Australian Summernationals
at Western Sydney
2/27/2007
There seems to be no doubt that in the last year that drag racing in Australia has taken a quantum leap that has almost put it on a par with American drag racing. Comparing apples with apples – if you look at the performance levels of IHRA competition in Top Fuel, Pro Modified and Alcohol funny car – the Aussies aren’t all that far away and the recent Summernationals at Western Sydney certainly confirmed this as Jon Van Daal reports.
Read versus Read – here Phil (far lane) gets the jump on Steve however it wouldn’t last as Phil lost an engine at half track and had to watch a 4.93 rush past for the win.
In Top Fuel there some of the most stunning racing I’ve ever seen down under. While we didn’t see the fifties that had made the Boxing Day race so special, it was the closeness of the racing that was a joy to watch. This started on Friday night when Alan Dobson put down low ET of the event – a 4.605 while qualifying next to Phil Read’s 4.63 at 327.43.
Third was Darren Morgan with a 4.70 while Phil Lamattina was fourth with a 4.71. Steve Read’s 4.86 was fifth while Terry Sainty and Bob Shepherd rounded things out with 5.30 and 5.46 times. I believe that this was the first time five four second cars had qualified for a Top Fuel bracket.
Eliminations opened with Alan Dobson smoking the tyres on a 6.68 bye run. Lamattina then went down to Steve Read when his 4.99 nosed over to allow Read through with a 4.86 time. Phil Read then took on Shepherd with the latter red lighting away a
superior 5.01 to Read’s back peddling 5.34. Shepherd then had the added embarrassment of having no chutes and ended up in the sand pit.
The final pairing saw the second Team Read car, with Darren Morgan at the butterfly taking on Terry Sainty. Morgan grabbed a couple of hundredths off the line but about two hundredfeet out his engine erupted into flames. This allowed Sainty to pass his flaming rival and a 5.23 easily handled a failing 6.6 second pass.
The semis opened with Alan Dobson and Steve Read lining up for one of the closest races of the bracket. This saw Read grab a .093 to .108 lead off the line but as the two proceeded down the Western Sydney quarter mile Dobson pulled to a slight lead. Dobson was to have a massive fire when his crankshaft broke which allowed Read to pull back in front within the last hundred feet – a 5.819/269 to 5.829 at a fading 246 mph.
The second race saw Sainty face Phil Read and it was an all the way win for Read. Coming off a .000 light in the first round Read’s .051 had his brother-in-law Sainty’s .099 covered and then shut off early to still record a 5.612 / 252 mph over a 5.15/254 lose.
