All about Drag Racing

New for 2004 was a digital SLR which, as you can see, took a bit of getting used to. It is possible that standing near the finish line trying to keep up with Steve Woollatt who was on his way to an off-the-trailer 6.595 second pass at 209.16 mph was a bit ambitious. I maintain that my panning was OK, he just holeshot me by a tenth or so.
This and the next picture were taken at the Easter Thunderball at Santa Pod on Sunday 11 April.

The Showtime funny car team were to have a rather unsuccessful year but they did not know that as they warmed the engine in the pits.
How Bob Jarrett stands there so nonchalently without a mask on beats me.

The next pictures were taken at the Main Event at Santa Pod on 31 May. This is about as close to a Fast Freddy Fagerström's eye view of things as most people would care to get. Apart from Tog of Eurodragster of course, he actually likes riding in these things . . .
Fast Freddy qualified a creditable no. 3 in a field of 16 pro mods with a 6.527/213 effort but went out in round 2 to Peter Wacker.

This car has been around about as long as I can remember, and believe me that's some time.
The original Santa Pod Wheelie Stingray reincarnated as High Risk and driven (I think) by Ron Picardo on this occasion.

John Spuffard blatantly disregarding the Clean Air Act in the Showtime fuel funny car. This run netted a 5.916/163.54 clocking which may have been the car's best run all year.

On to Shakespeare County Raceway where there are always lots of lovely Outlaw Anglias. The following pictures were taken at the Power Nationals on 13 June 2004.
This is Paul Hensher in his potent 498 cubic inch Gas Attack doing what comes naturally.

With all due respect to Paul and his fellow racers, to an old stager like me there is only one Anglia and this is it - Alan O'Connor's Al's Gasser. I have taken lots of pictures of this car down the years but this is definitely one of the best even if I do say so myself.

The new digital camera has a sort of electronic motor drive which takes up to four pictures one after the other. I thought this might be handy because I have more pictures of the back of Roger Gorringe's head than I have of cars.
In this case the professional photographers must have all gone for a pint which enabled me to capture this sequence of Mark Flavell burning out in his immaculate 475 cubic inch blown dragster.

I had managed to get some control over the camera by now and was able to capture Acceleration Archive contributor Steve Woollatt burning out on The Dealer without any problems. Mind you he wasn't doing 209 mph this time which probably helped . . .

The weather at Shakey was not always as good as this in 2004. In the foreground is Andy Carter's GoTalk sponsored top fuel dragster, behind is Thomas Natass' car with the familiar Batman logo carried over from his days in pro mod. The pair of them were match racing with the hugely-experienced Carter taking the win 2-0 with a couple of mid-six second runs over-powering the track on both occasions.

There was a new event for me this year - the Goodwood Festival of Speed. What drew me like a moth to a flame was the presence of no less than five legendary fuel altereds over from the USA.
This picture was taken down on the start line and I am afraid I have to report that Don Green and Ron Hope's Rat Trap misbehaved itself somewhat and refused to fire.

One doesn't have 'pits' at Goodwood, one has a paddock, in this case the Cathedral Paddock.
A blockage in the fuel lines was the likely suspect so these were attended to with the help of veteran funny car team boss Nobby Hills in the red cap.

A rejuvenated Rat Trap tows down for its afternoon demonstration run in front of a large crowd.

Dave Hough's Model T bodied Nanook did gain fire and is seen burning out amongst the straw bales which line the track.

A couple of pictures of Nanook and the team in the paddock. I thought Santa Pod got crowded until I tried taking pictures there!

Pure Hell was driven at the Festival by its owner Rich Guasco. You can see work ongoing on the Rat Trap altered in the foreground of the picture.

Leon Fitzgerald's Pure Heaven II is powered by a 427 inch L-88 Chevy rat motor and has run a best of 7.12 seconds and 212 mph. Scary!

The Bradford's Fiat Topolino bodied AA/FA, despite its appearance, was built in 2000 by the father and son team of Brad and Randy Bradford. The original car ran best figures of 7.06/209.