse power and reducing the torque to an acceptable level", says Graham. "It now produces 418 bhp and 520 lb torque. I have built the engine around a short-stroke crank and ally rods making it a high-revving short-stroke four-litre engine. "The block was re-lined by Turner Engineering who made a superb job of relining the old block and boring the new liners to the correct size as requested. The whole transmission has been redesigned and a lower first gear has been very kindly made for the little Bentec gearbox by Per Bengtsson from Flexoart in Sweden and a new clutch, roughly based around fourteen Hayabusa clutch plates, has been designed and manufactured in conjunction with Mick Ellis from BDR Performance Engineering The clutch works very well and has lots of advantages over the old set-up. "Testing has been short. Teething troubles were experienced at Kirkbride trying to find a base setting for the clutch. This ended up in a lot of orbital welding. Two weeks ago the Syko ran at York and had big traction and wheelspin problems, coming down very heavily after gripping at the wrong time in a spectacular fishtail manoeuvre, damaging the front stub axle, sub-frame and axle. "The trike is now undergoing the final preparations for the attempt by fitting a different exhaust system for the noise regulations at Elvington, an electric water pump, temperature control valve and radiator to keep the engine temperatures under control on the flying mile. "Even though I will be establishing new class records, my aim is to break the outright record for three-wheelers which stands at a 165 mph two-way average and which is held by Stan Whitton. All we need is the weather gods to be on our side. The meeting is open to spectators." Web site updates. 28th April: European Top Gas Series Champion and regular Eurodragster.com contributor Herman Jolink has launched a new web site at www.jolinkdragracing.com. The nicely-designed site includes race reports, calendar, pictures and video, sponsor links and more. Big Bang audiocast. 27th April: This weekend's Big Bang at Santa Pod Raceway kicks off with a Run What You Brung session commencing today (Friday) at 14:00. Santa Pod Raceway's radio station Nitro FM will be broadcasting audio this afternoon and then Eurodragster.com will join in with the Webster Race Engineering/Nimbus Motorsport webcam tomorrow morning. You can listen to Nitro FM this afternoon at www.eurodragster.com/nitrofm, and you can check our Big Bang event index, which includes the final entry list plus provisional running orders and links to Nitro FM and live timing, by clicking here or by clicking on the Event Coverage link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. A racer on grass. 27th April: Meanwhile in Houston ex-pat UK Top Alcohol Dragster racer Michael Manners of Eurodragster.com sponsor Cosmo Residences is parked on the lawn and all set for today's start of qualifying at the O'Reilly Autoports NHRA Springnationals. "We have done a little work on the car during our extended off-period", says Mike. "We have a slimmed down crew and taken about fifty pounds off the car. Hopefully that will help us offset some of the tremendous performance improvements which Bill Reichert and others have found while we have not been racing. "Taking care of business seems to be paying off. Cosmo is doing well as are some of my other ventures. "I love that Outlaw Anglia series and the Flying Fyfer. I wrecked my Anglia hot rod a few years ago and last week took delivery of a new chassis for it. As we used to say old Fords never die, they just go faster. "Wish us luck this weekend and as always we are always happy for our European supporters to stop by our pit. This year we are on the grass - bloody Pro Mods got our old space." Good luck and stay safe Mike. You will be able to stay in touch with Mike's progress courtesy of our buddies at Drag Race Central. Attention SSB racers. 26th April: Geoff Myers of Trakbak Racing has asked us to remind those racers wishing to take part in the UEM Super Street Bike Cup at the FIA Main Event that, under UEM rules, in order to be eligible for travel and prize fund payments teams must be registered for the Cup a minimum of thirty days before the start of the first round they wish to enter. This means that for teams wishing to compete at the FIA Main Event at Santa Pod on 1st-4th June registration must have been received by Geoff Myers at geoff@trakbak.com no later than next Tuesday, 1st May, in order to give him time for processing. Geoff tells us that he unable to accept late registrations for any reason. You can download the registration form (PDF format) by clicking here. The dates and venues of the four 2012 UEM European Super Street Bike Cup rounds are: FIA Main Event, Santa Pod Raceway, England: 1st-4th June NitrOlympX, Hockenheimring, Germany: 10th-12th August Kunmadaras, Hungary: 18th-20th August FIA European Finals, Santa Pod Raceway, England: 6th-9th September Bryony's birthday gift. 26th April: The UK's Bryony Wadkin-Snaith will be celebrating Monday's birthday in fine style with her first-ever outing in 9.50 Bike at this weekend's Big Bang at Santa Pod Raceway. Bryony has run in Run What You Brung on the family's The Fang Supertwin and Honda Blackbird to a best of 10.7/137 but this will be her first competitive outing. The offer to ride a 9.50 Bike came from ACU UK Top Fuel Bike Champion Kev Charman, with whose Nitrous Junkie team Bryony crews. "Kev asked me "How do you feel about riding 9.50 Bike at Big Bang?”, and I said that it would be amazing!", Bryony told Eurodragster.com. "I will be riding Richard Gipp's Suzuki GSX, which Brendan Young usually rides. Kev and Gipp have paid for my licence and foregone the rental fee." So seriously does Bryony view her ride that she has quit one of her two jobs to make the time. "I haven't ridden since October but hopefully I won't have forgotten how to do it!", she said. "I will take it easy on the first few passes but I think I have to make observed runs anyway. "I would like to thank Kev and Gipp, Nigel for helping out, and Lizz for being a bad influence. They'll probably have to put up with a lot of nerves from me." Thunder in the mountains. 26th April: The UK's Outlaw Anglia series kicks off 2012 at this weekend's Big Bang at Santa Pod Raceway and Colin Millar writes that the Scottish-based team The Flyin' Fyfer are ready to clock up more miles: Andy, Gus, Angelo, Gerry and I have been busy the last few months running up and down the country picking up the important bits such as the engine and gearbox. We tend to put in a few miles dropping off equipment and picking it up again, never have we managed to get two or three things collected at the same time but we do like all the scenery on the M6! A big thank you to Ian Whitworth for his expertise on the engine build and Ken at EDA for pretending to understand my accent and fast talking and of course his skills with the dyno. The results were very pleasing and they made me cups of coffee, what more can a Scottish lad wish for as they were free! A big thanks also to Andy Frost for another excellent gearbox rebuild and to Jon Webster for keeping the shiny new bits rolling up north. The car has been completely stripped, inspected, cleaned, checked, painted where required, and all put back together again and has had a few wee runs up and down the small mountain on which we are based. The team operates from a fantastic location on top of a hill called Falkland Hill which is 1000 feet up and sits in between Edinburgh and St Andrews, being away up the hills there are not many police cars around so a wee test drive up and down the road is not usually a problem. The team managed to organise a day at Glenrothes Airport last week to carry out some testing and true to our fantastic Scottish weather we arrived and as soon as the car met the tarmac the heavens opened. All we managed was the nice photograph. It's a great location but the negative side is a 400-mile trip down to the Pod and a 385-mile trip to Shakey with a lovely big motorhome which did 6.7 miles to the gallon on Unleaded but were over the moon after the gas conversion and now get a huge 13 miles to the gallon. Last season was our first year with the new car and we could not have had a better year with a slow progression of continued improvement which all came together at the Springspeed Nationals at Shakespeare County Raceway where the team ran two seven-second passes, a combination of all the hard work that had gone into making the dream a reality. We would also like to thank all of the Outlaw Anglia teams who support and encourage everyone within the class whether you are a new comer or you have been around forever; the enthusiasm and great spirit make this one of the most fun classes to be involved in. There has been a lot of communication with all of the Outlaw Anglia members texting , Facebooking and calling to ensure that they are all fired up and ready to go, we have a few who have struggled with lateness on alterations and have just missed the boat, some just don't have the funds which is a problem this year and some who are coming out a bit later in the season, but we have seven solid entries this weekend and even though the weather may not be on our side (Yellow card - Ed) we will have lots and lots of fun. So roll on the weekend and let the season begin, yeeeeeha! Finally our thoughts go out to the Cooper Racing team, Matt and Adam, who have withdrawn this weekend due to the loss of their Grandad (Our own condolences also - Ed). Poutiainen's lotto prize. 26th April: RF Motorsport, a top competitor in European drag racing for more than twenty years and with several European Championship victories in the Top Fuel category, is welcoming its newest sponsor Multilotto.com in the hunt for the 2012 Championship title. RF Motorsport currently run three Top Fuel Dragsters in the FIA European Drag Racing Championship, at the moment holding a second spot. Competitions for this year include races in Germany, Finland, Sweden and the UK with additional appear­ances in non-competition events in Europe to help raise the profile of drag racing. Of RF Motorsport's three Top Fuellers, Multilotto.com will sponsor the most competitive of the three, the dragster driven by Risto 'Bad to the Bone' Poutiainen of Finland. Risto has been the runner-up for the last three years but this year, with the support of Multilotto.com, the aim is the top spot in the 2012 FIA European Drag Racing Championship. Through Multilotto.com, people all over the world can participate online in the world's largest and most ex­citing lotteries, such as the US MegaMillions and PowerBall. Multilotto.com has the ambition of being Europe's largest provider of international lotteries and by teaming up with RF Motorsport and Risto Poutiainen, Multilotto.com aim to reach the always enthusiastic crowd of drag racing and motorsport. You don' t have to be present at a lottery retail store to buy a ticket and through RF Motorsport, Multilotto.com are offering all of Eurodragster.com readers two free lines in one of the USA's biggest lotteries, the Mega Millions draw. All you have to do is use the invitation code multilotto@rfmotorsport.com  when registering at www.multilotto.com. Swift snippets. 26th April: 19:45 Many thanks to Ian Marshall for sending us Version 4 of the official entry list for the FIA Main Event, which takes place at Santa Pod Raceway on 1st-4th June. You can check out the entry list by clicking here or by clicking on the Event Coverage link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. Entry closes next Friday (4th May); you can download Pro and Sportsman entry forms from the Santa Pod Racers Club web site at www.eurodragster.com/sprc or from the Speedgroup web site at www.speedgroup.eu. If you have any queries about FIA Main Event entry then please contact Santa Pod Racers Club at paula.marshall@btconnect.com or call 01933 313625 (outside the UK +44 1933 313625). Our best wishes for a long and happy future to Kirsty Gibb and Dan Giles who have become engaged. Former Junior Dragster racers, Kirsty and Dan have been an item for five years and will now be for considerably longer than that. Happy Days guys. We would like to wish a very Happy Birthday to UK 8.50 Bike racer Jake Mechaell. Have a very Happy Birthday Jake. An invitation to set records. 26th April: Entry is now open for the British National Records event at Elvington on 13th-14th May. Trevor Duckworth writes that this is the first time in over twenty one years that a records event of this size as been run at Elvington, the home of most of the British National and World records in the UK: The Event, run by Straightliners and the ACU, sees a new dimension in record-breaking in the form of the new British Top Speed records over the mile and one point four mile distances. These new records will utilise the full length of the two-mile runway at Elvington giving riders a chance to get nearer to the speeds set at Maxton and Texas in the USA, but we will be doing it properly with runs in both directions taking the mean average speed for the record. There are capacity classes for all types of bikes from 50 cc right up to 5000 cc and the new records are all to be established at this first event. We are also running the well-established standing and flying quarter mile British short distance records. Take a look at www.200mph.net for all the quarter mile record targets; some have stood for over thirty years and there are some very famous names on the list The entry fee is £250. Regulations and entry forms are available from helen.greathead@ntlworld.com or for further information please contact trevor@straightliners.co.uk or call 01484 710850. Web site updates. 26th April: The Mad Welshman has asked us to say a big Thank You to everyone who has taken a look at my his Flickr page at www.flickr.com/photos/the_madwelshman which has now been in existence for a year. "In that time, you have helped raise over 95,000 views which, to be honest, is truly overwhelming and is a much greater response than what I was expecting" says Mad. "I would also like to say thank you to all of the racers and track crews, without whom we would not have this wonderful sport and I would not have anything to photograph! Once again thank you all, and keep up the good work." Elsoms join the Blog roll. 25th April: We are pleased to welcome UK Super Modified team Elsom Motorsport to our roster of exclusive Racer Blogs brought to you in association with Alamo Rent-A-Car. In the opening instalment Rob and Sharon Elsom introduce themselves and give some back history as well as relating their return to the track at the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball. As ever you can stay in touch with the latest Blog updates by clicking here or by clicking on the Alamo Blogs link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. French Championship kicks off. 25th April: The airstrip of Mende-Brenoux hosted the last 2011 race of France's Trophée Dragster, but our good buddy Pascal Thébault says that this year Mende hosts the opening race of the Trophée Dragster 2012 which takes place this Saturday and Sunday (28th-29th). Despite the economic situation, the Association Trophée Dragster has had a pleasant surprise with 87 competitors currently on the  provisional entry list compared to 78 in 2011. The event hosts Super Pro ET, Pro ET, Junior Dragster, Street Run A, Street Run B, Street Run C, Drag Bikes and Run What You Brung. Established and run "By racers for racers", the French Championship is continuing its steady development, still with the same thoroughness but without sacrificing a friendly approach. You can check out the flyer for the full Championship series by clicking here. You can find out more about France Drag at promotop.org/drag/news/news.php, the Association Trophée Dragster at www.trophee-dragster.fr, and French Drag Bikes at www.facebook.com/pages/Dragbikefr/184774841546577. Tale of a mixed weekend. 25th April: It was a weekend of mixed fortunes for Nick Good, Dave Catton and the NGMotorsport Beovax-Lucas Oil Super Pro ET team at the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball. Despite the weather, Nick says that there were some highs over the weekend: There were no major changes to the two dragsters over the winter months so we were hoping to pick up where we'd left off at the end of last season. We had freshened the motor in Beovax-Lucas Oil Two and one thing we did want to see, weather permitting, was a seven-second time slip for Dave. If the track was going to be on the cool side with varying grip levels the Worthy four-link chassis should come into its own. Dave ended up qualified in sixth with a 7.86/171.9, both PBs. Qualifying wasn't as straightforward with the blown car. Ice and frost on Friday morning meant that the first qualifying session wasn't really an option. Unfortunately the weather dictated that we would only have three other qualifiers and after two half passes and a breakout 6.95 on a 7.00 dial-in we were probably lucky to qualify as high as sixteenth. Before the season we had wondered whether the two Beovax-Lucas Oil dragsters would be paired in eliminations. We couldn't believe it - the first round at the first meeting! Unfortunately a distributor malfunction  on my car during the warm-up on Sunday evening meant that we would have to wait to have the two cars racing one another in eliminations. Dave's bye run in the first round was our last action of the weekend. Once the hosepipe bans and drought had hit the headlines before Easter it was bound to rain when least wanted. A big thank you to the crew of Simon, Rick, Gary, Pete and Susie who do a great job. The team would like to thank their sponsors for the season: Beovax Computer Services, Lucas Oil, GlasWeld Systems, Samco Sport, Chris Brown Body Repairs, WeBuyAnyDamagedCar.com, East Coast Signs, SpinWerkes, Leatt MotoR, Johnson Ironworks, BGC Motorsport Components, and KMA Motors. Swift snippets. 25th April: Malmö Raceway is hosting a Test and Tune this weekend (28th-29th). More information and on-line entry are available on the track's web site at www.srif.se. Sten Brunnström tells us that he is planning a live webcast from Malmö Raceway at the weekend; we will post a Home Page link on Saturday and Sunday. David Lloyd-Jones of Santa Pod Raceway tells us that Friday's and Saturday's Run What You Brung sessions at Big Bang are open to VWs and racers only. Racers wishing to participate in any RWYB session will need to present their DVLA licence rather than their competition licence. Many thanks to Points Co-ordinator Yvonne Tramm for forwarding us the post-Auto Trader Easter Thunderball standings in the 2012 Santa Pod Racers Club Championships. You can check out the SPRC points on our Speedflow-sponsored Points Standings page by clicking here or by clicking on the Speedflow Points Standings link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. We have two spy pictures for you today. The first (below left) came with no words whilst the second (below right) came from the same E-Mail address as Sunday's "The beginning..." picture. If you know more, or if you would like to send your own spy picture, then drop us a line at eurodragster.com@btinternet.com. European fans have someone to cheer on at this weekend's O'Reilly Autoports NHRA Springnationals in Houston as ex-pat UK Top Alcohol Dragster racer Michael Manners of Eurodragster.com sponsor Cosmo Residences is making what this year's business commitments render a rare appearance. Qualifying commences on Friday and you will be able to stay in touch with Mike's progress courtesy of our buddies at Drag Race Central. Luke Bennett of blown-alcohol altered team and Eurodragster.com Bloggers Bennett Racing has asked us to point out that the team's altered is named Relentless because "The meaning of the word relentless is "Unyielding and never giving up" and that's us", and not because the team have any connection with the energy drink of the same name. We have two birthdays today (Wednesday). Happy Birthday firstly to our good buddy Maikel Gloudemans of our streaming server provider Doyousee.me. Anne-Marie and Stephen Seamarks have asked us to wish a very Happy 21st Birthday to UK Pro ET racer Matthew Seamarks. "Lots of love from Mum and Dad", they say. Have a great day M@ikel and Matthew. Speedgroup admin update. 24th April: Speedgroup Co-ordinator Åsa Kinnemar has been in touch to to draw the attention of FIA and UEM Championship racers to two info-packed pages on the Speedgroup site, which answer some of the most frequently asked questions at this time of year: Questions about Championship registration, event entry, start numbers, licenses etc are addressed at www.speedgroup.eu and the pages are named Practical Info 2012 – FIA and Practical Info 2012 – UEM. We advise all FIA and UEM Championship racers to check these pages, if nothing else to refresh your memories memory. Links to the full FIA and UEM regulations are also placed on those pages. Championship registration must be completed at the latest thirty days before the first Championship event which you wish to enter. Teams entering the FIA Main Event at Santa Pod Racewat on 1st-4th June are advised to register now if they have not done so already. We also wish to draw attention to and clarify the functions of the different web sites connected to Speedgroup: www.speedgroup.eu The official European Drag Racing Championship information web site operated by Speedgroup. Speedgroup handle FIA European Drag Racing Championship administration and assist Keith Bartlett in handling of UEM European Drag Bike Championship administration; In addition to information posted on the web site, Speedgroup also publish Online Newsletters on a frequent basis. Click here for the latest newsletter; Speedgroup work with Eurodragster.com to manage event coverage (we will have more information about this season's plans a bit later on). Speedgroup also operate a separate web site for the EDRS European Drag Racing Series. Go to www.speedgroup.eu and the EDRS logo at the top right-hand corner. With twenty seven events at seventeen tracks in seven countries the EDRS European Drag Racing Series is Europe's biggest series in drag racing and focuses on Sportsman classes. www.dragracing.eu This web site contains the new FIA and UEM Championships and EDRS Series and event entry system developed by software and timing system company Nitroz on behalf of Speedgroup. FIA and UEM Championship registrations, including fee payments, are handled via this system; All racers planning to contest the FIA and UEM European Championships and EDRS European Drag Racing Series are requested to complete their driver profiles in the system if they have not done so already. EDRS participants also must choose their Home Division in the system before the first EDRS race they enter. So far 353 racers have registered. There is a step-by-step guide on-line on how to do so. It is important that you add all information you can and that you include photographs. This site is also used by media and track announcers. FIA/UEM/EDRS organisers are encouraged to use this web site for event entry. For example, Tierp Arena's events from May through to August are already open for entry. Most Championship organisers are planning to handle the event entry to their events via the system. We will continually update event information. Important! Only those events which have opened for entry is visible on this web site. This web site is not a complete Event Calendar - please check the Speedgroup web site for FIA, UEM and EDRS calendars. Events are added to this web site as soon as their organisers have the invitations ready and wish to open the entry. For organisers who have chosen to handle events outside the system, information is available on how and where to enter on the Speedgroup web sites. We fully understand that it is not easy for teams to keep track of all they need to know, where to find it, and not least who does what between event organisers, FIA, UEM, National ASNs and Speedgroup. We are happy to guide teams and to answer questions about the FIA and UEM European Championships and EDRS European Drag Racing Series. Please contact me at asa.kinnemar@speedgroup.eu or call +46 70 531 5332. Speedgroup wish all teams and organisers good luck with their continued preparations and we hope to see you all at race tracks throughout Europe this summer! Swift snippets. 24th April: 13:10 Many thanks to Ian Marshall for sending us Version 3 of the official entry list for the FIA Main Event, which takes place at Santa Pod Raceway on 1st-4th June. You can check out the entry list by clicking here or by clicking on the Event Coverage link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. You can download Pro and Sportsman entry forms from the Santa Pod Racers Club web site at www.eurodragster.com/sprc or from Speedgroup as described above. If you have any queries about FIA Main Event entry then please contact Santa Pod Racers Club at paula.marshall@btconnect.com or call 01933 313625 (outside the UK +44 1933 313625). The UK's Vic Amato announces with regret that he has sold his Inabit Pro ET Mustang. "I have made some great friends at the track and will miss you all", says Vic. "I raced the car for almost ten years and had  a great time. I will be at the track as a spectator at some point later this year and will look you all up. Good luck to you all and be safe." We would like to say a big Happy Birthday to Team Heaven and Hell Pro ET team member and Honorary Eurodragster.com staff member Colin Roaf. Have a great day Colin. Andy Thetford of Mick Payne's Pro Modified crew asked us to say a big Thank You to Andy Robinson Race Cars, Webster Race Engineering and Santa Pod Raceway who donated raffle prizes for his birthday party. "We raised £700 for Leukaemia and Lymphoma research charities", says Andy. "In view of what has befallen Paula Marshall and Big John it was the least that I could do. Thank you all." Santa Pod Raceway are offering great value hospitality at the FIA Main Event on 1st-4th June, says Kelly Dormer. "Various packages are still available starting from £89 + VAT per person for the Quarter Mile Club", says Kelly. "Other Hospitality packages start from &£119 + VAT and include a day's hospitality and weekend admission.  All include privilege viewing area with refreshments throughout the day including hot breakfast and lunch". For more information E-Mail kelly@santapod.com or call 01234 782828 (outside the UK +44 1234 782828). Revealed: The axe hero. 24th April: Our good buddy Pascal Thébault writes that the axe hero in last Wednesday spy picture is Phil Berté who currently officiates as Technical Scrutineer in the French Association Trophée Dragster. Pascal says Phil's position is somewhat of a paradox as he has raced almost exclusively on two wheels. "In the early 1980s, Phil built two machines using MX engines supplied by Kawasaki France", says Pascal. "The lightweight chassis was based on two ally profiles with some titanium parts such as 4 mm thick fork heads. The green bike was raced in the France and Netherlands series as shown in the 1983 Uden Sprint photo. The White Arrow (seen at Long Marston in 1984) was used among others during a  US summer tour in 1985. After tests in Bakersfield, Phil raced in AMA Drag Bike at Phoenix, Baton Rouge and Gainesville. He then stored the bike having recorded bests of 10.20/124 mph. "Almost thirty years later, Phil has been asked to build two machines using the same architecture. One of the bosses of  Race and Style, an online seller of scooter parts, has commissioned a frame to accommodate a very special scooter twin. With Nitrous boost, he aims to be in the tens. "The other project is a Lakester, but looks like a guitar. The objective is to achieve the title of Fastest Moped on Earth using only engine  performance parts available at Bidalot Technologies. The bike will attend the next Bonneville Speed Week in August. 100 mph should be exceeded with a 50 cc engine which is genrally available for sale. "To return to drag racing, the rail in the background was run in the 1990s by Alain Pinel from Toulouse, and now belongs to Phil." PMR bring forward TS 'slammer. 24th April: Paul Marston Racing have announced that they are looking at moving forward the début of the UK's first purpose-built Top Sportsman doorslammer to 2012 rather than the original 2013. Paul Marston explains: The interest which Top Sportsman is producing in drag racing is quite phenomenal at times. Out of the blue PMR have been contacted by an online clothing company who want to use the Top Sportsman platform as a major marketing tool for an exciting new clothing range which that they intend to launch in 2012. It's a pretty tall order to bring the build programme forward nearly a whole year and could quickly become a logistical nightmare! These cars are very sophisticated machines and all the trips to the States which different members of Paul Marston Racing have made have over the past seasons have given us a real understanding of what works and what does not in the construction of a successful UK Top Sportsman race car. Remember that UK Top Sportsman is very new here, but the American version has been a large feature in most sanctioning bodies for up to twenty years now. Our race car has been constructed in England as it will race here, but naturally our parts mainly come from the States and quite often our suppliers do not share the same understanding of deadlines as us! But after talking to one of our major supporters, Gary Springford at Drag Race Engineering, and the PMR crew we all gave it a tentative green light. Our ace up our sleeve is that 98% of all the hard parts are already bought, paid for and in stock, so providing that the contract is signed and the money arrives we can get the job done. It has been an interesting project. It's like nothing else that Paul Marston Racing have built before, because we are not building a race car to bracket race. You want something that will perform very consistently; it's a similar set of rules as for Super-class race cars, consistency is king. Time for the B word - but! When you build a race car and all you want it to do is go very fast, wow! It's a whole new set of rules. All of a sudden everything matters, every single part that you put on the car has to be the right part and do a job otherwise it doesn't go on. In a nutshell, for every single part that is fitted you have to ask yourself "Is it the right part? In that case how do we make it better?". This, for a Sportsman racer and someone who works for a living, is all new territory since the majority of Sportsman racers are bracket or Super-class racers. Every single step has to be considered. Take the bodyshell shape for instance. What's the criterion? Well, to be as fast as possible it needs to be as aerodynamically slippery as possible. The easier it cuts through the air, the less drag it creates, potentially the faster it goes. After a lot of research, I think we've got that one right. Stay tuned to Eurodragster.com for more updates. Big Bang Perfect Awards. 24th April: This weekend's Big Bang at Pod Raceway is the second event in the 2012 Eurodragster.com Perfect Awards scheme. £100 is on offer for perfect performance. Racers please note that decals are mandatory for both Perfect Awards this season. This weekend's Eurodragster.com/ModUrStang Perfect Light Award has been reset to £50 after it was won by Marius Blackburn at the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball. The money will be awarded to the first racer this weekend to record a Reaction Time of 0.000 seconds. The Perfect Light Award is available all to racers in all classes during qualifying and eliminations, but will only be awarded for the first Perfect Light of the event. If not won this weekend then the Award will be increased to £75 for the Springspeed Festival; if it is won then it will be reset to £50 for the Springspeed Festival. The Perfect Light Award is presented in association with vehicle modification specialist ModUrStang whose web site you can find at www.modurstang.co.uk, or visit Mike Lacey in the Pro ET pits. This weekend's Eurodragster.com/Gold RV Perfect ET Award has been reset to £50 after it was won by Paul Marston at the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball. The money will be awarded to the first racer this weekend to run to 0.000 on their dial-in or index during qualifying or eliminations. The Perfect ET Award is available this weekend in Sportsman ET, Lucas Oil Junior Dragster (eliminations only), 8.50 Bike, 9.50 Bike, VW Pro, VW Sportsman and Junior Drag Bike, but will only be awarded for the first Perfect Run of the event. If not won this weekend then the Award will be increased to £75 for the Springspeed Festival; if it is won then it will be reset to £50 for the Springspeed Festival. The Perfect ET Award is presented in association with RV sales and service specialists Gold RV whose web site you can find at www.goldrv.co.uk, or visit Derek Flynn in the Top Methanol pits. To be eligible to collect either Perfect Award, racers are required to carry decals, one on each side of the vehicle. If you pull this weekend's first Perfect Light or Perfect ET but are not carrying decals then there will be no discussion; we will not pay out and the next person to pull a Perfect Light or Perfect ET will get the money assuming that they are carrying decals. ModUrStang and Gold RV decals will be available in Signing On on Saturday morning. Big Bang coverage. 24th April: Eurodragster.com will be at Santa Pod Raceway this weekend to bring you all the news from Big Bang in association with Alamo Rent-A-Car. Our coverage will consist of frequently-updated reports on the on-track action starting with qualifying from 4:00 pm on Saturday and then all day on Sunday, and courtesy of occasional stand-in photographer Julian Hunt we will post a photo gallery at the end of each day. There will be no pit notes this weekend as Simon is unfortuately unable to attend. The Webster Race Engineering/Nimbus Motorsport webcam will be on-line so long as the track is open on Saturday and Sunday and will be broadcasting live video and commentary/Nitro FM Audio with streaming services provided by our friends at Doyousee.me. Nitro FM will be broadcasting audio-only when the track opens at 2:00 pm on Friday and you will be able to listen to their stream at www.eurodragster.com/nitrofm. You can check out our Big Bang event index, which includes the final entry list plus provisional running orders and links to webcam and Nitro FM, by clicking here or by clicking on the Event Coverage link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. Swift snippets. 23rd April: Her Majesty Queen Carole Ismail of Race Control tells us that racer sign-on at this weekend's Big Bang at Santa Pod Raceway will be taking place in the Stewards' room, next door to the usual Signing On Office. Signing on for racers opens at 9:00 am on Saturday. You can find check out the provisional Big Bang running orders by clicking here or by clicking on the Event Coverage link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. Paul Ingar Udtian's licence upgrade from Top Methanol Dragster to Top Fuel Dragster did not take place at the weekend as some small but crucial parts, which were on their way from the USA, did not arrive in time for the Test and Tune at Mosten. The Islanders and car owner Stig Neergaard are now working on a Plan B. Norway's Hans Olav Olstad will have his new Supertwin ready soon, writes Terje Håkensbakken. "This is a gem of a drag bike with hand-built rear aluminium casing", says Terje. "Hans Olav is working on the motor and it all should be ready for a test at Tierp in May. You can look forward to seeing this bike on the strip." As did everyone else in the class, UK Pro Modified racer Wayne Nicholson and the Lucky Devil team struggled with the cold track at the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball but were confident knowing how much they had. "We had a little bit of a problem with a leak from our Bruno / Lenco", says Wayne "It shouldn't have been an issue, as we had the parts to fix it but we found that the seals which we had were wrong. However, a friendly helping hand or two got us back in the show. The event was rained off but we came away with some good info and we feel confident about our next outing at the FIA Main Event". You can find out more on the team's web site at www.luckydevil777dragracing.com. Steve Dudley tells us that the next slot drag race at MrD Raceway takes place at 8:00 pm this Friday (27th) at the Cathedral Primary School, Victoria Road, Chelmsford, Essex CM1 1PA. For more details check out the MrD web site at slotdragracing.weebly.com, and for more about the slot drags check out our recent Feature by clicking here. Web site updates. 23rd April: In the latest instalment of his exclusive Racer Blog presented in association with Alamo Rent-A-Car, Luke Bennett wonders where the time has gone and brings us up-to-date with the latest work in the workshops of the Bennett Racing blown-alcohol-altered team. As ever you can stay in touch with the latest Blog updates by clicking here or by clicking on the Alamo Blogs link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. Lindgren wheels Forsberg wagon. 22nd April: The latest news from Stock/Superstock is that behind the wheel of the Forsberg Motorsport 1966 Chevelle Wagon this year will be multiple Swedish and Nordic Competition Eliminator Champion PerErik Lindgren, driver of the Norhern Raider altered. Per Olof Forsberg, who has more than thirty five years of dragracing experience, says "We needed to take the next step in developing our programme, and new blood behind the steering wheel felt like the best way to do it! Now I can concentrate on checking the weather station, tuning the car, and now and then giving some hints how to drive and cut good lights!" "I am really very happy that this deal has gone through", says PerErik Lindgren. "It has been my dream for many years to do this! I am very aware I have a lot to learn in this category and that nothing is given away in S/SS but I will do my very best to compete with the big guys. The team's season will start in Lindesberg next weekend, then two weeks later they will make their début at the Swedish Championship event at Tierp Arena. "This is a learning year", says Per Olof, "but you never know what will happen when you rolling the dice. "The goal is to attend every possible Swedish Championship event but also give the EDRS cup a serious shot". "I see this as a win-win situation in many ways", says PerErik. "It is cheaper to transport the cars since we will have both in my trailer, and running two classes gives us more experience and is twice as much fun... hopefully! "A big thank you to local sponsors Burlink, AE Däck, Isakssons Åkeri, Regus, Bergs Maskin and Sesemic, and to our US partner Bergitta Bergqvist at Autoshop Racing Engines who always helps us out when we're in when in trouble." Swift snippets. 22nd April: The latest spy picture to arrive at the offices of Eurodragster.com came with the words "The beginning...". If you know more, or if you would like to send your own spy picture, then drop us a line at eurodragster.com@btinternet.com. The British Drag Racing Hall of Fame is inviting applications from anyone who would be interested in taking on the task of press and sponsorship communications plus event planning and management. For more information check out the Opportunity link on the BDRHoF web site at www.britishdragracinghof.co.uk or E-Mail BDRHoF Chair Stuart Bradbury at BritishDRHoF@aol.com. 1320 to go. 22nd April: Santa Pod Raceway has joined up with 1320go.com to provide live timing data on-line and to your phone. 1320go.com provides a web site and phone app which displays live timing data from drag strips around the world including Las Vegas Motor Speedway, Yas Drag Centre, Willowbank Raceway and now Santa Pod Raceway at www.1320go.com/santapod. You can watch live data from any track for on your phone once you have bought the app, or at 1320go.com where members can read historical data. As well as live data you can also view qualifying and elimination data from the current event via the menu button on Android or on-screen button on Iphone. Run What You Brungers, tuners, Crew Chiefs and racers who are members of the web site can analyse their race data along with additional downloadable software. "From the testing we have done so far, the app works at Santa Pod Raceway across all networks but as none of the local 3G connections are brilliant please download the app before you arrive if you wish to use it - Santa Pod Raceway cannot guarantee a 3G connection", says DJ of Santa Pod Raceway. The app is available from the Itunes App Store or the Android marketplace for a one-off fee of £6.10. Membership of the website is $1 a day or $24.95 a year per track for historical data. You can find out more at www.1320go.com. Big Bang racer update. 21st April: Many thanks to Ian Marshall for passing on details of the arrangements for next weekend's Big Bang at Santa Pod Raceway. Santa Pod Raceway's gates are open between 2:00 pm and 7:00 pm on Thursday, and then open for the weekend at 9:00 am on Friday. Both car and bike scrutineering commence at 10:00 on Saturday. There is no formal scrutineering order at this event. Three cycles of qualifying are planned from 4:00 pm on Saturday, with another three cycles of qualifying planned for Sunday morning and eliminations from Sunday lunchtime. The provisional running orders can be checked out by clicking here or by clicking on the Event Coverage link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. Please note that as ever these running orders are provisional and subject to change due to weather or track conditions or for any other reason deemed necessary by race officials. You can find the official Big Bang web site at www.big-bang.co.uk. SCR postpone Test and Tune. 20th April: Due to the very unsettled weather conditions with forecasts of heavy showers and longer periods of rain, having consulted with the Met Office and other weather bureaux, the management of Shakespeare County Raceway have reluctantly decided to postpone this weekend's (21st-22nd) Public Track Event. "We would like to apologise for the short notice and any inconvenience as we were reluctant to postpone any earlier", they say. "We will be rescheduling the weekend's events and the new schedules will be announced shortly. Our next event is on the Voltz Energy Shots Springspeed Nationals Drag Racing on 5th-7th May and following that will be the American Car Yanks Weekend and Public Track Day on 26th-27th May." 2012 Greek Championship. 20th April: Our good friend Elias Vathias has been in touch with news of the 2012 Greek Championship: Six races are planned for this year. These are held under the auspices of AMOTOE (Official Greek Motorcycle Federation) and OMAE (Under Recognition Greek Cars Federation). The dates are: 31.03 - 01.04 at Tymbaki, Crete 28.04 - 29.04 at Polykastro, Kilkis 26.05 - 27.05 at Polykastro, Kilkis 23.06 - 24.06 at Maleme, Chania, Crete 22.09 - 23.09  at Polykastro, Kilkis 03.09 - 04.09 at Tymbaki, Crete The first Championship Drag Race of 2012 took place at Tymbaki, Crete, and was a really good race with very powerful vehicles. More information on this race at www.greekdragster.com/database/events.php?RaceID=201201 Entries and classification at www.greekdragster.com/database/db_classification.php?race=201201 Timing data by class at www.greekdragster.com/database/db_RaceTimingData.php?race=201201 Photos at www.greekdragster.com/images/Shows_Races/20120401Tymbaki/index.htm Videos (uploading until the end of the week) at www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7A5E8E00054CE331 We have already had three Run What You Brung events this year in Rhodes, Serres and Tymbaki. The next RWYB will be held at Lamia Military Airport on 12th-13th May. This airport held a lot of drag races during the period 1990-2000 and now is back on the schedule. Lamia is in the centre of Greece and has all the potential to gather races from all over the country. Elias' excellent web site at www.greekdragster.com contains all the information you could possibly want about drag racing in Greece. Flamholc ready in Bristol. 20th April: It's time for the second round of the American Drag Racing League and Swedish Pro Mod racer Adam Flamholc has arrived in Bristol in Tennessee for Spring Drag III which takes place today (Friday) and tomorrow. "Things didnt really work out the way we wanted at the season opener in Houston, but after the event we made some really strong runs at a test session in Texas", says Adam. "We got some problems sorted out, and I believe that we can run really well in Bristol! The track is located in the mountains, so the weather conditions are not what we are used to, but we have four qualifying runs to figure it out. "ADRL are broadcasting the event live at www.livestream.com/adrllive. "As always a big thanks from the Flamholc Racing team and I to all sponsors Hurst Boiler, Amalie, Cleanpipe, Performance Plus, Auto Shop Racing Engines, Doyousee.me, JA IT Hjälp, MWS Ventilservice AB, Flat our Performance, Custom Graphics, Malmö Motorrenovering and Top It Service." You will be able to stay in touch with Adam's progress via the Flamholc Racing Facebook page. Swift snippets. 20th April: Visitors to Mosten MC's Test and Tune at Mosten this weekend will get a lungful of nitro as Frøya's Top Methanol Dragster racer Paul Ingar Udtian is to commence licencing passes in one of Stig Neergaard's trio of Top Fuel Dragsters. We will have more news about Paul Ingar's Top Fuel plans here on Eurodragster.com next week. The latest spy picture to arrive at the offices of Eurodragster.com (below left) came with the words "First time we've seen it in twenty years!". If you know more, or if you would like to send your own spy picture, then drop us a line at eurodragster.com@btinternet.com. Lloyd Allard has completed work on the Allard Chrysler Dragster which is now on its way back to Eurodragster.com sponsor Andy Robinson Race Cars complete with new blower pipes (above right). The Allard Chrysler Action Group's restoration team are re-grouping at ARRC this coming Sunday (22nd) to continue the work. If you would like to join them then please contact Bob Roberts at roberrl-1@robinson-race-cars.co.uk. Event entry update. 19th April: Entry is still open for the Voltz Energy Shots Springspeed Nationals, variously the second and third rounds of the UK Championships, which takes place at Shakespeare County Raceway on 5th-7th May. Official entry forms are available on the Shakespeare County Raceway web site at www.shakespearecountyraceway.co.uk. If you have any queries about event entry at Shakespeare County Raceway then please contact the track at enquiries@shakespearecountyraceway.co.uk or call 01789 720180 (outside the UK +44 1789 720180). Many thanks to Ian Marshall for passing on the final version of the official entry list for Big Bang, which takes place at Santa Pod Raceway on 28th-29th April and which is a Championship round for Super Modified, Sportsman ET, Junior Dragster, 8.50 Bike, 9.50 Bike, VW Pro, VW Sportsman, Outlaw Anglia and Junior Drag Bike. You can check out the final Big Bang entry list by clicking here or by clicking on the Event Coverage link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. Entry is open for the FIA Main Event, which takes place at Santa Pod Raceway on 1st-4th June and which is a round of the FIA and UEM European Championships, UEM Funny Bike Cup, and certain UK National Championship classes. You can download Pro and Sportsman entry forms from the Santa Pod Racers Club web site at www.eurodragster.com/sprc; FIA and UEM class entry forms are also available from the Speedgroup web site at www.speedgroup.eu. You can check out Version 1 of the official FIA Main Event entry list by clicking here. If you have any queries about FIA Main Event entry then please contact Santa Pod Racers Club at paula.marshall@btconnect.com or call 01933 313625 (outside the UK +44 1933 313625). Swift snippets. 19th April: Many thanks to Yvonne Tramm and our very own Simon for passing us the post-Auto Trader Easter Thunderball points standings in the UK National Drag Racing Championships. ACU and SPRC points will be available shortly. You can check out the UK points on our Speedflow-sponsored Points Standings page by clicking here or by clicking on the Speedflow Points Standings link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. Many thanks to Andy Marrs of TSI Timers Europe for forwarding us the official timing data from the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball. You can check out the Easter Thunderball timing data by clicking here or by clicking on the Timing Data link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. Web site updates. 19th April: The latest issue of the Speedgroup newsletter is now on-line and includes racer and sponsor features, calendars, information on the Contingency Programme and more including the first instalment in a new feature, the Eurodragster.com Editor's Diary. You can check out the Speedgroup newsletter at club.speedgroup.eu/newsletters/2012/edition3_2012/edition3_start.html. Hobbs signs up for NSA at SCR. 18th April: The Southern branch of the National Sprint Association will be hosting the second round of the club's Southern based Championship at Shakespeare County Raceway this weekend, 21st-22nd April. A notable name to appear on the NSA's entry list is the maestro of seventies and eighties British drag biking history and 2007 British Drag Racing Hall of Fame inductee John Hobbs. Although John's legendary Hobbit fuel bike is due to appear at the NSRA Nostalgia Nationals in June, John will be performing some shakedown laps on his replica. John has very fond memories of his days racing with the NSA which started in 1964 when he happened to come across a sprint meeting being held at Duxford Aerodrome where NSA legend George Brown was racing the mighty Vincent Super Nero. From that day on John was hooked on the crazy world of sprinting and later drag racing. The last time John rode competitively at the Long Marston/Avon Park quarter mile was way back in 1990 at the September BDRA Nationals when he beat Gordon Diggens in the final of Top Competition Bike with the Hobbit. John will also be laying down some shakedown runs on yet another well known seventies drag bike, Shotgun, a double-engine Triumph Shotgun owned by Dave Clee. There will also be another double-engine Triumph from the past making the journey to Strafford-Upon-Avon in the hands of Ray Law. The first round of the NSA Championship held at the popular Midlands race track attracted a mouthwatering selection of both vintage and nostalgia machinery right up today's modern bikes. The two day event included the eighties-styled Mickey Taker Triumph Trident of Jasper Joy, Nick Law's 500cc Godden and the wheelstanding antics of John Young's 350 and 500cc Japs. Quickest overall was Dave Batcheler's Suzuki 8.50 Bike Plumb Crazy. With another excellent entry promised for this weekend from the NSA head on down to Shakespeare County Raceway's Public Track Days on Saturday and Sunday. There's a lot more going on including the AMC Street Bike Challenge and Custom Chrome Racing Sunday. Gates open at 6:00 pm on Friday and the track opens at 10:00 am on both Saturday and Sunday subject to track and weather conditions. Down, but not out. 18th April: UK Nostalgia Funny Car racer Wendy Baker has been in touch with an account of the Timewarp team's weekend at the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball: In 2011 we only made two meetings, the Easter Thunderball and Dragstalgia, and despite being plagued by gearbox gremlins we were happy with the car's performance. It was disappointing not to make the NitrOlmypX as we were unable to secure a second Nitro car to come out and play with us, so not having run since last July it was great to be back at the track and, more specifically, back in the seat! Unfortunately, now that we have cured the gearbox, the gremlins have now moved on to bigger and better things, i.e. the fuel system! On the first run on Saturday the car went lean at about the eighth mile which over-revved the engine and bent the exhaust valves. There was no major damage but time was spent stripping the heads and changing valves. On Sunday the weather wasn't the only thing to get worse.  The car launched quite well, straight down the groove, but again just before the eighth something was amiss so, being the ever cautious person that I am, I lifted.  Back in the pits, the heads came off again and revealed the cause of the problem.  The inlet valve in number three had snapped and beaten the top of the piston, which in turn had attempted to ram the valve head sideways down the port. A disappointing and expensive weekend, so why did we go home feeling so positive and optimistic? We caught up with loads of old friends, made lots of new friends (Ivana looks better in a Nostalgia Funny Car than a Junior FC!) and despite the damage we have plans to make a few more outtings this year. We will be at the Mopars and Dragstalgia and should be running against Ramone with the alky car at both these event. We are hoping to make Hockenheim, if we can find another Nitro car to play with, and Drachten in August.  I have to say a big Thank You to Paul and the crew who work so hard so that I can have fun, and a special, huge thanks to Richard Stevens and MPM Oil for all their support and enthusiasm.  So many of the racers and fans seem to appreciate what we're doing and that's very encouraging, although I'm not sure my bank manager appreciates it! After twenty years I think I'm starting to get the hang of this, so we may be down but we're definitely not out. NFAA Round 1 review. 18th April: For their first meeting of 2012 the UK's Nostalgia Fuel Altered Association fielded three cars: Joe Bond, Adam Gleadow, and Nick Davies making his first outing in Lawrie Gatehouse's Chaos. Lawrie writes: Only Joe could make the Friday afternoon test run, as Adam and Motor Psycho and Nick and Chaos had last-minute snags to overcome. We lost the Saturday morning test run due to the damp stuff, but ran at the back of the Pro cars at around 6:30 pm with a track temp of 49F. As we lost the morning test run, we all agreed that this would start the point allocations. Nuthin' Fancy and Motor Psycho sported very attractive new paint schemes, all credit to the teams for endorsing the spirit of the class. First up was Adam v Joe, on quite a marginal track. However Joe carded a fine 6.305/207.09, the car moving around quite a bit, to Adam's equally good but losing 7.700/178.53, a new PB speed for them. Then Nick Davies had a bye in Chaos sporting its new lighter body, his first stint in a Nitro car. At the hit it went up on the tyres, but Nick pedalled and hit it again to record 9.193/157.40, off it at 1000 feet, a nice straight pass. On Sunday morning we lost another round due to the conditions, but finally got to run at 6:15 pm with a track temp of 48F. Chaos was paired against Nuthin' Fancy, Joe having lane choice. Crew Chiefs Roy Phelps and Bill Sherratt had taken some power out of the Chaos set-up to try to get it to grip at the start and Nick gave it a couple of dry hops to aid the process. Joe pulled a red light, giving an automatic win to Nick, but both cars ran superb side-by-side passes all the way to the stripe. Chaos got its first win with an arrow-straight 6.350/217.98 to Joe's 6.951/205.32, getting very close to the wall at the top end. Adam had a bye and ran an off-the-pace 8.308/177.88, saving the motor for later. Alas it was not to be, as the event was rained off. So we now have to wait for our second round at the SPRC Summernationals, hoping for much better weather. PMR's solid start. 18th April: Paul Marston Racing are quite satisfied with their season opener, the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball at Santa Pod Raceway: With tricky track conditions and inclement weather to deal with, the Easter Thunderball always provides a challenge to even the most determined teams and 2012 was no exception. In stark contrast to 2011, the temperature at Easter never even got within twenty degrees of the coldest track temperatures in the whole 2011 season, according to our records. For us decisions started to be made around two weeks prior to the Easter Thunderball, as even that far out the early indications were that Easter would be cold and wet. So with this weather quite likely, the decision was taken to investigate only taking one rac ecar. But to achieve this a motor change would be required as we could not be sure that the Whoopass Monza's trusty 477 ci motor would cut it in Super Pro ET, with the cold track conditions. A more powerful BBC was fitted as a precaution in readiness for the arrival of the predicted cold weather. You have to understand that no matter how hard the track crew work, and no matter how good the track prep is, if the track temperature is in the 40s and 50s a lot of cars will have problems hooking and getting down the track. You just have to figure it out, make adjustments and deal with it. From our perspective it took three hits to figure the track out and from there on, we got down every time. One of the advantages of double classing the same car, but it took a lot of changes to get there. One of the major problems which haunted us last season was finally put to bed at the Thunderball, namely the Disappearing Fuel Pressure monster! Many thanks to Pump Specialist Joe Hollerfeld at BLP Fuels Systems who got us in the right direction. From there it was only a matter of time. Thanks Joe, lunch is on Paul next time he sees you in Orlando, Florida. With the fuel pressure problems history, it was simply a case of reading the track conditions and working out how much it would hold, adding the weather and pick a number. Sounds easy, right? Nope, it is not easy! Thanks to the consistency of the track, which again is a credit to the track crew, we managed to pull off some great numbers which gave us number one qualifier and the Eurodragster.com/Gold RV Perfect ET Award in Super Pro ET and number four in Pro ET, and with first round win lights in both classes there was not much left on the table. PMR kind of figured that the chances of the Easter Thunderball being run to completion was unlikely, so qualifying points were very important. All of this would not be possible without the efforts of the legendary PMR crew, who truly worked very hard over the weekend. They ate all the twelve-egg scrambled cheese egg, toast, ham'n'beans breakfast which Paul cooked, they ate all the cakes lovingly baked by Jane, the twenty Easter cup cakes, the huge lemon meringue pie and the monstrous Easter cake, two visits to the Santa Pod Café for breakfasts, a truly huge chilli (thanks Crew Chief), pizzas, Spaghetti Bolognese (thanks again Crew Chief), and beef casserole, thanks lovely Lisa. Plus various snacks provided by Mick Howling's mum and Chris the ice cream man! Yep it sure was a real tough weekend, but the guys and gals at PMR stepped up to the plate with their knives, forks and spoons! Special thanks to Tony Morris at BLP and Gary Springford at Drag Race Engineering, your help and support always makes a difference. Round two is in a couple of short weeks at Shakespeare County Raceway; bring it on, PMR are ready. Swift snippets. 18th April: The latest spy picture to arrive at the offices of Eurodragster.com came with the words "I'm sure Lemmy would love a guitar like that!". If you know more, or if you would like to send your own spy picture, then drop us a line at eurodragster.com@btinternet.com. The British Drag Racing Hall of Fame can now offer both exterior and interior decals, the interior decals doubling as tax disc or pass holders. Designed by Darren West of Eurodragster.com sponsor Power Race Graphics, the decals are £2.25 apiece including UK postage and can be purchased via the BDRHoF web site at www.britishdragracinghof.co.uk. All proceeds go to operate the Hall of Fame. Announcing WG Transport. 18th April: Eurodragster.com sponsor WG4 Facilities and Services are are proud to announce their latest division WG Transport. WG Transport are available for moving race cars to small commercial vehicles. We asked Company Director Matt Wright, owner of the world's fastest Rolls Royce, why his company are branching his company into logistics. "As classic and cherished car owners, we appreciate the requirement for a reliable, correctly-insured company to take the responsibly to ensure the safety of people's pride and joy during transportation", said Matt. The Essex-based company are not satisfied with just local contracts either. They can provide a full nationwide and regular European service, proving that no job is too big or too small for the WG4 team. Using Ford Transit transporters with a payload of 1600 kg and Ifor Williams car transporter trailers, WG4 are available for multi-drop contracts. These lightweight durable trailers with the great feature of a tilt bed make them ideal for custom lowered vehicles with little or no ground clearance. If you have any enquiries please contact the WG4 team on 01277 366584. Web site updates. 18th April: In association with Alamo Rent-A-Car we have two exclusive Racer Blog updates for you today. First up is Junior Dragster racer Paige Wheeler with her diary of Easter Week which had high and unfortunately low points. Next up is street-legal Pro Modified racer Andy Frost who recounts his historic Easter Thunderball weekend at which he became the world's fastest and Europe's only six-second street car racer. As ever you can stay in touch with the latest Blog updates by clicking here or by clicking on the Alamo Blogs link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. Staying with Andy Frost, his six-second exploits are the subject of a feature on the Australian web site of sponsor MoTeC. "Our team would like to thank Motec for recognising what we're doing here, and we look forward to working closely with them and with their UK distributor Owen Developments throughout this year and beyond!", says Andy. You can check out the feature at www.motec.com.au/latestnews/frost. Our good buddy Jon Spoard has updated his UKDRN web site with galleries from Shakespeare County Raceway's opening Public Test and Tune Weekend and the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball at Santa Pod Raceway. You can check out Jon's pictures at www.ukdrn.co.uk. The Mad Welshman has updated his Flickr gallery site with shots of Saturday's action at the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball. You can take a look at Mad's work at www.flickr.com/photos/the_madwelshman. UEM SSB Cup update. 17th April: Further to our news item of 6th April, Geoff Myers has been in touch to remind UEM Super Street Bike Cup racers that to be eligible for travel and prize funds they must have registered for the Cup no later than thirty days prior to the first round which they will be entering. "The cut-off date for those riders wishing to compete in the first round, the FIA Main Event at Santa Pod Raceway in England on 1st-4th June, 1st May", says Geoff. "Riders who have not registered by that date will not be eligible for travel or prize funds at the Main Event." You can download the registration form (PDF format) by clicking here. The dates and venues of the four 2012 UEM European Super Street Bike Cup rounds are: FIA Main Event, Santa Pod Raceway, England: 1st-4th June NitrOlympX, Hockenheimring, Germany: 10th-12th August Kunmadaras, Hungary: 18th-20th August FIA European Finals, Santa Pod Raceway, England: 6th-9th September Owen/MoTeC contingency update. 17th April: Due to the rain-out of the Easter Thunderball Owen Developments, in conjunction with MoTeC, sponsors of Pro Modified, Topspeed Automotive Street Eliminator and Super Street Bike will be carrying over the unpaid prize fund to the FIA Main Event at Santa Pod Raceway in June, the race for the money being that much tougher with numerous European entries coming over to vie for the prize fund. With up to thirty Pro Mods  and large fields in Street Eliminator and Super Street Bike the competitors are going to have to work hard to claim the money. The racers will now be vying for £500 cash for winning their respective classes at this round. Please note that to be eligible for the payout you do not need to be using the MoTeC product: all you need to do is to carry the MoTeC decals, one per side of your vehicle. If you don't already have the decals you can pick them up from Signing On from day one of qualifying. The decals must also be on your vehicle from your first qualifying session. MoTeC and Owens wish all of the competitors the best of luck for the Main Event. Tierp event entry open. 17th April: Emelie Carlswärd of Tierp Arena has been in touch to remind racers that entry is open for the EDRS Nationals on 12th-13th May and Spring Wheels MC on 25th-26th May. On-line registration and entry are available at www.dragracing.eu as follow: STEP 1 Go to the tab "My Account". Press the button "New User" and follow the instructions. You will then receive an e-mail with a link to activate your account. Check your mailbox for spam, because your mail server may treat the activation e-mail as spam. When the activation for your account is ready you can login and register your user profile. STEP 2 Under the main heading "Administration" you will find nine sub-headings, which you will use to upload your profile. The second heading "Information" gives you some information about how you will create a user and register for the published events. The third heading "Account" shows your user information and here you can also edit your username and your password. When you click at the fourth heading "Driver/Team" you will came to a blank box with the heading "Driver Information" where you will click on the tab "Add" to start the registration for your profile. You have to fill in all fields (as far as possible) in the three headings "Driver Info", "Team" and "Pit Area". When you click on the fifth heading "Team Members" and click the tab "Add" you can fill out information about each team member in your crew. Then you go to the sixth heading "Vehicle" an then click the button "Add" to fill in all information about your race vehicle. The seventh heading is "Sponsors" where you can add information about all your sponsors. Then you go to the eight heading "Series" to fill in which division you will drive. Now that you have filled out all the details to your driver´s profile, you can register for the published competition under the heading "Notification". STEP 3 Under the heading "Notification" you choose the competition you wish to enter and click the button "Enter the competition". Then follow the entry step by step and fill in all the information as far as possible on each side. Before you get to the payment for your registration you have to read the Invitation and Supplementary Regulations for the competition and also confirm that you have read the rules and conditions for the on-line registration system. The notification concludes with a payment through DIBS Payment Services where you can choose from several different payment methods. Swift snippets. 17th April: Many thanks to Andy Marrs of TSI Timers Europe for confirming that Chris Polidano's 267.20 mph pass in Top Methanol Q2 at the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball was a new UK Top Methanol speed record backed up by his Q1 speed. Congratulations to all at Kalanc/Gold RV Racing. We will post an updated UK Bests sheet shortly. Belinda and Jeff Bull of Eurodragster.com Swap Meet sponsor Jeff Bull Race Engines have asked us to wish a big Happy Birthday to Mick 'The Fish' Smith. Our pleasure guys, have a great day Mick. All of the UK's Super Modified racers and the Smoke City Wheelers have asked us to say a big Happy 50th Birthday to UK Super Mod racer Andy Hone. Have a very Happy Birthday Fred. Easter Thunderball prize money. 15th April: Ian Marshall of Santa Pod Racers Club has been in touch with the following message to racers regarding prize money which would have been paid out at the end of last weekend's Auto Trader Easter Thunderball at Santa Pod Raceway: Due to the unfortunate rain-out of the Easter Thunderball, Santa Pod Racers Club have decided to carry over the prize fund which would have been paid out.  Subsequently, the prize fund for those classes which competed at Easter will be doubled at the SPRC Summernationals in June. The Wild Bunch and Junior Drag Bike prize funds will be doubled at the VP Racing Fuels National Finals in late September as these classes will not be competing at the Summernationals. Micallef's next career move. 15th April: Duncun Micallef's 5.105 Top Fuel Dragster licencing pass at the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball, which made him Malta's quickest and fastest drag racer, was the culmination of five years in motor sport. Via Malta Drag Racing Association Secretary Jason Camilleri, to whom many thanks, Duncun got in touch to tell us about his racing career and also about his licencing passes: 2007: Karting in Rotax Max and became runner up in National Championship (couldn't attend the last event). 2008: Bought a T-Bucket with partner Joe Ghiller and managed just six runs, the last was 8.5 seconds with nitro injected. John Cassar (nicknamed Lonz) was the team's Crew Chief and tuner and he used his experience for Duncun's needs. John was the only Maltese racer to drive a Top Fuel car on Malta, back in the early 1990s. 2009: Switched to Top Methanol Dragster with an ex-Andy Carter Top Fuel chassis. The team needed more crew members and former Knut Söderqvist Top Fuel team member Franco Pace came on the scene. It was a very difficult year for the team until we realised that we needed to change the engine and transmission in the car. 2010: A new set-up was bought and installed in the same chassis. Timo and Dennis Habermann were contacted to tune and help us with our new set-up. On 10th October the very first run with the new set-up resulted in a 5.93-second run with a 0.93 sixty foot time. Two hours later we ran 5.92. 2011: In May, once again under the supervision of the Habermanns, we managed to run the car twice. The results were a disappointing 6.6 and 5.98. In November we managed a 0.92 sixty foot time but shook at 660 feet and recorded a 6.1. Two hours later we ran 5.83 with poor traction in the first half, just managed a 1.00 sixty foot time.  So really my career consisted of just a few runs. In 2012 I contacted Rune Fjeld with the intention of going Top Fuel and he gave me the green light. I didn't know what it would take to drive a Top Fueller but John told me that it would be tough. Some people thought that I was crazy, but I kept calm and I trained very hard before Easter. On the first run my aim was to keep calm and in fact that really works because I had no one to instruct me for the burnout and also the car wasn't staged straight, but I managed to go to five hundred feet with corrections to the steering all the way. On the second run we spun the tyres, which was an experience I needed to get the feeling, since my intention was not to hurt the motor. On the third run, which made me the fastest man in Malta, I told my crew that I was really prepared for it. Burnout and staged perfectly. On the throttle and never off it it all the way. What a feeling! Yes, they were right. It never stopped pushing. At 1200 feet the car went to the left but I corrected and got the 'chutes out. I knew it was a good run and when I heard 5.10 I was shouting and crying with joy. That was a massive relief of pressure! I wish to thank all my crew which includes Raymond, Kevin, Martin, and Antti's crew, my partner Joe Ghiller, big thanks to Rune Fjeld for believing in me all the way, and to all my supporters. Finally I would like to thank my sponsors Azure and J Portelli Projects for their trust in me from the start of this venture. See you at the Main Event in June for some more! Less of the "Good" Friday. 15th April: UK Super Comp and Super Gas racer Jon Giles has every reason to want to rename Good Friday after a disastrous weekend: Over the winter we had a complete engine refresh with lots of new bits added by ICE Automotive who increased the horsepower from 717 to 846 so that we could run Super Comp as well as Super Gas. We also added a Neal Chance converter, but the icing on the cake was a Sid Waterman worm drive fuel system which runs off the crank to the fuel pump in the boot, what a piece of kit! That was the good bit. At the Peak Performance Day on 1st April the Powerglide malfunctioned and started releasing oil from the vent. "Not too bad", we thought. Chris Round and I put in a spare 'glide which Tim Adam had just refreshed for me. Little did we know the damage the malfunctioned gearbox had done: it had managed to put too much pressure on the end of my very recently-refreshed engine, causing the starter motor to snap and the crank to be pushed forward which in turn spun the main bearings and so on. The damage list is as long as the return road! On top of that we managed to smash the windows in the camper, have a puncture in the trailer and then to top it all off a lorry rammed into the side of the race trailer on the way home. What a weekend! On the bright side we managed to get home in one piece. Playing golf or fishing now seems to be an easier option! Rob and Nick of ICE Automotive have been fantastic with the help and support they have given me, and are working very hard to get it back to me as I write. A big thank you to them, and to Dave Southcombe, John Powell, Matt Gatland and Rick Johnson, and a really big thank you to Chris Round. Roll on the Main Event, fingers crossed. One motor saved... 15th April: Further to Liz Malcolm's recent Swift Snippet, UK Super Pro ET racer Vince Gibbs and the Nosferatu Racing team also express themselves indebted to Santa Pod Racers Club's eagle-eyed start line crew for spotting an oil leak from their motor at the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball: This turned out to be the rear seal on the sump, but we also took the opportunity to replace the crank rear oil seal just to be sure. Whilst the crew were working on the bottom of the motor I decided to take a look at a rocker cover fitting issue on our new RHS cylinder heads. I then found a serious unrelated problem that, had we made a run, would have considerably damaged our motor. So the drips spotted by the marshal turned out to be a godsend. Many thanks guys, you all do a fantastic job and keep us safe. On a completely different topic Team Nosferatu have a vacancy on the team for a webmaster. Simon Hodder created our fantastic web site at www.nosferatu-racing.co.uk and also did a fantastic job in 2009/2010 of maintaining it with regular news updates, video, photographs and many other features and pages. Unfortunately for us, but great for Simon and drag race fans, he is now completely busy with his full-time job and producing the on line drag racing magazine Drag Racing Confidential. So the team are now looking for a new member with the required skills and knowledge to continue this work, as well as attending all of the race meetings to assist with the running and maintenance of the car. We can offer a great team atmosphere, a great car to be involved with and all of the fun of being a drag racing crew member. if you are interested then please contact me at vincentgibbs@aol.com. ...and another hopefully so. 15th April: Andy Bennett of the UK's Doomsday Impala Super Pro ET team writes not with an Auto Trader Easter Thunderball race report, but with an Auto Trader Easter Thunderball burnout report: The weeks leading up to the event were frantic indeed. At the Finals last year we clipped the wall when Dave yanked the steering column off the splines during the launch. A quick £5 piece fixed it so that we can avoid a repeat performance, but the wall scrape rubbed the shiny off one side. The car was booked in to the body shop on the return from the Finals but as Doomsday is an eighteen-foot-long car the body shop doesn't like it taking up space in their unit. So the repair got bumped down the list and bumped some more. Eventually, in March and under pain of death, the repair was done. It didn't leave a great deal of time for Chris Rushton to step back up to the airbrush oche and lay the bumper and light graphics back in. Anyway, it was done in the nick of time. We had a request to do a magazine photo-shoot with a model, so we just managed to cram that in before the Thunderball too. The model's name is Strawberry Venom and the photographers were Rob Vanner W and Kenny Partington; the photos will be made public in a short while - they are spectacular, if you like that kind of thing! So off to the Thunderball on the Thursday. Doomsday pitted with our good friends Vince and Nosferatu in a shared big double marque tent. On the first call we queued together and Vince went up but was shut down due to an oil leak (see above). We were next, did a strong burnout then nothing - the car cut out. On attempted re-start we had nothing, so we initially thought the problem was the batteries not having enough poke to engage the starter. Not so, a little more sinister I'm afraid. The dark forces had thrown us a curve ball. At that moment in time we were unsure about the exact cause, but the engine was nipped up tighter than a gnat's chuff. Our good friend and guru engine builder Jeff Bull rolled under the car and inspected the crank and oil pump. It looked likely that the relief valve had stuck open and that we had had oil starvation to some vital organs. After a mad dash, a heck of a lot of preparation work, and a drive down from North Manchester our event came down to one burnout. "C'est la vie" as they say. We broke camp on Saturday evening and came home somewhat dejected. On Sunday, back at the garage, we yanked the motor so it's out and ready for repair. Hopefully it won't be too severe... Elsom's return. 15th April: The UK's Rob Elsom made his return to racing in Super Modified at the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball after a mad thrash in the week leading up to the race. Rob got in touch to let us know how the return went: We eventually got the car loaded in the coach, for the first time ever, about an hour before leaving and it fit like a glove. We got to the track at about 7:00 pm and got our pit set out, car on its stands and chilled in the coach ready for the next day. Friday was mostly spent getting properly acquainted with the car and making final preparation for our first run which was a planned 330-foot no-gas run. The burnout was OK enough but after that things went away and the car died leaving the line. Fortunately this was down to a switch being in the wrong position so we made our preps for the following day. Thanks to the glorious Easter weather we spent Saturday waiting for another chance to try again. Unfortunately once I tried to put the car onto the burnout it drove through the clutch in a shower of sparks and so I was pushed back again. Back in the pits it was decided to fit the spare clutch and, thanks to all the help and advice from Fred, Tim and the other guys in Super Modified, this was done. We can't thank the other teams enough for all their help and advise this weekend and I've got to say how great our class is for that, everyone is so willing to help. After all the work the night before we spent Sunday waiting for a weather window as we thought we would definitely get up the track but again, due to the weather, this didn't happen so we packed up and came home. Sharon and I would like to thank the lads for all their hard work at the track, Tony Gillam of Abbey Motorsport for all his help and support, Dave at Delta Pixels for his sponsorship at the event and Andy Kirk for all his help leading up to the event and at the track. Without all your individual input we probably wouldn't have made it. Thanks guys. The Rat emerges. 15th April: Charlie Draper writes that the UK's Reckless Rat blown-alcohol altered team had a great time on their first on-track outing at the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball despite the rain: We got a few things sorted. We got the chassis tagged to TMFC spec and went through scrutineering. The car looked the nuts on the track - and thanks to all the people that told us so from start line crew to spectators, it was much appreciated. Even though the engine had a couple of ignition problems I am hoping I know the cure for those. We came away happy and are looking forward to the SPRC Summernationals. We can't run the FIA Main Event as we have commitments with the Mr Whippy Top Methanol Dragster, always good to be involved with them as the Maltese are always a great bunch to be around. I noticed that in an earlier article the Harrisons were saying some Thank Yous, but one should go out to them as they stepped up and shared their awning with us as ours wasn't ready, and they and their crew made us more than welcome, cheers guys. As for the Summernationals, we are hoping to have two cars out one of which should be the Wrattens' if their work commitments allow. See you there! Piece of eight. 15th April: The Auto Trader Easter Thunderball was the first outing of the CHF slingshot Mr Spokehead III since it threw a rod at last year's NSRA Hot Rod Drags. Driver Ian Turburville writes: We had not fired the car since we fitted the big 555 ci Chevy and I had made improvements to the fuel system. We fired it up on Friday but it spat the seal out of the oil filter so we had to fix that. Then we found we could not start it at all! After chasing our tails for a day, and missing all the racing, it turned out to be a faulty starter motor - it just wasn't turning the motor fast enough to get a spark from our magneto. A frantic dash around the pits ended at Steve Johnson's Super Pro ET pit, as his car is also BBC powered. He had a spare starter and said we were welcome to not only borrow it but to modify it to fit our rail, what a hero! Starter fitted, the car fired straight away to big cheers from the other Wild Bunch racers. At last, we were about to race after a six month wait! I lined up against Dave Nelson and did a monster burn out, much to my crew's surprise. I was chomping at the bit! Then Sodd's Law came into effect and the start line crew shut me down for a fluid leak. It was no big deal, just a minor gasket, but would have been dangerous had it gone under the car so big thanks to David Warren for spotting that. Back to the pits to fix the leak and drown our sorrows with tea and hot-cross buns! We waited forever for the cold, miserable, rain to relent and finally they gave us the call to the lanes so we went down for a three hour wait while it continued to drizzle. The Santa Pod crew worked tirelessly to get the track in a go situation should the weather change, and change it did. All of a sudden the wind changed direction and the clouds veered off to skirt the Pod. Ian Marshall threw me a glance and pointed at his head, that meant helmet on! The whole of the Wild Bunch scrambled to their race cars like a squadron of Spitfire pilots, there was no time to lose before it rained again! I was in the first pair out with Peter Yates and his Ramraider dragster, a seasoned veteran against a complete novice. Again I did a big burnout, tempting fate. Laura backed me up into the groove and dialled me into the tower with a 9.00 on a pure guess. My previous best in this car was a 10.40! I staged nervously and as the amber went out I mashed the loud pedal. My RT wasn't stellar but a little better than Pete who had dialled in slower. The front wheels on Mr Spokehead instantly hit the air in a nice, controlled wheelie, which I drove through whilst punching second. The new shifter cured last year's problems and it took off like a rocket past Pete and his small block. I crossed the line with a new PB of 8.96 but at only 152 mph, turned out I was only on three-quarter throttle! That was the end of racing for the weekend as the foul weather returned and the event was cancelled. We were awarded the Commentators' Award for Best Appearing Car so we came home very happy indeed. I would like to thank Steve Leedell for being the best crew ever and top bloke, and to Laura for being best 'back-up-babe' and very promising photographer! The Wild Bunch are a fantastic group of dedicated racers and they made this old biker very welcome. Special thanks must go to the great community of drag racers who all helped each other out all weekend, especially me! Couldn't have got through it without Steve Johnson, Crunch, Karl and Rod Harrison and crew, Andy Raw, Chris Hartnell, Dave and John Nelson, Mark Coulsell and the Marras, Martin and Ingrid Chesworth, Tim Fountain, Glenn Stockton, Barry Sheavills, and all the other people who gave moral support and advice over the weekend! What would we all do without Crunch (Enjoy life a lot less - Ed)? The track prep was fantastic under such adverse conditions and low temperatures! Well done to the Santa Pod track crew! The next outing for the team is Big Bang at Santa Pod, where Laura will be doing her licencing passes in the unique Overkill dragster. A weekend with the Junkies. 15th April: The Nitrous Junkies were out in force at the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball, as Kev and Jake Charman contested the notably nitrous-free classes of Pro Stock Bike and Junior Drag Bike respectively. Kev, who rode Richard Gipp's Pro Stock Bike, writes: After we arrived on Thursday night we check both bikes out and did some jobs we didn't have time to finish on the Pro Stock bike, as it was a bit of a late decision to ride it. On my first run the track was still very cold, and I was trying hard to remember how to ride a bike with five gears. I short-shifted the whole run, shut off before the finish line, and cruised through. This was the first run of the season, 8.52/139, the last run of last season was 171 mph on my arse, so still to be on the bike was very pleasing. The first run gave me number two qualifier! My second qualifier was on Sunday, and late due to the weather. The carbs were hanging open a little, which unsettled me a bit as I had forgotten about that, having ridden injected bikes for the last two years. Got it together and got it up into stage and ready for the second launch. Thanks to Richard Bell for the nod on the tag! The bike launched better, the track was coming round.  Shifted first a little early, but managed to hit a couple of shift points along the way.  The run was an improvement, resulting in a much better 7.95/164. Sadly with Mark Smith out with mechanical problems, and Ray Debben having problems too, only myself and Len Paget were in. Sadly on Monday's race day the meeting was called as the rain was not going to let up. A bit disappointing, but I was happy to have run a seven. Meanwhile Jake's weekend in Junior Drag Bike was not without its moments. Jake reports: Despite not really knowing what the bike was going to do we took a stab at a dial in of 10.28 which I used for the rest of the meeting. The track, despite the track crew trying so hard to get some heat in, was very cold and as a result the rear wheel spun causing the bike to slow slightly. I went back to the pits and did the usual maintenance and out we went for a second qualifier. The tyres spun very badly. The bike left the line and turned violently to the right, luckily I managed to hold on and pull it straight and complete the run with no more problems. On my third and final run I decided to do a burnout. It burnt out perfectly apart from not being able to climb out of the dip in the burnout box and therefore coming out with a wet tyre. I dropped the clutch and the bike just stayed still spinning the wheel. When it eventually found some grip it bogged the engine and went very slowly up the track. Thanks to Chris and Kev for crewing on the startline and Lizz for videos. Also to Donna for some great food. Thanks as always to my sponsors Al at RCP Training and 'Uncle' Steve at Motorshack. Back to Kev: Lizzy's bike is getting there. It has had a lot of head work done, so we decided that she would be better to re-learn again in Comp Bike after a disappointing season last year and a disastrous season the year before! This season Lizz is being supported by Ken Cooper. He has my engine at the moment and is freshening it up. All being well Lizz should be out for the Springspeed Nationals at Shakespeare County Raceway.  This will be the first meeting where all three of us are racing, so it's going to be a busy one! Lizz is also delighted to announce that she is being supported by MPM Oil, and we would like to thank Richard Stevens very much. I am ever-grateful to our incredible long-suffering team: my long-standing Crew Chief Chris Pyke, and fiancée Donna for the catering, Gipp for the ride (I will get there mate!) and his crew Nigel. Thanks to Bryony for the support and cake and lastly to Lizzy who is being very patient, and Happy Birthday to you for Tuesday Honey! Thanks too to my sponsor Doug at Ensys. Swift snippets. 15th April: Dutch Supertwin racer Job Heezen asked us to say a big Thank You to Santa Pod Racers Club's track crew for their efforts in preparing a track which made it possible to run a PB for both rider and bike at last weekend's Auto Trader Easter Thunderball. "In these difficult circumstances it is hard to believe how they fixed it again", says Job. "Great job guys and thank you again." Many thanks to Ian Marshall for sending us Version 4 of the official entry list for Big Bang, which takes place at Santa Pod Raceway on 28th-29th April. Big Bang entry is still open, but is now subject to a late-entry penalty fee. You can download the entry form from the Santa Pod Racers Club web site at www.eurodragster.com/sprc. You can check out the Big Bang entry list by clicking here or by clicking on the Event Coverage link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. If you have any queries about entry to Big Bang then you can contact SPRC on 01933 313625 (outside the UK +44 1933 313625) or E-Mail paula.marshall@btconnect.com. No news update yesterday so this is a day late for which apologies but all of the Kalanc/Gold RV Top Methanol Dragster team asked us to say a big Happy Birthday for yesterday (Saturday) to Crew Chief John Foster. Hope you had a great day John. We would like to wish a very Happy Birthday for today to Speedgroup Co-ordinator Åsa Kinnemar. Have a lovely day Åsa. 2012 Outlaw Street Round 1. 15th April: The first round of the 2012 Outlaw Street series got off to a fantastic start at Shakespeare County Raceway with over twenty members campaigning cars over the weekend and over thirty members in total coming along for the weekend to either race themselves, spectate or help to crew others. Mark Wallington writes: After a long winter break it was nice to get trackside, especially as we'd managed to secure dry conditions for the whole weekend and a mini heat wave for the Sunday. Our thanks to all the SCR crew who made everyone welcome. Outlaw Street has started strongly this season with forty three members already signed up to come racing, and several new members were out for the first time at OS-1 to dip their toe in the world of Outlaw Street, all of whom appear now hooked and are already prepping for OS-2. The first round of the series is a non-points scoring round and normally a time for members to gently shake the car down after the winter, get used to being back in the driving seat, and dial in a time to start chipping away at through the season. The winter must have been too long for some this year as everyone was out racing hard with numerous Personal Bests set throughout the weekend and many smiling faces, including OS-11 Joe Mills in his Fox body Mustang who started the weekend in the fourteens and finished in the twelves, OS-14 Kline Demaine in his small block Chevy powered Capri who despite being plagued with mechanical gremlins set a new PB of 13.78, and OS-13 Stuart Ramsay in his 1967 Camaro who beat his best run at SCR with a 9.035/155.39. Unfortunately with every positive there is always a negative, and a few members suffered mechanical gremlins which couldn't be fixed trackside and required a trip home on a trailer, although frustrating for OS-19 Steve Moisey in his Shelby Mustang and OS-37 Chris Richards both of whose racing was cut short, I'm pleased to say that both were relatively quick fixes and that they will be back out for OS-2. The Joe & Co sponsored Reaction Time trophies are back for 2012, with nine available for this season, one per round. These were fiercely chased by all over the weekend and I can only assume that many members' New Year Resolution was to try to win one. The top six Reaction Times over the weekend were: OS-13 Stuart Ramsay in his '67 Camaro with a 0.132 OS-18 Vic Fisher in his late model Mustang with a 0.138 OS-42 Nigel Jenkins in his supercharged Mustang with a 0.223 OS-07 Andrew Murton in his '68 Camaro with a 0.281 OS-50 Roy Collins in his Pro Street Camaro with a 0.366 OS-31 Nick Rose in his late model convertible Mustang with a 0.378 That's a difference of 0.246 of a second separating the top six, and an amazing 0.006 separating first and second. So well done to Stuart who wins the first Joe & Co sponsored RT Trophy of 2012 and £25 prize money. As well as Joe & Co sponsoring the first, second and third place trophies and the RT trophies for 2012, we're very pleased to confirm that American Car, W-A-S-P, UK Street machines, HRG Services, Linards, Glu-10-3 Cake Company and Graham Durbridge have all committed to continue sponsorship and support in 2012. Joining Outlaw Street for the first time in 2012 is MissB Engraving who is sponsoring a unique glass tankard for each round winner hand engraved with the Outlaw Street logo, a burnout tyre, and the winning member's name. Also joining us for 2012 are Ingrid and Martin Chesworth who are going to be taking track action photographs at every round for 2012. The next round of Outlaw Street, OS-2, is at the Street Nationals at Santa Pod Raceway on 12th-13th May. If you'd like to learn more about Outlaw Street then please check out the forum at www.outlawstreet.co.uk. VP launch C85. 15th April: Eurodragster.com sponsor VP Racing Fuels has introduced C85 racing fuel, which Director of Racing Fuel Sales Jim Kelly says offers significant performance gains over conventional E85. "Conventional E85 gained some popularity because it was cheap and made some power, but it has a significant downside", says Jim. "In addition to requiring a costly E85 carburettor and completely revamped and upgraded fuel system, E85 is corrosive and very inconsistent. When you don't know if you're getting 60% ethanol, 80% ethanol or something else, it's extremely difficult to tune. Many engine builders have cited up to a two-jet swing in their tune from one batch of E85 to the next. "By contrast, C85 is blended with the same degree of care and precision as every other VP fuel, with a consistent proportion of ethanol and every other component in every drum. It takes all the guesswork out of tuning. "With VP's focus on power, we've engineered C85 to make up to four per cent more power and torque than conventional E85. In addition to these performance gains, C85's higher quality pure components make it superior to E85 in terms of cooling effect and resistance to detonation, and we've added corrosion inhibitors to fight the issues presented by ethanol." C85 will work well in drag racing, oval track, off-road and virtually any other automotive racing application, in particular forced induction applications due to its lower vapour pressure. Tests of C85 indicate most applications will require richening up by one jet size, or two to three per cent over current jetting. "For racers who have already made the financial commitment to use an E85-type fuel, C85 is the best choice",says Jim. "For racers who want more HP and torque than conventional 110 and 112 type fuels without the additional investment in an E85 carb and fuel system upgrade, VP's MS109, VP113 and Q16 continue to be the best race fuel alternatives for the money." C85 can be purchased from LA Racing Parts on 01803 391740 or at the Pod Shop at Santa Pod Raceway. Web site updates. 15th April: Rob Gallagher has updated his Flaming Headers gallery site with shots of Sunday's action at last weekend's Auto Trader Easter Thunderball. You can check out Rob's shots at www.flamingheaders.co.uk. Willday's European best. 13th April: A new milestone was reached in the world of performance tuning over the Easter weekend, when James Willday charged his JDS Street car from 0-160 mph in just 8.82 seconds. So what was this car? A purpose-built dragster with monster V8 and lightweight tube chassis? Nope. This was a street-driven Mazda RX7 with a tiny 1,300cc rotary engine and a huge Borg S480 turbo running at 1.8 bar boost pushing power to approximately 770 bhp at the wheels. Incredibly, this car uses the original steel monocoque chassis, manual gearbox and independent rear suspension orientation as the standard car (most dragsters use solid axles), making this a feat unequalled in Europe. The incredible eight-second run was made in the final qualifying session of the first round of the Jap Drag Series at Santa Pod Raceway's Autotrader Easter Thunderball event. Sadly, the elimination sessions were cancelled due to poor weather, so James was unable to capitalise on his excellent qualifying performance. "I've been bouncing off the walls ever since the run", says James. "The car has had the power for a while, but only now are we able to use it all without breaking driveshafts and gearboxes. Big thanks to Powergains Motorsport who have helped bring this all together." The jaw-dropping footnote to this story is that James refuses to trailer his car to events, and drove his race car all the way home on the public roads on Monday! The next round of the Jap Drag Series takes place at the Street Nationals at Santa Pod Raceway on 12th-13th May. To find out more about the Jap Drag Series check out www.japdragseries.co.uk. Racers' thanks. 13th April: UK Super Comp racer Nicky Frost would like to say a huge Thank You to all of her fellow racers for their kind thoughts and messages on the loss of both of her parents. "My dad was always at the track to support me and they will both be dearly missed", says Nicky. "It's comforting at times like this to know you also have a drag racing family, which few outside of the sport would understand. Special thanks go to Julie and Brian Pateman, John, Kim and Matt Atkinson, Splinter and Elona and Mick and Sarah Franklin. I hope to be back at the track later in the season." UK Junior Dragster racer Louis Davies asked us to thank everyone at Santa Pod Raceway for letting him race his new bike and to have a great time at the Easter Thunderball. "I would also like to thank my Grandad very much for building an ace bike for me", says Louis. "Also thank you for putting my photos on the pictures part of the report". You are very welcome, Louis. Rod Harrison and the UK's Team Stardust Super Pro ET team lost their torque converter on their second qualifying attempt at the Easter Thunderball. "I would like to say many thanks to Mark Flavell and his team for spending all their Friday evening stripping and rebuilding our powerglide gearbox, also to Steve Johnson for the loan of various parts we required", says Rod. "A big thanks to Steve Taylor for not only lending me his torque converter but delivering it to the track from Addlestone in Surrey so that we could continue racing. We were now in the need of transmission fluid and having approached Richard Stevens from MPM Oil, he not only helped us out with trans fluid but after some discussion has agreed to support Team Stardust with oils and consumables throughout the 2012 season, we would like to express a special thank you to Richard and MPM Oil for their support. Thanks must also go to our crew of Karl, Andy Raw and Stuart Fagg (aka Chunky) for their efforts in keeping us running over the weekend. Looking forward to the Main Event." Swift snippets. 13th April: Courtesy of Paula Marshall the official post-Easter Thunderball standings in the MSA British Drag Racing Championship for Pro Modified are now available on the series' official web site at www.msadragracing.co.uk. Kerryanne Frazier tells us that Bobby Frazier's Junior Drag Bike is for sale. The 2011-built bike has a chromoly frame, can take a motor up to GS500 and is of sufficient size to step up to Supertwin ET. For more details check out the Bikes For Sale section of our Jeff Bull Race Engines-sponsored Swap Meet. Spiers offers Camaro venture. 13th April: UK Super Comp racer Paul Spiers would like to offer the opportunity for an aspiring, existing or ex-racer to campaign his '69 Camaro in the UK during 2012. "This will be a joint venture operation, it's not a "Turn up and drive" deal, so funds are required for the running costs", says Paul. "It's an opportunity for someone to go racing without the cost of building a car, buying an RV and trailer. The Camaro is currently being updated. "The car will then be raced at Championship events in the UK and Europe during the 2013 season and we will be following the FIA Tour. I am planning to double-duty my car, either in Super Comp and Super Gas, or Super Pro ET and Pro ET, the decision will be made in conjunction with the new additional driver. Final testing and set-up will commence later on this year at UK Championship events and Pro test days. "The car is based in Bournemouth, Dorset and information can be found on my web site at www.wikid-racing.co.uk. Please ring me on 07879 417485 to discuss in detail." Web site updates. 13th April: The official web site of the UK's Chaos Fuel Altered team at www.chaos-fuel-altered.com has been updated with a report on the Auto Trader Easter Thunderball, which can be accessed from the Latest News menu item. There are links from the report to a gallery of pictures taken at the event, and also the remaining pictures detailing the modifications carried out over the 2011/2012 closed season. The April 2012 issue of ACAG Update Magazine is now available on-line at www.drceurope.co.uk/acag/apr2012. The twenty six pages offer a wholesome bubble and squeak of drag racing nostalgia linked to the restoration of Europe's first dragster. Sydney Allard's 1961 Allard Chrysler. Included in this issue is the latest news about the restoration work and Part III of the car's racing history plus great news about more sponsorship from F&A Racing and others. There is also a feature on the Potvin blown Chrysler rail campaigned by Lori and 'Potvin Doug' Peterson on the West Coast and news about a forthcoming IMI RWYB at Santa Pod. So much nostalgia that you'll want to grow your hair long again. Colin Donisthorpe leads off today's Auto Trader Easter Thunderball photo galleries with shots from Friday and Saturday on his Flickr site at www.flickr.com/photos/colin_donisthorpe. Next up is Callum Pudge whose Easter Thunderball pictures you can also find on Flickr by clicking here. Paul Lister has posted pictures of Saturday's Easter Thunderball action on his Drag Car Anon web site at www.dragcaranon.co.uk. Editor's note. 13th April: As attentive readers will appreciate it has been a bit of a struggle at the offices of Eurodragster.com in the last few days. Things are starting to straighten out but we still have a backlog of news which, tomorrow being a Saturday, we will have more leisure to code up and post on the next update. Thanks for their patience to those racers who have sent Easter Thunderball reviews which will all be posted on the next update, and please keep those news items coming to news@eurodragster.com. Event entry update. 11th April: Entry is still open for the Voltz Energy Shots Springspeed Nationals, variously the second and third rounds of the UK Championships, which takes place at Shakespeare County Raceway on 5th-7th May. Official entry forms are available on the Shakespeare County Raceway web site at www.shakespearecountyraceway.co.uk. If you have any queries about event entry at Shakespeare County Raceway then please contact the track at enquiries@shakespearecountyraceway.co.uk or call 01789 720180 (outside the UK +44 1789 720180). The standard-fee entry date has now passed for Big Bang, which takes place at Santa Pod Raceway on 28th-29th April and which is a Championship round for Super Modified, Sportsman ET, Junior Dragster, 8.50 Bike, 9.50 Bike, VW Pro, VW Sportsman, Outlaw Anglia and Junior Drag Bike. Entry is still open, but is now subject to a late-entry penalty fee. You can download the official entry form from the Santa Pod Racers Club web site at www.eurodragster.com/sprc. You can check out Version 3 of the official Big Bang entry list by clicking here or by clicking on the Event Coverage link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. If you have any queries about entry to Big Bang then you can contact SPRC on 01933 313625 (outside the UK +44 1933 313625) or E-Mail paula.marshall@btconnect.com. Swift snippets. 11th April: UK Pro ET racer Liz Malcolm asked us to thank Santa Pod Racers Club's start line crew for alerting husband and crew Iain to a previously unseen oil leak. "This turned out to be a gear selector oil seal, which we were unable to fix at the track", says Liz. "This has now been replaced. Thanks for all the offers of help, especially Billy Gane's dad Dave for the offer of his car." No news update yesterday (Tuesday) because your News Editor was making funeral arrangements for his Fiesta and licking his wounds from the weekend so we were unable to say a big Happy Birthday for yesterday to Lizz McCarthy of the Nitrous Junkie team and Santa Pod Raceway Track Announcer and Eurodragster.com Blogger Colin Theobald. Hope you had good days, guys. Christine, Sandy and Stuart Morrice and Megan asked us to say a big Happy Birthday for today to UK Super Comp racer Collin Morrice. Our pleasure, have a great day Collin. Web site updates. 11th April: Dutch Pro Modified racer Robert Joosten has updated the Pro Dutch Racing web site at www.produtchracing.com with a video of a dyno pull which resulted in a broken dyno: "Again", mutters Robert darkly. Editor's note: A rushed news update today but tune back to the next update for race reviews from the Nitrous Junkie, Doomsday Impala, Turboville and Elsom Motorsport teams, a new European best, an interesting offer from Super Comp racer Paul Spiers and more, and please keep the news items coming to news@eurodragster.com. Easter Thunderball rained out. 9th April: The Auto Trader Easter Thunderball at Santa Pod Raceway was curtailed by the weather as heavy rain which arrived overnight continued into the day giving race officials no choice but to call the event. The event as a whole was frequently disrupted by the weather but as ever the SPRC track crew and race officials and the racers worked together to make the best of things. Congratulations to Maltese Top Methanol Dragster racer Chris Polidano who, subject to ratification, set a new UK Top Methanol speed record of 267.20 mph in the second qualifying session. Congratulations also to Pro ET racer Marius Blackburn who won the Eurodragster.com / ModUrStang Perfect Light Award and to Super Pro ET racer Paul Marston who won the Eurodragster.com / Gold RV Perfect ET Award. Both Awards have been reset to £50 for Big Bang. You can check out our Alamo Rent A Car-sponsored reports, pit notes and galleries by clicking here or by clicking on the Event Coverage link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. Swift snippets. 8th April: We would like to say a very Happy Birthday to Richard Stevens of Eurodragster.com sponsor MPM Oil UK, and to UK Pro ET racer Simon Gough. Have a great day guys. Swift snippets. 7th April: UK Super Gas racer The Very Reverend Sir Neville Mottershead ODE has been in touch to respond to the challenge placed by Stef Pateman in her Super Gas news item on Thursday. "I feel compelled to respond to Stef (CEO)", says Nev. "I'm sorry I can't be there: it would have been good to help bump the Super Gas field up towards the twenty mark. Unfortunately I'm currently in the workshop building customer engines - Small Blocks of course. Tell your Dad to think himself lucky I'm not there. Best of luck everyone. Have a great weekend and good to hear you're still with us Tog (Thanks buddy - Ed)." Yvonne, Kirstie and Spencer Tramm have asked us to say a very Happy 65th Birthday for today (Saturday) to husband and dad Steve Tramm. Our pleasure guys, have a great day Steve. UEM SSB Cup update. 6th April: Keith Bartlett, the promoter of the UEM European Cup for Super Street Bike, has been in contact to give us an update on the events in this year's calendar. Building upon the success of last year's three-round Super Street Bike mini series, for 2012 the exciting and very well-supported Super Street Bike becomes a formally-accredited UEM four-race Cup class. Keith Bartlett stated "Super Street Bike is a hugely well-supported class whose competitors last year showed their readiness and enthusiasm to make the step up to a formalised European competition. I am really looking forward to more of the same close exciting racing in 2012." Teams wishing to register for the SSB Cup should complete a registration form and return it by E-Mail to Geoff Myers at geoff@trakbak.com no later than thirty days before the date of the first round of the Cup. You can download the registration form (PDF format) by clicking here. The dates and venues of the four 2012 UEM European Super Street Bike Cup rounds are: FIA Main Event, Santa Pod Raceway, England: 1st-4th June NitrOlympX, Hockenheimring, Germany: 10th-12th August Kunmadaras, Hungary: 18th-20th August FIA European Finals, Santa Pod Raceway, England: 6th-9th September Swift snippets. 6th April: Fiona Flynn has asked us to wish a big Happy Birthday to Top Methanol Dragster racer and Eurodragster.com Derek Flynn. "Happy Birthday from all at Gold RV and good luck to Chris Polidano and the Kalanc-Gold RV team", says Fiona. Have a great day Derek. Lucas launch loyalty card. 6th April: Eurodragster.com sponsor Lucas Oil is preparing for the big Easter weekend's racing at Santa Pod with an on-line promotion at www.lucasoil.co.uk. The US-made lubricants and additives supplier, which will be the brand behind this year's new F&A team challenge for the European Top Fuel Championship as well as several other dragster classes, will be giving away tickets for future Santa Pod events. It's all part of the new Lucas Loyalty Card promotion, which allows Santa Pod fans who sign up to the card the opportunity to buy Lucas Oil products - on sale for the first time at the Pod Shop this weekend - at better than retail prices throughout the meeting. Although Lucas Oil supplies a wide range of lubricants and additives which help motorsports teams to reduce drag, clean injectors, increase power, improve fuel economy and reduce the output of harmful emissions, many of the products will improve performances of on the road cars, too. Stef's Super Gas bits. 5th April: Stef Pateman, CEO of the UK's Never Mind the Bollocks Racing, Hyena Racing, Pateman Racing et al has been in touch with an update from the Super Gas pits ahead of this weekend's Auto Trader Easter Thunderball at Santa Pod Raceway: We hope you've had a well rested Winter and what felt like such a long build-up to Easter. Dad (Champion Brian Pateman - Ed) is very pleased with the fantastic turnout of racers entered to keep the Super Gas spirit alive this year: eighteen in comparison to last year's twelve is pretty impressive! Make sure you remember to come and collect your Britex Services stickers from the Pateman pits. From my investigation into racers' gossip and modifications to cars I thank those for reporting back. It was nice to hear some of you lot were out testing last weekend. I know the Morrice boys were out trying out their new suspension fitted by Hauser Racing and freshly rebuilt engine by Jeff Bull. To my knowledge they were running some pretty good times so keep it up boys! Jon Morton's motor, like the Morrices', also made a visit to Jeff Bull for some tender loving care and a major winter rebuild which introduced new rotating parts and a new billet oil pump. Jon has made the decision to put all efforts purely into the Super Gas class for the new racing season ahead! He has been a well deserved runner-up four years in a row in Super Comp, he thinks has the number two jinx!! Excellent results though Jon! Jon's stepson Dan Page is also making a return to Super Gas this year with a new 540 cubic inch engine in his beautiful Green Nova, which should be pulling some high mph!  Jon Giles and family have made some very important and thoughtful changes to the exterior of his Roar Willys, installing some Breast Cancer Research pink ribbons for this season to make people aware after their own experience, and to help raise awareness and support for this charity which has such a great cause. We welcome the return of Matt Gatland, who finally run out of excuses to come back! He has however, sadly damaged his axle when testing but we all hope it get's fixed in time, it would be a shame for something to get in the way of his first race this weekend. Good luck Matt! Nev - where was your ass kicking come back like you promised Mr Pateman? Also joining us and the rest of last year's Santa Pod gang:  Mark White, Nick Griffin, Jon Turner and Paul Foote. We welcome those of you who have made a comeback to the class: Pete Cresswell, Steve Dunn, Paul Hudson, Stuart Doigine and Martin Curbishley.  Also to those who have shown an interest and entered as newcomers: Guido Uhlir, Rick Johnson and Richard Webb. We look forward to seeing you all at Easter and the best of luck to all teams new and old for a challenging year for everyone! Blakemore in dock. 5th April: Wendy Clutterbuck and UK Funny Bike racer Tim Blakemore have been in touch to say that a surgical procedure which Tim was due to undergo at the end of this month was unexpectedly brought forward and took place yesterday afternoon: It was went fine. Tim will be in hospital recovering for most of the weekend, which means we will be unable to attend this weekend's event at Santa Pod and I will not be able to bring the choccy cake I promised to our fellow racers. Sorry Shaggy - next meeting I promise! We are very pleased to see such an improvement in bike entries and hope it continues to grow!  Unfortunately, as Tim will have to wear a head brace for the next two to three months, we will be sidelined until late in the season.  We would like to wish the best of luck to Conor Meehan (JB6), who is proudly representing the team this weekend for his second full season in the exciting Junior Drag Bike class which will be making its début at the Pod. Conor's bike will be sporting brand new paintwork and he will be wearing new leathers - we can't stop the boy growing. We also want to wish all the Juniors a great weekend, they are a credit to the sport. Ou best wishes to Tim for a rapid recover from his surgery. What's 0.001 between sisters... 5th April: UK Junior Dragster racers and sisters Paige and Belle Wheeler are kicking-off another exciting year of competition with the support of Alamo Rent-A-Car. The Wheeler sisters head off this weekend to the 2012 Auto Trader Easter Thunderball for the first drag racing event of the season. Racing fans will be able to see these rising stars of the drag racing world and cheer them on at Santa Pod Raceway between tomorrow and Monday. It could be a very exciting season opener as in practice sessions last weekend, both girls recorded personal bests. Paige (aged 13) recorded a personal best 0.0012 reaction time on Saturday and younger sister Belle (aged 8) managed to beat it on Sunday with an incredible ultimate perfect reaction time of 0.0000 measured to ten thousandths of a second. Alamo is a sponsor of the Santa Pod Raceway, the UK home of European drag racing with track-side branding, as well as a presence on the Eurodragster.com web site. This forms part of Alamo's commitment to supporting the Paige and Belle and the racing community. Following a successful race season in 2011, Alamo is helping the Wheeler sisters to attend a full programme of UK race events, starting with the Easter Thunderball. "We're delighted to be able to continue supporting Paige and Belle in 2012, building on the last two years of sponsorship", says Neil Summerville, EMEA Franchising Director, Alamo Rent-A-Car. "The girls are raring to go and keen to prove themselves again this year. We are also proud to sponsor Santa Pod Raceway, as Alamo continues to support the UK drag racing scene and develop our strong partnership with the track. "Paige and Belle are up against some stiff competition, but they've already shown they have what it takes to compete in the UK Championship, so we're behind them all the way for 2012." Alongside the National Drag Racing Championships, Pro Fuel Shootout, bike and Pro Mod racing, racing enthusiasts at the Easter Thunderball will be treated to demonstrations, stunts and exhibition vehicles, for excitement on and off the track. With a global network providing access to over 2,500 rental locations in over 100 countries worldwide, and over 1,680 European locations, including at every major airport, Alamo offers a wide range of vehicles and optional extras for leisure travellers, making it the ideal partner for drag racing fans. For more details visit www.alamo.co.uk/dragster. Nitro FM ready to fire up. 5th April: Nigel Fitzmaurice and Julian Parsons of Santa Pod Raceway's on-site radio station Nitro FM are all set to start the ball rolling this evening (Thursday) with new sponsors and a new streaming provider for broadcast on the web. As well as the usual audio accompanying the video on Eurodragster.com's Webster Race Engineering/Nimbus Motorsport webcam, Nitro FM will continue to broadcast a separate audio-only stream for those who have things to do about the house or the office. This year the audio stream will be provided by Doyousee.me who also provide streaming services for Eurodragster.com. This year's programme sponsors are as follow: Nitro FM music: Team Jackson's MoT Commentary: LA Racing Parts, Peter Walters Race Design and Richard Walters Services and Custom Paint Breakfast Show: KazAston.com Evening Show and online services: Webster Race Engineering On-line with Eurodragster.com: The Dark Revenger (Dave Cherrett) Weather report: Panic Racing Associate sponsors: Hauser Race Cars and the National Association of Supertwins Spot prizes and Associate sponsor: Shockwave Racing, FGR Motorsport and Marshall Amplification Shirts: Walters Race Design and Richard Walters Services and Custom Paint Broadcasts will commence at 18:00 this evening on 96.2 FM at the track and live on the web. This evening's broadcast will end at 21:00. Broadcasts then commence at 07:00 each morning and continue until 22:00 on Friday, Saturday and Sunday and until close of play on Monday. On Friday, Saturday and Sunday Nigel will be your host until approximately 20:30 and then Nick Gay and Ian Petrie will take you to the close of broadcasting. You can reach Nitro FM's web broadcast via our Autotrader Easter Thunderball Event Index by clicking here or by clicking on the Event Coverage link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. Alternately, to go directly to the audio-only stream, go to www.eurodragster.com/nitrofm. Web site updates. 5th April: In the latest instalment of his exclusive Racer Blog presented in association with Alamo Rent-A-Car, Santa Pod Raceway Track Announcer Colin Theobald waxes lyrical on the imminent start to the 2012 UK National Championships. As ever you can stay in touch with the latest Blog updates by clicking here or by clicking on the Alamo Blogs link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. Editor's note. 5th April: As some of our readers will be aware Eurodragster.com News Editor Tog was involved in an accident on the way to Santa Pod early this morning when a lorry pulled out whilst Tog's car was alongside it, putting Tog's car into a spin and then T-boning it and pushing it into the path of another lorry for good measure. Tog was and is A-OK and even his notoriously dodgy ticker played it cool, but we fear that the faithful Fiesta is pretty much finished. Tog would like to thank everyone who has been in touch this morning with concern, good wishes and offers of help. Particular Thank Yous go to Paul Marston who offered to bring a car to Tog's home and leave it at his disposal for the weekend, and to Spencer Tramm and Tethys who both offered practical help. Very much appreciated everyone: there is no community like the drag racing community when someone is in distress. Tog's insurance company stepped up to the plate and rapidly organised a replacement car so he looks forward to seeing everyone late this afternoon (Thursday). On the journey he will have the inestimable pleasure of driving over his own skid marks on the M25. Thanks again to everyone who has called, texted, E-Mailed or posted messages. Event entry update. 4th April: This Friday (6th) is the official closing date for entry to Big Bang, which takes place at Santa Pod Raceway on 28th-29th April and which is a Championship round for Super Modified, Sportsman ET, Junior Dragster, 8.50 Bike, 9.50 Bike, VW Pro, VW Sportsman, Outlaw Anglia and Junior Drag Bike. You can download the official entry form from the Santa Pod Racers Club web site at www.eurodragster.com/sprc. Completed entry forms can be handed in at the Signing On office at this weekend's Auto Trader Easter Thunderball. You can check out Version 2 of the official Big Bang entry list by clicking here or by clicking on the Event Coverage link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. If you have any queries about entry to Big Bang then you can contact SPRC on 01933 313625 (outside the UK +44 1933 313625) or E-Mail paula.marshall@btconnect.com. Entry is still open for the Voltz Energy Shots Springspeed Nationals, variously the second and third rounds of the UK Championships, which takes place at Shakespeare County Raceway on 5th-7th May. Official entry forms are available on the Shakespeare County Raceway web site at www.shakespearecountyraceway.co.uk. If you have any queries about event entry at Shakespeare County Raceway then please contact the track at enquiries@shakespearecountyraceway.co.uk or call 01789 720180 (outside the UK +44 1789 720180). SCR Track Weekend review. 4th April: The daily threat of petrol stations running dry together with a predicted cold snap for the weekend didn't result in Shakespeare County Raceway's Season Opening Public Track Weekend from being devoid of machinery. Quite the contrary, as all weekend long the pits and the car park of the Warwickshire drag strip were overwhelmed with new visitors from both car and motorcycle clubs taking the opportunity to hit the strip along with the season campaigners from the National Sprint Association and the Supercharged Outlaws to name just a few. SCR's Jerry Cookson writes: With six Supercharged Outlaw teams in attendance the quickest front engine dragster down the line was Sam Freeman in the Hammond & Freeman-owned Speed Demon to a best-ever 7.583 despite an early shut-off with a speed of 156 mph. With cameras strapped to the roll cage car owner Vic Hammond also took one final drive down Broadway for a proposed film. Afterwards he did come over and apologise to the crew for being a bit wobbly across the start line! Alec Coe was also in the sevens with a 7.933 in the class' other FED Shy Talker. Alan Smith driving the nostalgia Allard Dragon Avanti had a scary moment off the start line when the dragster wheelied and snapped right heading towards the Christmas Tree. Stomping on the brakes, Alan pulled up the dragster up six inches away from the base of the Tree! Earlier in the weekend Alan had been running with a new wheelie bar set up to counteract the crowd-pleasing stunts pulled at last year's Hot Rod Drags. The stunning new Gasser Circus '64 Chevy Nova from the workshops of Denning and Pike finally broke cover on Sunday much to the delight of team members and nostalgia photographers. Jerry Denning performed several burnouts and a best of 11.6 at 100 mph. Martyn Hallam's '33 Willys and the Henry J Horrid Henry or Mick Allen were also representing the class. Wild Bunch racer Craig Larman ran his first ten-second pass on the transbrake of The Ferret '23 Model T Altered with a 10.61. After that the rest was easy, beating the car's previous best of 10.4 with a 10.36 last run of the day. The first round of the Junior Dragster League attracted a good entry including two Tot Rods. By the final runs for the day Alex Brett was awarded the round points followed by Bradleigh Vardy in the Fueltopia Scholarship car just two thousandths of a second behind. Alex also picked up £25 from Nitroburners for Best Reaction Time with a 0.039. Making its début was the stunning dragster of Callum Swinchatt, the first Junior chassis to roll out of Roy Wilding's workshop and presented by Pryzm Paintworks. With the car tuned to run consistent 9.2s all weekend, Callum's apprenticeship in Tot Rods certainly paid off with a 0.001 reaction time in Saturday's Test and Tune. Hard Luck Award must go to John Przybyl in the Lucas Oils dragster when at the 330-foot marker he suffered the misfortune of an exploded clutch. John brought the dragster to a safe stop just shy of the eighth mile.   Junior Drag Bike was well represented with two new bikes breaking cover for the first time. Matching his dad Alan's Suzuki Comp Bike Tigger, birthday boy Louis Davies débuted his new matching Junior Mod class 125cc LDR bike resulting in a best of 10.23. Also testing for the first time was Liam Holgate on a bike built by his dad Simon. Liam put in three runs on Sunday to the tune of 15.4.   Making a crowd-pleasing début for its stunning 9.9-second runs and altitude-breaking wheel stands was Garth Wong's Japanese engineered Toyota Celica. With all the right whistles and bells going on under the hood Garth's Toyota-engineered racer is going to be one hot customer on the Japanese racing scene this year. The first round of the Honda Drag Series was also featured at the weekend with the final matching Endless Horizon Motorsport's head mechanic Dominic Fakhri in his recently finished H22 powered EG Civic against Mike Rust in his '79 1.3 Civic. In the end the race was all but won on the start line as Dominic pulled out a great holeshot of 0.023 which was just enough to hold off Rusty by 0.129 of a second across the finish stripe. Taking the prizes, points and goodies as quickest Outlaw Street Racer of the weekend was Stuart Ramsey with the Therapy '67 Camaro. Packing 502 cubic inches of BBC under the hood, Stuart's Camaro rattled off two nine second passes with a best of 9.035/155. This was followed by Andy Murton's 540 cubed '68 Camaro SS at 9.876. There was a great turnout of bikes also for the first of seven AMC Coating Street Bike Challenge races. Ranging from traditional Suzukis to classic Triumphs the day belonged to Essex bike enthusiast Chris Boyles who took the AMC trophy and a £100 worth of vouchers in 11.037 at 132.76 mph on a KTM RC8. Second quickest was Tom Warren's Triumph TS9S at 11.674/132.76 followed by the 1700cc Yamaha Vmax of Richard Corbert at 11.717/122.05. Unluckiest driver of the weekend was Viva Outlaw racer Martin Buckler which unfortunately suffered the misfortune of having a heater hose split on his rebuilt 3.5 Rover powered '71 Vauxhall Viva covering his tyres in coolant at the top end of the track. Martin did a great job of keeping the car shiny side up and away from his opponent's path despite hitting the armco. The top end emergency crews were there in seconds to see Martin exiting the car unaided. All in all, a fantastic season opening event for Shakespeare County Raceway. We would like to say a big thank you to all the racers, clubs and spectators who came out to support the event. If this is the sign of good times returning to the Raceway then this year is going to be a belter. An Exotic finish. 4th April: The last few weeks have been extremely busy for all involved with the UK's Motor Psycho blown-alcohol altered team, especially their new sponsor. Joining Lucas Oil, Auto Finesse and Fresh Reflections are Custom Exotics. Driver Adam Gleadow writes: Custom Exotics are based in Harlow, Essex, and specialise in prestige autostyling and paintwork, predominatly with American vehicles but they can apply their talents to anything.  They offer all aspects of vehicle restoration, repair, paint and customization to the highest standards with many show winning and magazine featured cars to their name. Quality of work and meeting the customer's needs are the highest priorities, as well as being great guys to hang out with! We dropped the body off with Scott at Custom Exotics a few weeks ago with an idea of what we wanted: the purple had to stay and we wanted metalflake! Scott quickly talked us round from a standard base to something with a little more 'pop'. Many many late nights later (sorry to Nat, Scott's partner, we'll let you see him again soon!) the finish is something else. House of Kolor Pavo Purple basecoat followed by Wild Cherry Kandy, lashings of Beatnik Purple Roth Flake and seven coats of clear has transformed the '34 Ford body beyond what we could have imagined. Custom Exotics' work is truly first class. If you were in any doubt of where to send your car, bike or whatever for paint just come and see us at Easter! Joe from Fresh Reflections has also been hard at work: we couldn't have perfect paint without the rest of the car to match. The rear wheels, rocker covers, blower idler pulley and a few other details have been fully mirror polished and the body complemented with gold leaf lettering, free-hand sign-writing and pinstriping to accent the stunning paint. Just to finish it off we've had various parts anodised or zinc-plated. All that's left now is to protect and enhance it all with Auto Finesse's fine range of detailing products, and finish re-assmbley before we get back on track. Pop by at Easter for a chat and to pick up one of our new hero cards thanks to Jayne Kay Designs. You can follow the bodywork from prep to base coat and lettering/pinstriping on our Facebook page but you will have to wait until Easter to see the finished paint! Web site updates. 4th April: Dutch Pro Modified racer Robert Joosten has launched a new web site at www.produtchracing.com. The site features news, team biographies, multimedia and more. Robert has promised us a news item soon to bring us up to date with events in his workshop. The Mad Welshman has updated his Flickr gallery site with pictures of Saturday's action at Shakespeare County Raceway's Public Track Weekend. You can check out Mad's pictures at www.flickr.com/photos/the_madwelshman. KC's family post Rookie Award. 3rd April: The drag racing world lost and up and coming star last year after a tragic accident at York Raceway. Kasey Dixon-Grainger, who lost his life doing the sport that he loved, has left a void throughout his family and circle of friends, of whom there were many. His story was one which rocked the drag racing and modified car world; not least because of his young age - just 23 - and the touching stories that reverberated throughout the community of his passion, commitment and the sense of fun that he brought to the sport. Now KC's parents Paul and Tanya and many, many racers have committed to ensuring that his life is remembered. As the new season is upon us, the KC Rookie of the Year Award is respectfully announced as part of KC's legacy, to recognise and protect new racing talent. The trophy will be awarded annually at the Hot Rod Drags. Nominations for both sanctioned and non-sanctioned racers will be open throughout the year from fellow racers, organisations and track start line crews. The annual recipient will also benefit from a donation of £500 to be spent on safety equipment. Nominations for the KC Rookie of the Year Award should be E-Mailed to kc@fgowi.co.uk. KC's family welcomes the support of any company or organisation interested in this initiative. Please also E-Mail the above address. Swift snippets. 3rd April: UK Pro ET racer Mike Lacey of Eurodragster.com Perfect Light Award sponsor ModUrStang says that he will be back on track this weekend after John Sleath has stepped up to the plate. Mike's gearbox, which broke in testing on Sunday, was delivered to John yesterday and by the time Mike got back to base John had already stripped it down and delivered a health report. The box is being rebuilt today and should be back in Mike's Metamorphosis Camaro tomorrow. "A big Thank You to all those who help, especially John Sleath and Nic Williams", says Mike. "See you all on Thursday." Easter Thunderball Perfect Awards. 3rd April: This weekend's Auto Trader Easter Thunderball is the first event in the 2012 Eurodragster.com Perfect Awards scheme. £100 is on offer for perfect performance. Racers please note that decals are mandatory for both Perfect Awards this season. This weekend's Eurodragster.com/ModUrStang Perfect Light Award is £50. The money will be awarded to the first racer this weekend to record a Reaction Time of 0.000 seconds. The Perfect Light Award is available all to racers in all classes during qualifying and eliminations, but will only be awarded for the first Perfect Light of the event. If not won this weekend then the Award will be increased to £75 for Big Bang; if it is won then it will be reset to £50 for Big Bang. The Perfect Light Award is presented in association with vehicle modification specialist ModUrStang whose web site you can find at www.modurstang.co.uk. This weekend's Eurodragster.com/Gold RV Perfect ET Award is £50. The money will be awarded to the first racer this weekend to run to the thousandth on their dial-in or index during qualifying or eliminations. The Perfect ET Award is available this weekend in Super Pro ET, Pro ET, Sportsman ET, Super Comp, Super Gas, Super Street, Lucas Oil Junior Dragster (eliminations only), 8.50 Bike, 9.50 Bike, the Wild Bunch, VW Pro, VW Sportsman and Junior Drag Bike, but will only be awarded for the first Perfect Run of the event. If not won this weekend then the Award will be increased to £75 for Big Bang; if it is won then it will be reset to £50 for Big Bang. The Perfect ET Award is presented in association with RV sales and service specialists Gold RV whose web site you can find at www.goldrv.co.uk. To be eligible to collect either Perfect Award, racers are required to carry decals, one on each side of the vehicle. If you pull this weekend's first Perfect Light or Perfect ET but are not carrying decals then there will be no discussion; we will not pay out and the next person to pull a Perfect Light or Perfect ET will get the money assuming that they are carrying decals. ModUrStang and Gold RV decals will be available in Signing On from Friday morning. SPR taking fuel orders. 3rd April: Santa Pod Raceway are able to supply fuel to racers attending this weekend's Auto Trader Easter Thunderball courtesy of sponsor VP Racing Fuels. "We currently have our full range in stock and it's available at some very competitive prices", says James Forster. "If you would like the fuel delivered to your pits then please let us know for which event you need it, along with the driver or rider's name and race number. To view our full range of stock please visit www.santapodshop.com. For more information of to place your order please contact the office on 01234 782828 (outside the UK +44 1234 782828) or E-Mail info@santapod.com. Pre-Ordering is recommended as fuel will be sold on a first come first served basis. "Fuel can also be bought directly from the Pod Shop whose new extension also allows us to stock even more automotive products. You will find products from Nimbus Motorsport, Trico Windscreen Wipers, WD40, and a full range of Lucas Oil products. Coming soon is stock from Karcher and Forge Motorsport." Web site updates. 3rd April: Alan Currans has updated his excellent Acceleration Archive with a gallery of shots of Saturday's action at Shakespeare County Raceway's Public Test and Tune Weekend. You can take a look at Alan's shots via the What's New link at www.theaccelerationarchive.co.uk. Eurodragster.com News Editor Tog has updated his personal web site with pictures from the weekend's Run What You Brung and Peak Performance Day at Santa Pod Raceway. You can check out Tog's pictures at eurodragster.smugmug.com or at www.togsdragracing.com. SPRC notice to crew members. 2nd April: Santa Pod Racers Club Assistant Race Director Carole Ismail has asked us to make an important announcement to crew members going to the start line area with vehicles at Santa Pod Raceway this season: Crew members must not sit or lean on the guardrail on either side of the track. Crew members must not loiter in the start line area. At the latest, crew members should leave when their class has finished running. Whether or not their class is running, crew members must vacate the start line area when requested by either race officials or security personnel. Action will be taken against any crew member who becomes argumentative or abusive if asked to vacate the start line area or to get off the guardrail. Notices to the above effect will be posted in the start line area in time for this weekend's Autotrader Easter Thunderball. Team Reloaded ready for 2012. 2nd April: UK Super Pro ET racer and Eurodragster.com sponsor Peter Walters and Team Reloaded are really looking forward to the 2012 season. Pete writes that after a successfull 2010 and 2011 season, finishing fourth in the National Championship in both years, the team are aiming to improve: 2011 wasn't the most perfect year for us, with various mechanical issues, but we still managed to reach two finals (SPRC Summernationals and a non-qualifying European Finals). But we are still looking for our first Super Pro win, and hopefully we can achieve this in 2012. The car has undergone some visual changes, including new front wheels, new front and rear wing end plates and various bits of tidying up including some carbon fibre touches. Mechanically the car is the same: we recieved our repaired Donovan block back, but have decided to keep it to one side and to run the 2012 season with our spare engine, which we used last year. One addition we have made is a new shifter with an electric shifting solenoid, which will hopefully make us a bit more consistent. We have started to plan some big changes in the engine department for 2013, watch this space. We have had some new hero cards done, designed and printed by PWRD, so come along to the pit and pick one up! Finally, my Simpson helmet has had a new paint scheme. Like the hero cards the helmet was designed by me at Peter Walters Race Design and painted by my dad's new company RW Services which specialises in custom paint and fabricating. Both PWRD and RW Services are Nitro FM and race commentary sponsors for the 2012 season. Swift snippets. 2nd April: Terje Håkensbakken says that Svein Olav Rolfstad and Jan Sturla Hegre of Norway's Rolfstad Pro Racing Supertwin team will be ready for the 2012 FIA Main Event. "Jan Sturla has a new engine in his bike", says Terje. "The team will be hunting a new European ET record. That is their main goal." Thanks to Robin Jackson for letting us know that UK Pro Modified racer Wayne Nicholson gave a short interview to BBC Radio Leeds this past Saturday (31st). The interview can be heard by clicking here and scrolling forward to the 2:44:50 mark. The link remains available for seven days after the broadcast. Wayne and the Lucky Devil team begin their MSA British Drag Racing Championship campaign at this weekend's Autotrader Easter Thunderball at Santa Pod Raceway. Pit crew Mum and Dad have asked us to say a big Happy 12th Birthday to UK Junior Dragster racer Russell Victory. No sooner said than done; have a great day Russell. See Nimbus for System 1. 2nd April: Eurodragster.com sponsor Nimbus Motorsport are pleased to announce that they now stock the full range of System 1 oil and fuel filters, including all the spare elements, O-rings and related hardware. Created by Steve Faria in the USA more than fifteen years ago, System 1 products have been extensively tested in the world's most demanding environments and used successfully in the racing circuits of NHRA, NASCAR, Busch Series, CART, IRL, Formula 1, World of Outlaws, International Hot Boat Association, Monster Trucks, Off Road and numerous other racing applications. For more information check out the Nimbus Motorsport web site at www.nimbusmotorsport.com or call 01377 236170. Pre-Easter Test Weekend coverage. 1st April: We have been at Santa Pod Raceway this weekend covering Saturday's Run What You Brung and today's Peak Performance Day in association with Alamo Rent-A-Car. You can check out our Autotrader Easter Thunderball event index, which includes links to the Test Weekend coverage, by clicking here or by clicking on the Event Coverage link on the left-hand side of any Eurodragster.com page. Today's (Sunday's) report is just a list of best times by each racer; the timing crew were testing one of their contingency PCs today but this PC could not be networked therefore we did not have our usual access to the timing database. In the absence of an on-line link David Anniwell of SPRC's timing crew worked a small miracle to prepare a data file, but the file contained some corrupt data which took a fair while to sort out. As time was getting short having done that, we decided just to post the list of FTDs. Jerry Cookson and Jon Spoard have kindly agreed to provide us with a report and a couple from pictures of this weekend's Public Test Weekend at Shakespeare County Raceway (see above) so check back for that. Swift snippets. 1st April: Having suffered a breakage in testing, UK Pro ET racer and Perfect Light Award sponsor Mike Lacey is urgently seeking a reverse pattern TH400 box, good for 1000 hp, to buy or rent for next weekend's Autotrader Easter Thunderball. "I foot-brake launch so it doesn't need a transbrake. If it has, then that's fine too" says Mike. If you can help then please get in touch with Mike on 07774 712000 or via his web site at www.modurstang.co.uk. Paula Marshall has asked us to say a big Happy 23rd Wedding Anniversary to husband and SPRC Chief Starter Ian Marshall. "Ian has been fantastic managing everything whilst I have been ill", says Paula. "A very Happy Anniversary to Ian". We would like to add our own Anniversary wishes to Paula and Ian. Earlier news