Ever since the Western Sydney track opened, there has been widespread support for fuel dragsters and although one funny car match race was run a couple of years ago, the simple fact was that there weren’t too many racers who would tie up hundreds of thousands of dollars in a machine they could only race once or twice a year.

When news of Densham’s return was first announced it seemed everybody was wondering who his opposition would be. Despite this, a number of racers stepped up to the plate and put their hand up to show their support. Even Densham admitted things had changed over the period since his last appearance. “I can’t believe its been twelve years since I last came down here things have certainly changed in that time,” he said. In the end though, there were nearly as many fuel funnies as fuel dragsters at the second round event.

THINGS ARE HEATING UP

While attending the New Year Series rounds at Surfers back in the seventies it seemed like it never rained on race day. Most of the rain stayed in the far off hills above the track, but now those very same hills seem to be the birth place of storms that move north and play havoc with Willowbank’s race schedule.

The first round of the New Series on January 2 & 3 saw rain cover the city of Brisbane and keep crowds down in what was the thirteenth event in a row that was somehow rain affected. Blame it on the global warming, but certainly weather patterns have changed. None more so than on the Friday of the second series round that saw track temperatures of 160 degrees, ensuring none of the fuel cars were able to hold on to the track until nighttime fell. Certainly it’s a wonder I wasn’t turned into a fish after downing 15 bottles of water in a five hour period in an effort to quench my thirst.

After winning the final at the second event Gary Densham admitted that not everything had been right on the night. “We found that we had a clutch problem. It turned out to be the air regulator to the clutch but we didn’t have time to fix it so I had to make the best of it.” he said. Needless to say, all the funny car pits were a hive of activity.

I guess you can never take the teacher out of the racer, as prior to the first round of eliminations, Gary Densham had an impromptu stroll through the staging lanes and met up with a few Junior Dragster competitors. Here Blaze Hansen (on the right) shoots the breeze with the veteran American racer.