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OFF SEASON, WHAT OFF SEASON…? Hard to believe it’s nearly six months since the Euro Finals but withdrawal symptoms were beginning to show probably due to the lack of regular inhalation of methanol fumes. The car remains essentially the same although a lot of off-season maintenance has been carried out. One of the Brad Anderson engines had a damaged crank that was beyond repair and so this has been replaced. The data logger was sent back to the States for checking as well as various safety items for renewal of their SFI tagging. Some minor brackets on the car had broken welds and these have been repaired. Some work was also carried out in the trailer to improve storage and some toolboxes have been made mobile. Two water-storage bags had sprung leaks so these were replaced. The big breakthrough however is the central heating! Yes folks we now have warm-air heating in the kitchen and bunks and boy would it be welcome during the Easter Thunderball. Ok I lied, we have made a change to the car. Next time you see it, take a look at the front wing(s). The team is unchanged for this year namely: Dave (driver and top-end specialist), David (clutch and gearbox), Ricky (bottom end), Brian but called Harry (parts cleaning but also all-round ace mechanic), Linda (team administrator, team cook, startline crew, engine records-keeper, OK so women are good at multi-tasking) and Phil (general dogsbody). In addition there is Anthony Cohen (Team Principal) who drives the tow car and videos every run but also works incredibly hard off-track to win sponsors and his wife Rhonda who is the team psychologist. Rhonda is writing a thesis on drag racing but we still can’t see how she will make any sense out of this sport. Last but not least there is Suzy (team stylist) and Catherine (good company and ace barbequer). Have you ever had one of those days when you just know things are not going to go well? You know the sort of thing, you rush out to the car late for an appointment and a tyre’s flat. Well our pit at the Easter Thunderball 2005 meeting was clearly the venue for the annual conference of the National Gremlin Association. We elected to use a Keith Black engine for the Thunderball as neither of the Brads was ready. Just to make sure everything was ok we test-ran the engine in the workshop and although initially slightly hesitant to start it subsequently fired up 3 more times without problems. Off to Santa Pod on Good Friday and a birthday celebration for Dave complete with cake and candles. Grumpy might be a year older but rest assured he has lost none of his drive and ambition. The same couldn’t be said of the car however as come Saturday morning it refused to start. 4 hours later and the first round of qualifying had come and gone but we hadn’t gone anywhere. We had changed the fuel pump, the mag cap and the points box. We tried a different starter motor and battery pack. We even drained the methanol from the car and refilled with brand new. Quite honestly if we thought running naked around Santa Pod would have helped we would have tried it (despite being bl**dy cold). Eventually after changing the magneto and borrowing Dave Millams ‘squirty’ bottle (bottle with starting solution comprising petrol or sometimes a petrol/methanol mix) we had a running engine. Another quick warm-up and then a rush to the fire-up road for the second round of qualifying. A tentative burnout due to problems with the throttle mechanism (don’t ask, it’s another story) and on green the car just lights its rear tyres and tries to go sideways. Pedalling a couple of times Dave decides to ease off and coasts to the finish line in 11.76 seconds. Well you have to be in to win and we were qualified albeit 5 seconds off the pace! Sorry did I forget to mention the fires? Well throughout the morning our engine failed to ignite the mixture within its cylinders but it was quite happy to ignite unburnt fuel being pumped out of the headers. This ball of flaming fluid then lands on both a rear tyre and the pit floor and proceeds to do its best to toast both. The first time we grabbed an extinguisher and doused everything in white powder. Subsequently we had bowls of water ready and had to douse flames on the pit floor every time we attempted to start. It got to the point that Wellingboro fire service asked if we would notify them of a start-up so they could send over some trainees.  An inspection of the engine after our first run showed significant damage to pushrods and valve springs such that all the springs were replaced and work continued late into the night to remedy the push rod problem. Sunday dawns very damp and a little foggy so it was slightly surprising to hear that the pro classes were to start the days proceedings but it didn’t make any difference to us, as the car wouldn’t start! We weren’t going to be caught out again however as we had kept the bowls of water from yesterday under the benches. A change of coil lead and the engine fires up. Switch off and check the valvetrain only to find more damaged pushrods, so scrub the 3rd round of qualifying. Come the 4th and final round of qualifying and everything comes together. A little tyre shake off the line but straight and true and a 5.66 @ 243mph takes us to no1 qualifier. A rewarding day topped off with another Wilson birthday celebration this time for son David - more cake and candles. Race day and it’s warm and sunny yet the weather station data was giving us headaches. The air quality was changing frequently and the engine had to be fine-tuned each time in order to work at its best. First round was against Lindsey Deuchar who made his intentions clear by screaming away from the lights like a fox being chased by pro-hunt supporters. It was clear to us on the startline that Dave was behind in the first 3rd of the track but our car is always strong towards the line and sure enough he just came out the winner in 5.59 seconds at 254mph. 2nd round was a bye for us but a 5.52 @ 253mph just demonstrates that Dave doesn’t believe in short squirts (well I may not be very tall but I still think I’m useful!). In the final we were against Rob Turner. Regular followers of Drag Racing will know that the Turners are 8 times MSA Champions so they take no prisoners. ACI Racing also races to win and so this final promised to be a good one and sure enough it was. Rob looked to be just ahead from the lights but again our 2nd half performance took Dave across the line first in 5.50 seconds at 248mph. An eventful weekend then, especially when you consider we only broke a couple of valve springs throughout the whole of last season and yet here we managed to break springs and pushrods aplenty just in the warm-up. In addition we did our best to barbeque the car and so to come away with a win was very special. Our thanks to the Santa Pod track crews and officials and a special thanks to Andy Robinson who worked with us and probably learnt a lot about how not to run a blown methanol engine. See you all at Shakey in a few weeks time.
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