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IT'S SUMMER DOWN UNDER
Words and photos by Jon Van Daal
2/22/06
While the northern hemisphere is in deep winter during early February, down under its high summer. While the Winternationals were being played out at Pomona, the Summernationals were being run at Western Sydney International Raceway and our man on the spot, JON VAN DAAL gives us the low down on what turned out to be one" cracker" of a race. We've kept the Australian spelling and idioms, but changed to American punctuation -- just so everyone has a little something to complain about. --Ed.
Despite a wild drifting burnout Aaron Tremayne top qualified with a 7.33 but fell to Denis Whiting in the semi finals.
ny NHRA POWERade champion worth his salt rises to the top through a combination of excellent driving ability, great team work, a good race car and a steady supply of reliable parts. American teams seem to be getting bigger and bigger in order to obtain the data to win a race and ultimately win a championship.
Trying to achieve the same type of success outside America is a lot harder than one would think. Firstly, being 7,500 miles (or 7.500 for those outside the U.S.) from the United States means time and extra money with air freight and import duties. Secondly, racers outside America aren’t at the top list when it comes to obtaining parts – being so far away often means waiting for supply and then waiting to receive the parts when they are sent. Unfortunately a few of the parts sent to local racers end up being incorrect and in some cases substandard (as one racer found out at this event – meaning he couldn’t qualify).
While the track preparation at Western Sydney was second to none at the Summernationals you simply can’t duplicate the traction created by having around a hundred fuel car passes each day during qualifying for an NHRA national event. So what does this all have to do with a race in the antipodes – well how about world class performances for one.
Ben Bray is the reigning Australian Top Doorslammer champion, but has been contesting the Pro Comp bracket (a combination of alky dragsters and funny cars) as well. On his third qualifying run he and his famous father, Victor, tuned the car for the conditions and this saw the car run an unheard of 5.575.
“We knew the car could do it – it just all came together on that run,” an elated Bray the younger told me. “Usually Top Doorslammer runs after Top Fuel and a lot of the time we have to run just after an oil-down so we can’t get the best out of our car. This time round we were able to get a clean track and with the conditions dad tuned the car for a fifty. Prior to the run dad said that it would be a high five fifty and he was spot on,” an excited Ben continued.
While Ben didn’t have a problem doing well in Top Alcohol he had a lot of pressure on him in Top Doorslammer thanks to the debut of his new GTO (Monaro to us). Even though he had run down into the six-zeros in testing he was still on the outside of the field looking in prior to his last qualifier.