'Thunder on the River' Race Report
February 2006

2006.02.26 NWSC Carrum Victoria - To say we have been a little starved of some drag boat racing lately would be an understatement. With the last race being held in late November 2005, and then the cancellation of the January 29 th race, it’s been nearly three months since the Victorian Drag Boat Club lit up the liquid race track! With a long hot summer still with us, there is still plenty of racing to look forward to, as the club now reaches the half way mark. Yep, summer!! Long hot days and nights, the beach, cold beer and BBQ’s…..Can’t get any better than this!! Except when you want to go drag boat racing!! Fair dinkum, the VDBC must have done something wrong to the big man upstairs!

To quote from last season, “typically, the weather this season has certainly seen the end of the drought in most places around Australia, and, if you want to bring rain and some other bad weather to a drought affected area near where you live, just schedule a drag boat race at a lake near you! It seems the Victorian Drag Boat Club can’t take a trick with the bloody weather, and for some unknown reason, the weeks leading up to a race day, sees blasting hot sunshine most days, little wind and perfect conditions for racing. But, come race weekend, the rain comes, the wind howls, and the temperature drops to near blizzard conditions”, unquote. So guess what?? Here it is, the next race season, and nothing has changed. The race billed as the ‘THUNDER ON THE RIVER’ event was no exception. Saturday club members were to assemble at the National Water Sports Centre to prepare the site for the Sunday race day. By 1.00pm the area was underwater by torrential rain, thunderstorms, lightning, hail and the never ending down poor of rain, which saw most of the city of Melbourne, underwater and flooded! The pro boat pit area again turned into a quagmire, but with not too many entries in these classes, this didn’t cause too much problem. It sure was ‘THUNDER ON THE RIVER’…… and we hadn’t seen a boat race yet!

Consider the poor New South Wales racers. Craig Cook and his team, lead by Paul Madill, try to attend as many races as they can, but left early Sunday morning and never pulled their boat from the trailer. It seems it’s wearing very thin with the team, who spend a considerable amount of money to come 800 km’s to race each time and leave with nothing more than a further hate for Victoria and it’s forever changing weather pattern. What is disappointing is that the sport is suffering from a lack of ‘big boats’ this season, and this weather issue is slowing decaying what is left of a once great rivalry between the NSW boys and the Victorians. Unfortunately, Victorians have given up defending the state and its bloody ridiculous weather. Guess somebody up there hates drag boat racing!

The conditions started to improve after the drivers meeting, held at 10.30am, a late start, but better than calling the entire show off altogether due to the rotten weather. The rescue boats and teams were out very early in the morning, in rain, picking up debris and all sorts of stuff that had been pushed down the river by the rain, and what a job this turned out to be. Small branches had trees attached to them, general rubbish, and dozens of tennis balls all seem to find their way down stream and created a nightmare for the boys collecting the junk. The decision that team owner, Craig Cook had to make was that with so much junk floating in the water, both he and Paul decided to abandon their plans to run the newly rebuilt ‘THUNDER FROMDOWN UNDER’, and having bought two boats with them, the second belonging to Gary James, who recently purchased the ex ‘NITRO THUNDER’ hydro, less engine, it was a going to be a risk to run the boats, just in case something was missed under the water. Having recently hit what many believe to have been an old car tyre floating under the surface, the team made a wise call to pull up stumps and head north for the long drive home.

Still, the new ‘DISTANT THUNDER’ was unpacked from the team trailer to show the sceptics how you turn a Blown Alcohol Flatbottom into a Blown Alcohol Hydro! By simply removing the engine from the BAF, paying a lot of money to buy the hydro and ‘bingo’, instant BAH!!!! Over the Christmas period, the big blown engine from ‘DAD’S TOY’, the BAF of Gary James, was removed and shipped to the workshop of Paul Madill, where the transplant was performed. In a makeover worthy of a TV show, the former ‘NITROTHUNDER’ was transformed by Paul and his crew and renamed ‘DISTANT THUNDER’ with some fancy airbrush work, and the boat was showed to all who ventured down into the pits for a first look. Can’t wait to see this new outfit on the water and neither can Gary!

The rain had come to a stop and the course again swept for any remaining debris as the bracket boys came out to play and boats started to fill the holding rope for the warm up session. New boats on the day were a STV outboard called ‘KATES’ with Simon Curwood driving, and ‘THE WIZARD’, with David Peters at the wheel. Both boats and drivers had not raced before and were both looking to have a great day.

The crowd started to fill the bank, and the clouds gave way to breaks of sunshine finally, and the sun stayed with us for the remainder of the day. Only trouble was the big hydros were half way back to NSW by then!

However, Alan Butcher bought his ‘ANNIHILATION’ BAH to run a couple of test passes and went out in really good water to smash the old Australian record for a blown hydro under 366ci class, with two passes around the 155 mph mark. With the boat sounding really strong, the 366 ci blown small block Chev took Alan for two rides and blasted the previous record held for over 12 years. Crew Chief Peter Robertson and engine tuner Bob Fisher along with the team, celebrated long into the night and we hear more than a few didn’t make the bell the next morning!

The Stock Eliminator class (66-75mph) saw 7 entries and this brought the bracket alive. ‘DECEPTIVE’, Matt Smith, who has been missing of late and finally made the water for this season, ‘SHOW NO MERCY’, Ben Coughlin, ‘ROBBIE MARINE PRODUCTS’, David Kula, ‘WHITE HEAT’, Rowan White, ‘PSYCHO’, a new boat driven by David Bradford, ‘IMMATURE’, driven by Drew Foster, and a new entry ‘MR.WIZARD’ with David Peters at the controls . Water conditions were ideal for the bracket boys and the racing was excellent. Rowan White had one of those days that you just wish you didn’t get out of bed for, breaking out in the sped class not once but four times! The ‘WHITE HEAT’ ‘machine looking great with some new graphics, ran just way too fast and has slipped in the points chase after the day. It was great to see the ‘DECEPTIVE’ boat back, and some work has been done, maybe a gear change, as the boat shot out of the hole quicker than a Top Fueler! Drew Foster driving ‘IMMATURE’ just keeps getting better and better. Being his first season racing, Drew has shown all in the class who is boss! The red Flatbottom is leading the bracket at the moment by the points, but the chase is now on from others in the class. Ben Coughlin in ‘SHOW NO MERCY’ has a battle on his hands now! After two years of domination in the class, Ben has to really pull out the finger now to get around Drew Foster. Ben has made some changes to the boat to keep ahead but the challenge has been set now and Ben has the metal to catch him! Two new boats made the rope in the Stock Eliminator class, ‘PSYCHO’ with Dave Bradford at the wheel, an old circle race boat complete with a 265 six cylinder Hemi engine and with three Weber side draft carbies and just looked awesome! David Kula and ‘ROBBIE MARINE PRODUCTS’, has a mixed day. Winning three rounds out of seven, DNF in two of them, and two runners up in the rounds, David has third place right now in the Signature Spas Australian National Drag Boat Championship Points table, and can still lay a claim for a higher position before the season finals in May. David Peters in ‘MR.WIZARD’ was a first timer to the Liquid Quarter Mile and a great time! Although a couple of wins, a couple of losses and a lot of fun, we hope David will be back again on March 26/27 th at the APBA Australian National Titles. The final between ‘IMMATURE’ and ‘SHOW NO MERCY’, was a pure delight to watch. These two guys have been going at each other all season, and as Ben is still the current champion of the class has his hands full with Drew Foster. The ‘IMMATURE’ boat was too good on this occasion winning by half a deck, at 75.32mph and a 14.81 ET.

The Modified Stock class (76-85 mph) saw only 3 entries, those being ‘MERLIN’’, Esmund Muller, ‘THE WARRIOR’, Paul Scott and Simon Curwood driving ‘KATES’, for the first time in drag racing. Paul Scott is still finding his way in his machine, and still sorting out some engine gremlins in ‘THE WARRIOR’. The big outboard of Simon Curwood gave them all a scare and never lost a round, finding its way into the final to meet old charger Esmund Muller in the final in ‘MERLIN’. When the green light was given both boats shot out of the hole, but experience counts in the final round, and Esmund was able to hold off a fast charging ‘KATES’ who was coming home fast. The ‘MERLIN’ boat won with a 85.93mph at 12.88 ET, as close as you can get to the bracket dial in. Congratulations to both drivers for putting on a great display of racing.

In the Super Stock class (86-95mph) again another disappointing field of 3 boats took to the rope. With regular boats like ‘ARROGANT’, ‘MISSILE’, ‘WIZARD’, ‘OUTCAST’,‘RATTLER2’ and ‘VANISHING POINT’ still missing from the pack, it was left to ‘TRIPPA’, Chris Buhagiar, ‘FLAT OUT’ driven by Chris Howlett’ and David Howie in ‘ENERGY’. Al three boats have been going at each other for a while now, and David Howie now has the biggest challenge with the other two boats chasing him down. The ‘FLAT OUT’ boat of Chris Howlett, in its real first season of racing, has loomed as the biggest threat to Howie. The big 572 ci Chev engine in the Howlett boat is a menacing amount of power and has proven reliable and hard to keep up with. Chris Buhagiar has ‘TRIPPA’ still looking and sounding good and dusted David Howie in round 3. The ‘FLAT OUT’ boat broke out in round 6, but would still find its way into the final. Joining him was the ‘ENERGY’ boat of Dave Howie, and believe it or not, in rounds 2 and 5, both boats had to go back to the holding rope as the lasers could not separate the lanes as to who won!! With these two in the final together, and daylight starting to fade, the thought of being back on Monday morning was real. At the finish line the ‘ENERGY’ boat got the nod in lane 2, by an eye bow hook in what was just an awesome display of drag racing by all three competitors.

With no entries in the Super Comp bracket, (96-105mph), usual Super Comp driver Tony Tippelt driving ‘ARMEGEDDON’ took on Bruce Cocks in the ‘BAD HABITS’ Blown Alcohol Displacement boat in a grudge style race over three heats. Tony won all three passes over Bruce who is still having propeller problems. Last we heard Bruce was looking for Ron Braaksma’s phone number to order a new PBR prop. So what’s happened to Pro Comp this season? Missing from the class, which was tipped to be the next big thing, is Graham Mott, ‘SHE’S MAD’, Marty Lynch in ‘FLAMED & FLAT’, the John Bynon owned, Mark Potter driven Big Block Ford powered machine ‘FORDMIDABLE’, Paul Browne in ‘QUICKSILVER’, and David Vella and the ‘FORCED ENTRY’ machine. This class should be the biggest thing going around, but due to reasons unknown by most, they just don’t make the entry list. It’s time to get it together boys and put the show on that promised so much and yet has delivered nothing this season.

But that’s not to say it just ones class. What’s happened to all the classes? Where are all the boats? What seemed to be a bumper season, has turned ugly, with many boats staying in the shed at home. Both the VDBC and drivers need to examine the reasons for the decline in numbers. Fuel costs, licence costs and other factors are all legitimate reasons for non racing, but when the VDBC go to great lengths to organise and maintain a race schedule for all to enjoy, you would think that the drivers would embrace it.

With the Signature Spas 2006 Australian Power Boat Association Championships coming up next round, you think, just think that the missing boats will reappear on March 26 th at the NWSC. Let’s hope for all concerned that the rope is stocked with some real quality.

Contributed