Bringing the revs up into stage and launching the car pulled harder than I’ve felt before and I held the shifts longer, around 330ft I saw Joe out the corner of my eye but I wasn’t all that far behind so I thought it must have been on for a semi decent pass. In the second 1/8th it was really pulling until I felt the car nose over at 1000ft, coasting over the line and popped the chutes.

After turning off at the top end I waited for the crew to arrive, not really sure what time to expect, when Martin announced it was a 7.60 I was over the moon, nothing like diving straight into the 7s!

Upon inspection in the pits it turned out that the burst panel on the blower had gone, and an onboard video confirmed it was as it went through the 1000ft mark. With clocking 172mph at the 1000ft and 173mph at the quarter it would surely have been on for a low 7.5@180mph, so plenty more to come next year. Unfortunately we found an air leak on the blower manifold on Sunday morning, we think the aluminium plate on top of the manifold had warped so we were out for the rest of the weekend, which was then lost to rain.

Over the winter we’ve got plenty of improvements and changes to make, we will be putting a set of 4.56 gears in the rear axle to get the 60fts down, also a magnesium buzzard catcher injector will be replacing the nostalgia ribbed Enderle injector which is just not big enough to supply the air required, if time permits there will be a few aero tricks on the body as well.

I’d like to congratulate Joe Bond, the whole Bond family and Nuthin’ Fancy team on their NFAA Championship win, there’s not a more deserving team out there. I’d also like to thank everyone who has helped and supported us this year, you know who you are - it wouldn’t be possible without you all.

Once again a massive thank you to sponsors; Lucas Oil and Dodo Juice.

Now, how long is it until Easter? In the mean time I’m off to the California Hot Rod Reunion in Bakersfield to finish off the season with sun and nitro.

In our preparations I’m excited to announce a new sponsorship partner: We’ve put together a deal with Dodo Juice. Those of you heavily into vehicle detailing/polishing will know Dodo Juice for being the best of the best and creating their own pure carnauba specialist polishes and waxes for different applications - along with their own line of cleaning equipment there is nothing better for keeping your ride looking it’s best! For more information about their products take a trip over to Dodo Island, the home of Dodo Juice and all things shiny. For the results, see Motor Psycho at the track!

After pretty much destroying our B&J gearbox last year at the National Finals we have invested in a top of the line Lenco CS2 which was built for FIA Top Methanol usage so should be more than enough for us. We have also altered the rear end gear ratio and performed one or two other changes with the end result being that we were ready to test at the start of June, although are plans were pushed back a little due to some problems with seals and not wanting to play until we knew everything was right.

Come the Summer Nationals we were ready to take part in an NFAA meeting where we made it to the 3rd/4th place shootout but were shut off due to an oil leak caused by a rushed turnaround and insufficient time to run all the usual tests. We followed this with some tests at the Retro Show where we determined we were having issues changing gear - later found to be a combination of poor pressure from the CO2 regulator and incorrect tower heights on the gearbox itself.

With this corrected we set out to test again at Mini In The Park which rewarded us with an 8 second run at over 170mph. Looking over this run afterwards we need to put more clutch into the car to get it off the line better, and also raise the wheelie bar height as if you look closely you can see the car squat then bounce off the wheelie bar. We will be making this changes and are entering the Euro Finals in Super Pro, where we hope to run our first seven.

Euro Finals weekend in itself was a manic one putting all the last touches to the car and getting it ready to make noise, which it did Saturday afternoon and after solving a mag clamp problem if I do say so myself it sounded fantastic.

Two weeks later we were ready for shakedown passes at the National Finals, due to highly overgeared rear axle the clutch and gearbox took some heavy abuse, but its a start.

Work is already underway for the 2010 season, the rear gear problem is currently being solved, the gearbox will be rebuilt and the clutch freshened. There are some other rather unique and potential highly advantageous plans being hatched, but I’ll keep them secret for now!

The list of thank yous is huge, without these people though this car simply wouldn’t have been possible.

Les Downey at Lucas Oils UK for their continued support, this is our 11th year of involvement with Lucas and simply nothing else would go in that engine.

Bill & Luke ‘Pit Rat’ Felstead, Bob Jarrett, Dave ‘Crunch’ Crunkhorn, Martyn Hannis the Bond Family & Nuthin Fancy Racing, Bob Glassup & Xtreme Racing, John & Leslie Wright, Lawrie Gatehouse, Tony Betts, Andy Kate & Luke Robinson, Jason Phelps, John Spuffard, Dave Bryant, Martin Hill, Doug Ripley, David Lloyd-Jones, Darren Prentice & everyone at Santa Pod Raceway.

Also to the crew, my Dad (Bob), Darren, Martin, Ben, Tanya & Vicky, a better crew I couldn’t wish for.

Finally some congratulations are in order, Bennett Racing for their championship win, Joe Bond for getting back into the 6s and runner up in the championship, Bill Felstead & Jon Best for having the most evil sounding car on the planet and running right into the 6s on fire on his first full pass, Bob Glassup for breaking into the 6s for the first time and commiserations to Freddy’s Revenge for the engine damage sustained at the National Finals, we hope to see you out again soon.

Don’t forget you can keep up to date with all the news from the team via our Twitter and Facebook accounts.

We received the block back on Thursday morning after having the bottom end rebuilt and Darren, Bob (my Dad), Luke and I set about rebuilding it and getting it back between the chassis rails. By Friday we were ready to fire the motor up - all was well and we were looking forward to the weekend ahead.

Saturday morning arrived and a starter motor problem held us back from the first session and a slight oil leak saw us shut off after the burnout in the second session but the burnout sounded promising.

In the 6:30 night session Darren Prentice asked John Everitt and I just to do burnouts and a launch as the track was cold and getting damp, but what a launch, it found some traction and pulled the front wheels right up,

Shifting into second they stayed up and tripped the 60ft beams with the rear wheels still clocking a 1.24 - after that it I shut it off but we were extremely happy with the launch and running at night was an amazing experience with some throttle barks and dry hops with John. When the crew game to get me at the top end there were grins all round and we decided to run in the RWYB on Sunday to see what would happen on a full pass.

Sunday dawned and the pits filled up quickly, it was a really busy day at the track. We made it to the startline at around lunchtime and once again paired up against John. At the hit it spun the tyres then turned right and lifted the wheels when I pulled second. I stayed in it until the centre line was getting too close for comfort, lifted and straightened up then nailed it again, weaving all over the lane. Great fun but no good for my ET, only managing a 10.1 but we were all pleased with the cars performance.

This leads us on to the spy pic two weeks ago, the pictured blown Chevy is sat in Doug Ripley’s workshop waiting to go between the rails of Motor Psycho next year, It is a 481-X Rodeck block with Bac-Man billet heads and an 8/71 blower - I’ll have more news in the next few weeks.

Unfortunately this means the current injected Big Block has to go, so if anyone wants a freshly rebuilt 489ci injected alky motor that has serious 8 second potential contact us via the ad in the for sale section.

After all that we have a few people to say thank you to: the crew for all their hard work all season on the car, allowing me to go out there and have a blast; John Everitt for rescuing us with a spare starter motor and being a great match race partner; Sam Freeman for the loan of a generator after ours died and Darren Prentice for keeping us informed, and generally being one of the most helpful people you could know.

Finally if anyone has any pictures or video from the weekend please let us know - we are especially looking for a wheels up night shot from Saturday evening. Have a good off season everyone and see you at the track next year.

We have been putting some testing in today and have just run a 9.45 @ 131 mph, our best yet with the new car.

Adam tells me the car was sideways off the line causing him to lift and pull 2nd. The car went sideways again at the hit so he pedalled it and then the car hooked up.

If we can get the car too stick off the line we are shooting for an 8. Fingers crossed!

Friday was largely dry and saw sportsman classes run through a huge number of qualifying cycles, which should have been good for us. However on warming the car up on Friday morning we discovered an oiling problem in one of the cylinders, which was hugely smokey, We had no option but to take the head off at this point with visions of holed pistons racing through our minds. With the head off the piston and valves were thankfully absolutely fine but it was obvious that we had head sealing problems which were traced to stripped threads in the block. It is a good thing indeed that we had the head off as running like this may have lead to torched heads.

As a precautionary measure we checked both heads and eventually fixed quite a few head studs with helicoils, checking valve seats and guides while we had the opportunity. By the time we had got the engine back together racing was done for the day, and after chasing some gremlins in the timing system the motor sounded great. We eagerly awaited Saturday to try it out.

Saturday came, and we still had a slightly oil cylinder on one sidde which we have put down to the oil control ring. We warmed the motor up and it sounded great, but on the track the performance was a bit lacklustre. Back in the pits we fired the motor and it sounded awful - checking the timing showed it was now severely retarded. We re-timed the mag and tried again, it was a bit better but not much. Back in the pits again it was obvious the mag is moving at the hit of the throttle - possibly even in the burnout - and throwing the timing out. Unfortunately this was the last run of the weekend, Sunday saw us do nothing ore than eat Roast Beef and watch Hot Rod in the back of the lorry and come Monday morning we packed up and went home, despite having qualified on the ladder. This turned out to be good call as the meeting was later called off.

We sat out the Summer Nationals as we had not received the parts required, and the motor is now being freshened for the Nostalgia Nationals with new rings and a beefier mag clamp. this should hopefully see Iron Dan perform to his full potential.

Videos from the Main Event are now online: Qualifier 1, Qualifier 2.

Dan was not the happiest of engines at Easter though, seemingly grumpy at being woke from his hibernation so early in the year. I can’t see what he was complaining about though as the weather was some of the balmiest I have seen at Easter - rather than the normal snow there was sunshine and lots of it, even featuring shorts and t-shirts on one day.

We spent a while chasing down a problem in the fuel system only to find that when we thought we had sorted it the motor was running really hot and seemingly lean. A quick sanity check showed this to actually be caused by the mag clamp coming loose and allowing the timing to retard itself, shooting the spark while the exhaust valve is open and causing lots of flame.

This was a quick fix, but on attempting to fire the car we discovered two things - our starter motor is really getting worn out, and we had broken a bearing in the gearbox, putting us out of action.

Despite this we had a good weekend, and the event looks like going down in history as a classic. Congratulations to those running new personal bests, especially Frank Bennett and Joe Bond, and many many thanks to those who provided us with help all weekend, especially Martyn Jones and Crunch who made us feel very welcome in the Super Pro pits - I am already looking forward to the Main Event, our next scheduled appearance.

It isn’t just the car on the mend either - Darren is getting better after his recent stay in hospital.

More news soon, and see you at the track.

We wouldn’t be racing now if it wasn’t for all Darren’s hard work over the years, and wish him a speedy recovery. He was last seen hassling the nurses for more ‘Nitrolingual’ as we all know that the more nitro you can get the better.

If you would like to talk to Darren then his bedside number is 07041 136273.