---

News November / December
"Season Wrapup"

Here is their schedule for the next few months. 

Feb
9            Orlando Bracket race 1/4
15 - 17  Bradenton Div 2  S/C
16          Orlando Bracket race 1/8 MAYBE
22 - 24  Gainesville Div 2 S/C 

March 
7 - 9       Orlando Div 2 S/C
13 - 16  Gatornationals S/C
29          Orlando Bracket race 1/8 

April 
12          Orlando Bracket race 1/4
18 - 20  Cecil GA Div 2 S/C
24 - 28  Southern Natationals Atlanta Ga  MAYBE      

October 20th - Division II Race
at Silver Dollar Raceway

	On October 18th Mike and Tony arrived at Silver Dollar Drag Strip in Georgia. On hand was Marc Henney from Germany to help out and to also pick up some tricks for next year's season in Europe.The plan was to make some runs on the Thursday as the track was running a test and tune for $50 per car. That would have been really helpfull but unfortunately it rained all day, so the guys went to work on the motor home giving it a good clean.  So it turned Friday and again another wet day meant now they would lose even more runs which they needed to set up Mike's car up on.  Mike had put a differant converter in the car, so they were not sure where it would fall with the timer and rpm on the T/Stop.  Finally the sun showed up Saturday morning and the mood changed, now everybody was pumped up and they wanted to race. Tony´s good friend the 2006 Div2 Orlando Super Comp champion Steve Deatherage showed up and park next to the guy's with his JW Performance Transmission S/C dragster.  Tony was out first with his dragster, he had raised the rpm back to 4300rpm to try and get the 60ft more consistent and also he lowerd the start line chip to 4500rpm. The delay was set to .060 and the timer to 2.40. On this run he would be way to slow running a 8.999 @ 171.75mph and the RT was .055 missing it some what.

Mike´s dragster was more of a challenge, the two racers talked it over and went with the T/Stop being set at 4200rpm and the timer at 2.20. After the car was warmed up Mike checked the stall on the converter, it was way to low coming in at 5200rpm after three time stalling it. Mike's RT was a .035 with .015 in the delay box, the ET was a 8.588 @ 169.72mph. 

Six hours later they got their second and last time run, Tony was up first this time with 2.20 in the timer and .040 in the delay box. This was right where he wanted to be running a 8.881 @ 172.19mph with a .026 light. With Mike's dragster all they could do was put lots of numbers in the timer to try and come up with a ratio. Sixty numbers were added to the timer making it now 2.80, which was way more than Tony would have liked to have seen. The converter was hurting and needs to be taken out and loosend up some to help this problem. The run ended up being a 8.743 @ 169.94mph with a .022 RT with .005 in the delay box. This showed that Mike would need around 3.40 in the timer to go 8.90 on this run, this would kill some of the mph because the car is on the T/Stop so long. 

Round one was on Sunday at this race for Super Comp, Tony drove up earlier than normal. This made him first to arrive in the staging lanes, not something he liked to do too often. His opponent was Sherman Adcock Jr who is not an easy pick, as he is one of the best and also a former Champion in S/C and S/G. Tony took some more out of the delay box, setting it on .030 which should give him around a .010 to a .015 light, the timer was at 2.18 and he was hoping that he was set up for a 8.88 or a high 8.87.
Sherman was better on the start line with a .003 against Tony's .015 but Tony had a little bit more mph, at the 1000ft mark he was a car length in front of Sherman, so Tony started backing into Sherman with just the brake. Tony figured he had killed around .003 on the track and was safe and watched Sherman dump him hard giving Tony the strip. But Tony broke out by .007 running a 8.893 @ 165.72mph with Sherman dumping to a 8.946 @ 160.27 >>Game Over<<. 

Mike added sixty numbers once again to his timer (3.40 now) and left the .005 in the delay box. He was the first off the start line with a .031 to a .040 against his opponent, Mike however was ahead all the way and did not want to run way to fast like in Atlanta, so at the finsh line he got on and off the throttle giving the strip to his opppnent. Both racers were on the brakes Mike lost with a 9.002 @ 159.99 and the other lane ran a 8.960 @ 158.28 taking the win. 

This was not what the two racers were hoping for but they did get to race. Their next race is on November 17th at the Night of Fire at Orlando Speedworld in Florida.

Check out the Gallerie for more pictures of some very nice looking doorslammers at this event!
    

October Update

On October 19th - 21st Mike and Tony will bei in Georgia at the Silver Dollar Dragway, this will be the 6th division two event and the last one this year. Fellow racer Marc Henney from Germany who races in S/C will be joining them on their trip to the race. Marc is the son of Rolf Henney long time friend of Tony, he is also a big part of the drag racing scene and the chairman of the Drag Racing Club M.S.T.O e.V. in Germany.

The guys will be arriving at the track on Thursday morning and will start testing the same day. On Saturday they will also be joined by fellow racer and owner of the first and only drag racing school in England Paul Marson, who will be there together with girlfriend Sam and Son Max. 

This should be a fun weekend with great weather possibly and cool temperatures, come back for all the news on Friday the 19th.

September 27th - 30th
Division II Race in Atlanta

Sunday

Round 2
After a long wait the Super Comp class was called to the staging lanes, Tony had to run against Jimmy Stahl a racer out of Boone NC. Tony knew that Jimmy was a little faster than he himself was, as Jimmy is good for the 175mph area. Tony set his car up for what he thought would be around an 8.87 run as the air was the best it had been all weekend. So he put 2.02 in the timer and added .005 to the delay box now set to .045. When Tony staged the dragster it rocked a little, then he went -.009 red and it was all over.
Tony ran the car out running a 8.821 @ 173.05, the pick up being much more than he thought it would and the 60ft was a 1.551 which was .005 better than round one.

Now Mike and Tony are on their way home to Florida which should take around 8-9 hours. Check back soon for an update and also Tony has some more pictures to share.

Saturday

Round 1
Tony was the third pair out and set his timer at 1.96, he had a .010 RT with .040 in the delay box against a .142 so it was an easy round for Tony. He ran a 8.952 @ 168.66mph taking the stripe by .0377 on the brakes, his opponent broke out running a 8.857 @ 167.12mph.

Time Runs

Mike and Tony have made their last time run, here are the results:

Mike had problems on the start line when the car would go up on the converter, his run was a 8.688 @ 167.49mph because the car had rolled through the lights at idle this changed the ET. 

Tony was behind Tim his old racing partner and when he saw that he ran a 8.85 he changed his timer from 1.94 to 2.00, he ran a 8.874 @ 173.29 the RT was a .036 with .050 in the delay box. 

Now they are waiting to be called to the staging lanes for first round

This morning Tom Callis took a look at Mike's Motor, he thinks that with a new valve spring Mike should be able to run this weekend. So the guy's are trying to get it done in time to make a time run.

Friday

First Time Run
The track started with the time runs at noon, so the guy's got the cars out of the trailer and hung out and waited to be called up for their first time run. Tony changed the rpm on the T/Stop to see if he could get some more mph out of the car, he lowered it 200rpm to 4100rpm.
Around two o'clock Super Comp was called to the lanes, Tony went first and set his timer at 2.00, his RT was not great .054 - the starter held the tree for a long time. An ET of 8.983 @ 171.12mph with a 6mph head wind, so he got some more mph, so for the next run he is going to take time out to find the ratio.
Mike made his run and got a .025 RT, running a 8.844 @ 162.27mph. After the run Mike and Tony started checking Mike's car out to see why the car was losing mph, they found a bad fuel filter so they hoped that they had fixed the problem. 

Second Time Run
Tony ran in the right lane again so that he could see the difference between the first and second run. This time he put 1.80 in the timer, the sun was starting to go down and it was hard to see the tree. He put .010 in the delay box to see if he could go red, as first round will be run at the same time on Saturday. He did go red with a -.019 and ran  8.889 @ 172.28mph just where he wanted to be perfect.
Mike's ran a 8.786 @ 161.90mph with more time in the timer, so it was obvious that his problems were not end with the fuel filter, something else was wrong big time. So the two racers started looking the car over, then they started it up and heard a noise coming from the trans area. They then changed the complete trans with converter. After that they restarted the car and a lifter started making a noise and ended up braking a valve spring, so it was an early end for Mike this weekend. Tomorrow they will take the motor out as the engine builder is at the track and he can take it with him and have it ready for the next race at Silver Dollar Raceway.

Saturday racing begins at 9:30 with Super Street. Super Comp will be the 5th class out, so round one should be around 5:30.

Thursday

After an eight hour drive Mike and Tony arrived at Atlanta Drag-Way at 4:30am. The gates opened at 11:00am so they got some sleep while waiting outside the gate.

Tech was at 12.00pm so after they cleaned the cars up they went and got in line for tech, which of course they got through with no problems. After tech they then had to go to the credential trailer to sign in and hand over the paper work from tech, Tony went straight through but Mike had forgot that his member ship had run out so he was sweating a little for a while. In the end they renewed his membership so all was ok and the guys started to get the cars ready for the test & tune, which was at 3:00pm. The test & tune cost $100 and they could make as many runs as they wanted. 

Mike drove up first to make a run, when the car left the startline it did not shift into second so he had to lift. Afterwards Mike found the problem, a lose wire. Mike ended up making three runs his first being a 8.940 @ 166.21mph, the second a 8.896 @ 164.15mph and the last a 8.922 @ 161.98mph. 
Tony got four runs in, his first a 8.866 @ 170.49mph, after that run he changed the timer from 2.00 to 2.12 and went a 8.916 @ 170.86mph - both runs were made in the right lane. For the next run Tony went to the left lane and changed nothing on the car, the result a 8.903 @ 171.12mph. Then after waiting for the trans to cool down he made his last run but this time with 2.06 in the timer and the top end dump set at 8.00 in timer three. The run was going to be fast because the 60ft pick up .003 so the top end was now wrong, the car ran a 8.853 @ 160.18 still interesting to see that it lost 10mph. If he had not had the top end dump it would have run a 8.82. 

Tomorrow morning they should get their first time run and then in the afternoon two more runs, so stay tuned. 

September 15th Race

The last points race was held at Orlando Speedworld on the September 15th and was a 1/8 mile race, the weather was touch and go because of possible thunder storms. When the cars were unloaded Mike and Tony put the T/stop back on Tony´s dragster. Mike went through tech and then headed straight up to the staging lanes. Tony was not far behind and was about to climb into his dragster when it started raining.
After about a two hour wait the track was dry and ready for all racers to make one time run. Mike and Tony ran their cars wide open and Mike was first out, his run was a 5.145 @ 137.61mph. Shortly after Tony went 4.846 @ 142.75 with a.005 RT. 

Round one
Tony was the first of the two racers out on the track, with a dial in of 4.84 against another Undercover Motorsports dragster with a 5.05 dial in. Tony had was actually involved in building this car while he had been working at Undercover Chassis back in 2002 and had also driven it on one occassion. The owner is now April Prinz who has been racing at Orlando for around twenty years now, so Tony knew he had to been on his game, but this time he was too fast on the start line when he went red with a -.004 against April's .004. Tony ran a 4.855 @ 141.55mph lifting before the finish line as he did not want to show his hand, April ran a 5.061 @ 127.81 and also lifted before the stripe.
Mike won his first round running a 5.168 on a 5.12 dial in, his opponent had a.042 RT which was not good enough against Mike's .033. 

Round Two

September 8th Race

The plan at this race was to try to run two time runs with a 8.90 set up and then the last run in wide open mode. Then before round one to take the T/Stop off the car to see how much the changes make in ET with and without the T/Stop on the car.

Both Mike and Tony arrived in time to get though tech and have the cars ready to run by the time the track started running at 4:00pm.
Mike´s car was set up on the T/Stop to get more information for the next race in Atlanta, he had 1.8 in the timer for the stop. His RT was -.019 with 1.120 in the delay box, and the ET and speed a 8.851 @ 169.51mph.  
Tony started his run behind a racer in a Chevy Nova who was out at Orlando getting some seat time in, for the up coming Real World Street Finals being held at Orlando on October 26-28. When the Nova went to leave the rear end broken right on the start line, dumping all the gear oil on the ground. After a good 30min wait Tony got the order to fire his car up, when he staged his car he noticed when he was lifting off the brake Pedal that the trans brake was not holding. He looked over at the shifter and noticed it was in second gear, so then he had to reset the delay box and put the shift into first. By this time the tree was coming down so the RT was way off a 1.087, Tony at least could make a run and get some info. But at around the 700ft the car started moving around to much so he lifted. The 1/8 mile time was a 6.081 @135.67mph, this at least showed him he was on the slower side of a 8.90 as the 1/8 mile ET should be around the 6.04. 
Once back in the pits Tony and Mike decided to get back in line so they could try to make two more time runs. They were the second pair back in line, and after many oil downs and down time they would only get one more run, this was a little early as they like to be at the back of the staging lanes in stead of the front of the line. Both ran the cars wide open for the last time run. So who got the better RT between the two on this pairing, Mike did with a .018 against Tony´s .023, Mike ran a 7.983 @171.42 and Tony 7.669 @ 175.34. This was a very good result for Tony showing that the car had picked up some mph with the T/Stop changes. 

Round one
After the last time run Mike and Tony took the T/Stop off Tony car, then came up with a plan. Seeing as Mike had more of a chance of making the Orlando team for the bracket finals in October, Tony told Mike they should try and run next to each other again for round one, then Tony would give the win to Mike by going red as he really wanted to run the car wide open to see how fast it would go. This worked out for them and they got to run the cars both wide open, Mike a 7.927 and Tony a 7.640 with Tony going red, Mike had a .002 RT almost giving the win to Tony making it to close for this round. 

Round two
After Tony had bought back into round 2, he had to run a S10 pick up for the this round with a dial in of 9.21, the dragster got a 7.64 dial in. The S10 had a .007 RT to Tony´s .019 and when the race was over Tony lost the race by .001. Both racers broke out, the S10 ran a 9.201 and Tony´s dragster a 7.630 @164.87 so he was on the brakes.
Mike put a 7.92 dial in on his dragster and his opponent a 9.24, both drivers had .017 RT. Mike lost time on the track and only ran a 7.983 giving the win to his opponent. 

We have one more race report to catch up on from the 1/8-mile race at Orlando Speedworld on September 15th so stay tuned. 

Update September

After the two weekends racing at Bradenton, Tony had found out that he was losing around a tenth in ET with the T/Stop on the car. So Tony took it in to BLP to see how much airflow he was losing.
	here Tony flowed the T/Stop under a carb and found out that he was losing a total of 88cfm.   After which he striped it down and measured the thickness of the throttle shaft, the primary was close to .200 (inch) and the secondary .175 thick. The BLP shafts are .090 thick so Tony went ahead and thined the throttle shafts down in the T/Stop down to .080 inches
	Before	After
When the T/Stop was completed Tony then tried on the flow bench to see how much of a difference it had made. Now it was only losing 35cfm which should help to pick the cars ET's up when running with it on the car.
	The next event was in Orlando so Tony was hoping to do some testing before the first round.

Labor Day Weekend 1/8 Mile Race
September 1st

Round one

After the 1/4 race was done and the racers who had not run in it had their time run, it was time for the big money race to begin and with over 100 racers at the racetrack it was going to be a long day. As in the first race there were buy backs if you lost in round one. 

Tony had to run the same guy in which he had run in round two of the 1/4 mile race earlier that day, so the two made a deal to split the buy back so they could run it out like a time run which happens alot in the states among friends. Tony had a .026 to a .059 RT and with the 4.858 on a 4.85 dial in won the round against his friend who ran a 5.026 on a 5.02 dial in.

Mike's first round was over at the start line when he caught a -.021 red light handing the win to his opponent. 

Round two
Mike bought back into round two and was on the right side of his RT this time with a great .002 light even though the other lane had red lighted by-.018 before he had left the line.

Tony was up against a newcomer to Super Pro a young lady who had just steped up from Jr Dragster. Tony had been watching her throughout the day and felt that he needed to be on his game against her! So Tony set up his car for a 4.85 and she had a 4.99 on her car. Both racers had great RT's Tony a .001 and .006 for the Super Pro newcomer. This was going to be a close race Tony took the stripe by .0024 running a 4.860 against a 4.997. 

Round three
In this round Tony rolled through the light and therefore had a red light, you only get one chance to stage! The reason for him rolling through the light was that the car backed out of the stage beam and as Tony reset the delay box he forgot that he was using the pro-stage and the car went to full throttle going about five passed the beams, so his weekend was over.

Mike won the round and only having an advantage of .002 at the start line with a .020 RT, running a 5.145 on a 5.13 dial in. 

Round four 
Round four and Mike dialed his car in with a 5.12 against a 5.78 and was paired off with a door car, both car's ran dead on their dial with a zero but Mike's RT was not good enough against his opponents therefore losing the round. 

Even though both racers were out of the race, they had a great time and were looking forward to the following weekend at Orlando Speedworld where they would be racing for points again. 

Labor Day Weekend 1/4 Mile Race
September 1st

Each year on Labor Day weekend Bradenton Motorsports Park in Florida has a two race on one day deal which is held on the Saturday. The first race is for $2.500,00 and is run over the 1/4 mile, then they run for $5.000,00 over the 1/8 mile, with each racer only getting one time run before round one, so it was important to get a good run.

Mike was up first and with 1.110 in the delay box he came up with a .017 RT, he broke into the sevens running a 7.972 @ 170.81mph.
Tony had to take his T/Stop off the car completely and had to replace it with a one inch four hole spacer, so that he could see how much faster his car would run. He had 1.150 in his delay box and was a little off with a .028 light, the run however was awesome being a 7.626 @ 174.04mph. 

Round one
This time Tony was to run first, and he was up against a dragster that had a dial in of 8.75. Tony put a 7.62 dial in on his car thinking it still may run close to the dial in. He would lost this race at the start line with a .064 against a .045 so he was allready .02 behind and then he lost some sixty foot running a 7.645 @ 174.24mph.
Mike won round one when his opponent broke out more than Mike by .017 running a  7.963 on a 7.97. 

Round two
Mike was up against a door car with a 10.23 dial in, so Mike chose a 7.96 dial in this time and had the better light with a .007 to a .014, he took the win with a 7.992 taking the stripe by .0102.
Tony bought back into round two and was paired up with a dragster which again had a 7.98 dial in, so this time Tony moved his dial in up to 7.65 hoping he wouldn't lose anymore ET. Both drivers had bad lights, Tony had however caught the better one which most likely saved him from losing, a .046 to .095. Tony took the stripe by .0095 winning the round with a 7.714 to 8.005. 

Round three 
Both racers lost in round three. Mike was up first running a 7.970 on a 7.98 dial in @165.22mph with a .030 RT followed by Tony who was up against a S10 pick up with a 10.97 dial in (see picture below). Tony had to change the way he was racing as he was losing to much time now in the sixty foot area, as the car was spinning to much. Tony moved the shift point from 2.0 to 1.0 second and then dialed in at 7.72 ET. He knew this was rolling the dice because he was not too sure how much shifting the car that early would change the ET. His opponent had a .003 RT to Tonys .019, Tony was real close with his dial in as the car ran a 7.733 but because of the RT it was not enough to win as the pick up got to the stripe by .0187 first. 

Tony´s round three oponent	The runner up	Mike and Tony´s Dragsters in the Trailer

August Update

After experiencing a couple of problems with our computer, we are back with a better system and are bringing you all the updates from the last couple of weeks of racing. There has been a lot going on in Florida over the last few weeks so hold on tight. 

August 25th

Bradenton had a test and tune from 10am to 2pm so Mike and Tony wanted to try a couple of things out. Mike made his first two runs wide open to see how fast his dragster would go with a higher shift point which was set to 2.20 on time on both runs. The first being a 7.961 @ 171.49mph and the second a 7.976 @ 171.55mph. Mike was happy with the runs and was surprised with the ET's.

Next they wanted to run with the T/Stop as they had changed it from the last time they ran in S/C in April. This however turned out to be a wasted run as the car did not shift, a low battery was the problem. After charging the battery Mike tried again and this time came up with a 8.748 @ 169.39mph with 1.6 in the timer. 

In the mean time Tony wanted to try a 1050cfm holly and then a 1250cfm holly from BLP to see how much faster the 1250 was. So
Tony put the 1050 on the car and set the dragster to shift on rpm at 7000rpm, the first run was a 7.723 @ 172.87mph  and the second a 7.737 @ 173.31mph. Then Tony put the 1250 on the car, the next run was a 7.713 @ 174.14mph. This however was not a great run because the car shook hard when it left the start line and also when it shifted, so it would have lost time.
The main problem was the track was getting too hot, so Tony decided it was too hot to run anymore. 
After looking at the results Tony could see the car was much faster in the first half of the run, but made little advance after 1000ft. Tony made one more run later in the day but with the car set up for an 8.90 run, this was to see how it ran in the heat so he set the car up with a 1.8 in the timer. Tony ran a 8.877 @ 171.95 with a .004 light with 1.140 in the delay box. After that it started to rain so the evening bracket race was called. 

August 18th

the BMW was back out with repaired motor

August 20th 2007
"Racing with good buddys
and catching up with old friends"

Friday, August 10th 2007
"Update"

Tony is on his way to his friend and fellow racer Mike, to pick up his dragster today, as the cylinder-head's are now ready to go back on the short block. If the car is done in time Tony will race at Speedworld in Orlando at the 1/4 mile points race, in Super Pro. If they do not manage to get the car ready in time then he will crew for Mike once again.

On a further note Tony is in close contact with his friend and fellow racer Marc Henney in Germany, who is testing his super comp dragster this weekend on the Hockenheim Quartermile in Germany, preparing for the big international event of the year in Germany that will take place the following weekend also at the Hockenheim Quartermile (www.dragster.de).
Tony and Marc have been in close contact the whole season talking race strategies. Marc is the son of a friend of Tony´s, Rolf Henney. Tony and Rolf go back a long way to the time when Tony began his racing career in Germany in 1980. Rolf is the president of the german M.S.T.O. club (Motorsports Timing Organisation). So Tony will be keeping his fingers crossed for Marc and talking strategies with him this weekend.

Keep watching.

Sunday, July 29th 2007
"Update"

	It's been awhile since we reported on what's been happening here in Florida, so here is the lastest news. Back in June Tony went down to Mike's to work on the dragster, which included putting another new flex-plate in the car. After Tony finished fitting the new Flex-plate he checked the car over to try and find out why the flex-plates kept breaking, which he found out to be the distributor not being phased in correctly. Now the car starts like it should, or better said it did untill Tony found some broken valve springs.
So Tony took the heads off and droped them off at Vic Fera´s workshop and told him to go ahead and put all new parts in the heads. This meant now Tony was playing crew chief for Mike at the next two races in Orlando in June. Mike made it to the third round and ran a best of 7.906 @171.90 at the first race. Then the following weekend Mike was out in the second round. Mike returned to Orlando alone for the first race in July and once again made it to the third round losing against his friend John Joinor. The next race was rained out, Mike only got one run in and was about to stage the car for the second run when it started to rain at the finish line.

Tony has also been up at Kurt Damron's "Undercover Motorsport" workshop helping out with the front end of the new 2008 model Undercover Dragster.

Now that the parts for Tony´s Dragster have arrived Tony is planing on trying to get the car back together within the next few weeks, so he can get back on the track in time for the next races on his race calender. 

Stay tuned!

Sunday, May 19th 2007
"Orlando Saturday Evening Points Race"

So how did the guy's fair last night ? Tony did not have a very enjoyable evening, as soon as he went through tech inspection (see picture below) Tony discovered that the flex plate that they had put in a week before was already broke, the motor was kicking back and broke some teeth off the ring gear making it not possible to start the car.  Mike went down to the staging lane to watch his daughter make her run and then made a run himself. In the mean time Tony hunted down a Flex plate, which he found from his race friends Chris & Jay Davis. By the time Mike made it back Tony was almost done with his dragster. Mike ran a 5.012 @ 139.64 and he said the track was very slick. Tony got the dragster done in time to make it down for the last time run.
	Tech Inspection Line
Tony set the car up to run wide open to see how fast the car would run, 4.864 @ 143.54 with a RT .028 and the car spun a little. Mike was next with a 4.986 @ 140.12 so it looked like the track was now coming around.  Then there was more trouble for Tony, when he got into his car to drive up for round 1 the starter broke, Mike came to the rescue with a spare one. Then as Mike and Tony were the last in line they had to run each other, which was no big deal as there was a buy back for $20. Mike's dial in was a 4.96 and Tony's a 4.85, Tony had a .010 RT and Mike a .055 so Tony bliped the throttle as he came up on Mike taking the win. Tony ran a 4.885 @ 136.44 and Mike a 4.985 @ 138.78  Round two and this time Tony went up first so the two would not meet again in the startline, he would have to run Bill Mutter who he had run last year a few times. This time Bill would take the win as Tony bliped the throttle to early giving the stripe to Bill. Tony's RT was a .010 over Bill's .021 and their ET's where as follows: Bill 6.449 on a 6.43 dial in @ 113.42 Tony 4.886 on a 4.84 @ 136.61.  Mike got lucky when his opponent broke out with a 5.823 on a 5.83 dial in, giving Mike the win. Mike ran a 4.983 on a 4.96 dial in.  Round three and Mike had a problem with the car going up on the two step, by the time the car came up the tree was coming down and Mike had missed it, his RT being a 1.336 so it was all over on the start line.  That´s it for now here are a couple of pictures Tony took:

Sunday, May 13th 2007
"Orlando Saturday Evening Points Race"

So did the guy's get to Orlando in time? Well after 100 miles detour through north Florida trying to get around smoke screens and bush fires the guys only just made it in time to make it to the back of the staging lanes for round one. There was maybe twenty minutes to spare when Mike and Tony got to the lanes, as Super Pro was filling the lanes as they arrived at the track at Orlando Speedworld. Both drivers decided to leave the cars set up as if they were running Super Comp. Tony found his buddy Vic Fera to get some info on the condition of the track and where he stood with his ET from the last race there. From the info Tony had got from Vic he knew that the Timer set up would be close to that of Cecil where they had run just hours before.
Tony was out on the track first and had to run against a local women that runs a 320 BMW with a big block Chevy. This picture was taken in 1999, now she has a Supercharger on it and had run a 8.13 in time runs early that day. So Tony had 1.95 in the timer as in Cecil where he ran a 8.86 Vic had informed Tony that the track was slower so Tony thought he would be close with this number. Tony left first with his 8.90 dial in against the BMW's 8.12, when Tony's dragster went back on wide open throttle he could see his oponent was having problems getting the power to the track and had to lift. So Tony lifted after the 1000ft mark so after that run he knew what the car would have run. Tony´s RT was .037 and his oponents had a .011 so Tony got lucky winning that round with a 8.991 @ 146.55 on the brakes as his oponent got back on the gas running a 9.399 @ 157.67. After the run Tony worked out that the car was on a 8.89 pass, which was great to see how close he dialed the car in and which was also more info for maybe a later race when they might have the same changes in the weather.
Mike was up next having to run against a door car and won when the other driver broke out. Mike had a great RT of .005 against a .046. Mike ran a 8.96 @ 167.00  The second round and Mike was out on the track first this time, he however red lighted plus the car lost some 60ft and ran a 8.99. Tony also red lighted with a -.013 after taking .025 from his delay box - oh well that´s racing! Tony ran the car out anyway and ran a 8.851, he had taken .02 out of the timer before the run as it looked like everybody was running off their dial in.  Both Mike and Tony had a great time this weekend, they may not have gone many rounds but they got to race at two tracks on one day!  Tony would like to thank Mike and his family for all their help and support and looks forward to racing together with Mike next weekend. They will be in Orlando again, at the next points race which will be 1/8 mile. Mike's daughter Kaitlyn will also be there with her JR dragster. Here are some pictures of the event in Cecil:

Sunday, May 13th 2007
"Saturday Rap up"

	After the two racers woke up Saturday morning they were surprized to find the wind had changed and now the area was covered in smoke. In south Georgia and north Florida there are some bad bush fires that have been burning for days now. At 8.40 the call was put out for Super Street to make their way to the staging lane for their second round as round one had allready been held the month before. Racing got under way at 9.00am and as you can see on the photos below nobody could see well at all. Mike was the first out with his dragster, he left the .025 in his delay and had a great .005 light, the timer was set at 1.75 and both Mike and Tony had there fingers crossed that they were not to far off the 8.90 dial in. Mike´s oponent had a RT of .046 so Mike got lucky when they both broke out with a 8.89 against a 8.937 so Mike moved on to the next round. Tony waited in the pits to go up, when he drove up he was in line behind his friend Steve Deatherage, Tony was the last car to show up in the lanes which meant the two had to run each other. Tony took some time out of his timer when knew he was racing Steve, the two cars are very close in the way they are set up. The delay box was set to .075 and this is where Tony lost the race with a .025 against Steve´s great .005 RT - so it was going to be hard for Tony to beat him. Steve had told Tony before the run he was not sure if it may be a little slow out there, Tony thought it would be better to be on he fast side of 8.90 and being as they could not see up the track they could not see what the other racers were running. Tony had 2.00 in the timer when he got to the staging lanes, but changed it to 1.95, Tony took the stripe by .0087 and ran a 8.864 @ 169.91 against Steve's 8.891 @ 170.64 so Tony broke out.
Mike´s second round was over very fast when he red lighted with a -.019, he ran the car out to a 8.891 @ 168.43, if he had gone green on the start line it would have been a hard race to win. The young lady in the other lane went .002 running a 8.900 @ 160.04. The guy's then loaded up and started it out for Orlando Speedworld to try and run the track points at the Saturday night race. Hopefully Tony will give us some information later on today.

Saturday, May 12th 2007
"Saturday Race Report"

First Round of Super Comp was run just before 11.00am. We do not have the full details of the runs yet but we know that Tony ran against his good buddy Steve Deatherage both with great lights and very good performances with Steve claiming the win for himself. Mike had a very good run with a 8.937 and will be running against Sarah Crosby from Talahassee Florida in Round 2.

We will be back with news as soon as possible.

Saturday, May 12th 2007
"Friday Race Report"

On Thursday evening Tony and Mike hit the road, leaving Winter Garden at 7.30pm heading North on Florida's  turn pike and arrived at the track around 10.30pm.  Before the guy's hit the track on Friday, Tony decided to replace the flex plate and starter pinion as it was starting to get to noisy. So out came the trans which is no big deal in a dragster. By the time the flex plate was on the floor Steve Deatherage had arrived with a new one from JW Performance transmissions. The car was finshed in time to check it over clean it and warm it up. The weather was a little warmer than the last time they had run there last month. So after checking the weather out Mike and Tony set up their cars as follows:

Mike's car Tony´s car Delay Box .025 .065 RT .025 .027 Timer 1.5 2.08 ET 8.830 8.900 mph 168.26 171.75

Tony was over the moon with the results from his run but still a little puzzled with Mike's as it ran a little faster than he was hoping. The run which would be their last one was at 7.12pm. Again Tony's car ran right where he wanted it with a better light. Mike had problems with the car on the start line which ended up giving them no infomation for Sunday. The car rolled to far before the trans brake came on which through Mike off on the tree. If there is time after the race in Cecil the guys are going to try and make it down to Orlando for the points race at Orlando Speedworld in the evening.

Mike's car Tony´s car Delay Box .025 .065 RT .114 .005 Timer 1.5 2.00 ET 9.029 8.892 mph 167.70 170.92

Thursday, May 10th 2007
"Special visitors and preparing to race"

At present Tony is getting ready for the conclusion of the LODRS Div 2/4 Race at South Georgia Motorsports Park that had to be postponed and will be held from May 11th to May 13th. At first Tony was disapointed that the original race weekend had to be called off due to the bad weather conditions, because he and racing colleague Mike Stascewski had both been doing very well on their time runs and setting up their cars for the race. But now Tony is actually pleased that he can race at a Divisional Event this coming weekend, because he will have a very special set of hands out their at the track helping him! His old race friend and ex opponent Mick Chealey alias "Mr. Shifter" is visiting from England for a month and will be traveling to South Georgia Motorsports Park with Tony. Chunky and Mr. Shifter had some great races against eachother in the late 80´s in Europe both fighting for the Euroseries Trophy, Mick in his 27' Roadster and Tony in his 23 Model T in Competition.

1986 Hockenheim F1 Grand Prix Racetrack Germany (left) Mick Chealey's 27' Roadster "Mr. Shifter" (right) Brian Cross's Fiat Topolino "Deadly Messiah"

Sunday, April 22nd 2007
"Saturday Night Bracket Racing"

	Mike and Tony arrived at the track around the same time together 3.30pm and got straight to work unloading the two dragsters and Mike's daughter Kaitlyn´s new junior dragster. The pits were overflowing with cars so after tech the guys drove down for their first time run where there was already a long line of cars waiting to run. They started running at the track at 4.00pm and Mike made his first run at 5.02, his ET was a 4.97, with a 60ft of 1.12  Tony was next in line and he had set the car up to run wide open, with the shifter set up on time at 1.50. This would make the car short shift and not show what the car could run flat out. With the delay box set at 1.165 Tony had a reaction time of -.004 in the left lane, the car shook hard around the 60ft mark and ran a 4.85 @ 143.72. The biggest problem the racers were having was the tail wind plus the cooler weather which was in the mid 70oF, which was much cooler than normal for this time of year. The staging lanes closed at 6.30pm so the guy's made sure they made it in time to be at the back of them to run as late as possible. Mike ran another 4.97 on his second time run and was real happy with this results. Tony lowered his start line rpm (4800-4500) by 300 to try and make the dragster a little softer on the hit. On the first run he had a 1.108 60ft so he thought maybe it would help the cars 60ft time better with a softer hit which it did with a 1.092. For this run Tony moved into the right lane with the same delay catching a .019 light missing it just a little. The shift time was also moved to 1.7 which gave Tony an ET of 4.821 @ 143.49. Mike won the first round with a 4.94 as his opponent broke out by more, Tony got the bye in the first round, so as it was a free time run he set the car up like he was running in Super Comp. He put a 6.04 on the car and ran 6.066 @ 136.36, his RT was a .014 with 1.175 in the box. Second round and it was now after 10.00pm but there was still lots of racing, Tony was up first and with a plan! If he was running a car with a dial in of 5.50 and faster he would run the car wide open, if his opponents dial in is slower than 5.50 then he would run the car in the 6.06 set up. Tony had been watching in the first round and had noticed that many of the faster cars were not running the number so maybe the track was getting to cold. Tony´s opponent had a 5.86 dial in so Tony went with the 6.06, but Tony did not win this round as his RT was a .040 and against a .010 you are not going to win many rounds! Tony ran 4.057 @ 135.99 and still did not get to the stripe first. Mike red lighted in the second round after hitting the bump down coming up with a -.024 red, even if he had not hit the bump down button he still would have gone red with a -.004. Mike's daughter Kaitlyn was driving for the first time in her new dragster painted just like her Dad's dragster with the "Mixed Nuts" logo. Mike and his wife Ann enjoyed watching Kaitlyn race her dragster for the first time, both were proud of how she handled the dragster down the dragstrip. First round was however not to be on this weekend, as the belt for the drive pushed the dragster to much and the dragster had to be shut off. To all the other JR dragster racers in Orlando we say "watch out Kaitlyn will be back!".   So how did Tony´s other friends do, Tim lost in round two, Vic in round three and Steve was still in at 12.30am in round four when Tony made his way home. Next race will be back to South Georgia Motorsports Park in Cecil on May 11th. Check out the galery for more pictures of Saturdaynights Bracket Race in Orlando!
Kaitlyn Staszewski

Saturday, April 21st 2007
"Back on the track"

Tony is not sitting idle this weekend as Orlando Speedworld is hosting it`s second bracket race for points this year. Racing will kick off at 4pm with time runs, which should allow Tony and Mike to get at least three runs in.

The staging lanes will be closing at 6.30pm and once they are empty, they should be calling Super Pro up for their first round which should be at 8pm. After Super Pro the next class to be called the staging lanes will be Sportsman, Bikes and JR Dragster.

This weekend the race is being run on the 1/8 mile only. The weather is looking good for Saturday, this should give Tony the chance to run the car wide open with the 1250 BLP carb on the track for the first time. His best time on the 1/8 is 4.78 and he is hoping it will run under this ET.

Tony is happy to have his racing buddy´s around him this weekend with Vic Fera, Mike Staszewki, Steve Deatherage and Tim Hutcherson also racing at Orlando - this promises to be a fun weekend!

Tony will send us a full report about the saturday night bracket race plus he will be taking some more pictures so check back with us!

Sunday, April 15th 2007
"Race Postponed"

	The race was cancelled on sunday due to severe weather conditions and strong winds, the race has been re-scheduled for the 11th of May. At present we are not sure if Tony will be participating in May due to an important family event that Tony does not want to miss, his youngest step-daughter is graduating from legal college what Tony is very proud of.
Mike and his Mullis Dragster		Tony´s Undercover Dragster

Saturday, April 14th 2007
"Testruns"

Friday`s 2nd test run´s

For his second test run Mike took 20 numbers out of the timer so it was set at 1.8 and left everything else the same. On this run Mike was in the right lane and had a reaction time of .062 running a straight 8.900 @ 168.95mph
Tony was a little confused because he thought the car would go faster than an 8.90 but decided to leave Mike`s car set up as it was for Saturday morning - because first of all he wanted to make sure that Mike´s car repeated the performance and also because there was a change in the weather, it was still in the mid 80s but the barometer had fallen and humidity had changed from 20s to 50s.

For Tony´s second run he added 8 numers the timer was at 2.18 and added 30 numbers to the delay box so it was at .070 Tony hit a red light with a reaction of -.002 running a 8.875 @ 172.89mph in the right lane.
Tony thought it was neat running against his friend Steve Deatherage on this run especially when both had same reaction but with Steve running a 8.902 ET.

Saturday`s 3^rd and 4^th test runs

Saturday morning the guy´s were ready for their next test runs here is how they turned out:

On his 3^rd test run Mike´s reaction was .049 running with the same setup and time in the box  resulting in an 8.936 @ 170,69mph which was because of tailwind instead of headwind with gusts up to 15mph – Mike ran in the right lane on this run.

For Mike´s 4^th run the guy´s took 30 out of the delay box so it was at .10 Mike redlighted with a .007 reaction. The Timer was changed to 1.68 and he ran 8.927 @ 169.30mph in the left lane.

So after going over all four of Mike´s runs the guys reckoned Mike had a ratio of 10:1 - which means for every 10 numbers changed up or down in the timer the car will run .01 faster or slower on the track

On Tony´s 3^rd testun he stayed in the right lane, he put 75 in the delay and had a reaction time of .016 – he had put 2.30 in the timer for the t/stop, his theory being that because of the weather forecast for tommorow saying it will be much colder making the cars have much more power - so Tony wanted to slow his car down so he had a rough idea what the car would run with more time in the box, his goal was to run a 8.95 and he ran a 8.942 @ 173.25mph.

Tony´s ratio is around 2,5:1 so he changed his timer to 2.20 for his 4^th test run, so he could try and run an 8.90
For this run and Tony switched to the left lane and put .070 in the delay box. Tony´s reaction time was not as good as he wanted it to be with a. 034 the reason was that his opponent went  into stage last and after Tony hit his throttle his opponent roled through the lights and got a -.306 red light which threw Tony off a little – his ET was 8.904 @ 173.32mph.

Tony is very happy with the performance of the car, with his 60 foot times being very constant through all four runs. Here are his 60 foot times 1^st to 4^th run

1^st run = 1.524
2^nd run = 1.512
3^rd run = 1.524
4^th run = 1.530

So the Guys will be heading back to the staging lanes very soon for their last time run today, before the first round tommorow morning.
Tommorow´s forecast said the temperature should be around 66F with the wind probably coming from the north. For this evening there is a big possibility that there may be a severe storm from the west with rain!

If raceday on Sunday get´s rained off, Mike and Tony have allready made the decision that they will stay to run on Monday.

Friday, April 13th 2007
"First testing run on Friday"

Tony and Mike have both made their first timing run for today. After Tony setup Mike´s car similiar to his own set up he watched Mike do his first timing run before going out on the track himself. The setup was changed as follows startline rpm to 5000rpm, the t/stop rpm to 4200rpm and the shift point to .5 out.
Mike had 2.30 in the first timer and 40 in the delay box and 2.0 in the t/stop timer - his reaction time was .023 at the tree and his ET was 8.922 @ 167.12mph - so the results were very promising and Mike was pleased with the set up and his result on this run.
Tony´s set up was 40 in the delay box, 2.1 in the t/stop timer, the startline rpm was set at 4150rpm and shifting out timer was set at .5 - allthough having very similiar set up´s Tony´s result were differant from Mikes with a -.024 reaction time and an ET of 8.862 @ 172.04mph. Both cars were within .004 of eachother at 60 feet - Tony with 1.524 and Mike with 1.520 at 60 feet.
There was a slight head wind which slowed the cars down about 1mph.

We will be back with more details as soon as the guys go out for another run either this afternoon or tommoros morning.

"heading for the Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series Division 2 - 4th Event"

This morning Tony got on the road heading for South Georgia Motorsports Park in Cecil Georgia for the 4th Event of the NHRA Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series Division 2 Championship. That Tony is racing this weekend is possible because of the help of fellow racer Mike Staszewski, who took Tony´s dragster up to Georgia in his trailor yesterday and is also taking Tony´s dragster over tech for him today - so at this point a big thank you too Mike!
Mike is 40 and runs his own company called Staski Heavy Duty Equipment in Vero Beach FL, he runs a slip joint Mullis Dragster with a 548ci big block chevy which does 7,70s @ 172mph wide open.

Tony should arrive at the track around 10.30 for the three day event, which is looking to be a challenge this weekend with the weather forecast showing temperatures between 86 - 87^oF for Friday and Saturday with an 5 - 10mph east wind today and a gusty 15 - 20mph southwest wind on Saturday. With a coldfront coming through on Saturday afternoon cooling things down, Sunday´s raceday with it´s forecasted 66^oF will be extremely challenging for the drivers.

Tony´s basic plan for today is to clean the car and check everything out before making his first run, which will be a run for orientation. Tony and Mike also plan on using the same set-up so they can both use the information they get of their runs.
The plan on Saturday will be to set the car up to try and run a 8.95 - 8.96 - Tony reckons that the car should run .050 to .060 faster on the Sunday due to the forcasted weather conditions. First round will be on Sunday morning.

So be sure to check back with us to see how Tony, Mike and the other guy´s from Florida do.

Sunday, April 8th 2007
"Testing"

Last weekend Tony went out to Orlando Speedworld with Vic Fera and a few friends who had rented the track for the day. Tony himself was not driving just helping out. Vic wanted to try his new Vac pump out to make sure there were no leaks, which after a 7.79 @170.00 was working just fine and showed no leaks from the engine.  Then the guys tried the rest of the runs in 8.90 mode, having the T/stop come on at 0.00 so right of the start line. First run was a 9.07 @169.00 which was way to slow, with the rpm on the stop being at 4000rpm - Vic raised it to 4500rpm for the next run. This would be 8.68 which was a little too fast. The timer for both runs was set at 2.00 the only difference being the rpm on the stop, Vic then tried the car again to see how close it would run without changing anything. The car lost 60ft around .02 with the ET at 8.72, after the run Vic and Tony talked about the run and decided to throw away the run, thinking that the run may have been a fluke as Vic may not have had the car on the converter all the way after getting a quick tree. So off Vic went to make another run without changing anything, this run was better with a 8.70 and the 60ft being close to the 8.68 run. For the next and last run Vic added .040 to the timer to see how much it would slow the car down, and also what the ratio would end up at. This would be a 8.77 @ 168mph which was too fast and gave them a four to one ratio, which was more than they where looking for. This meant they needed to lower the rpm on the stop to around 4150 - 4300rpm giving them around a two to one ratio or there about.
Here are two more cars also testing at the track with Vic and Tony:
Marty Nichols daughter in her Top Dragster running 7.30s	Randy Kuhns in his Top Sportsmann Grand Am ran a 7.99 @ 175mph - shame he broke the converter on that run.

Monday, March 12th 2007
"Weekend Wrap Up"

Well the weekend is over and now Tony can look back at another fun weekend being on the books. He said it is always fun racing at your home track. This is where Tony made many of his first encounters with some of the country's finest drag racers. From 1992 to 2000 he was there every Saturday taking it all in. Now there are only bracket races from April through September twice a month. Tony arrived at the track early Sunday morning at 8am to get ready for the day's racing. The racing started at 9am with Super Street and was to work it's way up to Super Comp around 11.30am. All the  Super Comp racers were surprised when they skipped the Super Comp  class in the schedule and went to the next class. There were only 32 cars left in round two which meant there were five rounds instead of the normal six to go. Finally, they were called to the lanes. Tony knew the racer he was up against. He had finished number four in the world last year in Super Comp. They had met at Undercover Chassis while Tony worked there. Shane Carr has raced for a few top teams in the last five years and is a former IHRA World Champion in the 8.90 class. Tony had also raced against him a few times and knew you can not give him an inch. His plan, after going through many different ones, was to set the car up like his second time run where the car ran a 8.896, since the weather was the same. The only thing that was going through his mind was that there was a tail wind - not a strong one - but every now and then it would pick up, so Tony knew there was a chance it may pick up the ET.  As you can see by the time slip on the right, they both had almost the same RT.  When they reached the 1000ft mark Tony was .0006 behind. They were both looking at each other at the 1150-1200ft mark waiting to see what the other would do. Just as Tony turned his head away Shane dumped hard and Tony ripped the throttle twice losing 2 mph and took the stripe by .0278. Sadly, it was not enough as he broke out by .007 giving the win to Shane.
	time slip from round two
All was not lost as the weekend did end on a good note when Tony's friend Steve Deatherage won in Super Comp (below). Tony had re-built the carb for Steve's car at the beginning of the season.

Sunday, March 11th 2007
"2nd Round"

Tony went into second round and was up against last years no. 4 Driver in the world Shane Carr. Tony knew this was going to be a tough race, Shane is very good especially when it comes to the top end of the track. Tony´s light wasn´t as he were he would have liked it to be but it was still a very close race, with both drivers level to eachother at the 1000 ft mark, but Shane dumped hard at the finish line and Tony blimped the throttle twice loosing some mph but not enough for the win.

Tony will be sending us the details for the run later on today.

Saturday, March 10th 2007
"Saturday Wrap Up"

Saturday ended up be a little hotter than Friday by a few more degrees, but not too much to enjoy with the temp reaching a high of 86F (30C). Tony checked the car out and warmed it up ready for his last time run, which was delayed because of some oil downs. At around 12 noon super comp was called to the lanes. Tony held back so he could be at the back of the staging lanes, his plan was then to head up to the lanes early for first round leaving less time between the two runs. Tony thought it was a good plan as the last ten pairs of cars got held up again for twenty minutes for another oil down. Tony wanted to run in the left lane on this run but got put into the right one - Orlando has a really bad bump after the finish line in the right lane, about 300 ft, which means you have to wait to brake hard. Tony changed his set up at the last minute as most cars were going .00 on the tree and running 8.90 so he thought lets test something if it`s that consistent. The dragster is fitted with three timers in the delay box: Timer 1 is for the the main T/stop which is made by 1-Stop and is 4 blade stop which is controled by air and is used to put the car on the number (8.90) at the start line area. Timer 2 is used to shift the dragster on time which the car must repeat. Timer 3 is set up to the inline T/stop which in this case is set to idle, this means you can automatically dump at the finish line if you want. Tony has used this in the past, sometimes it works great and other time´s it doesn´t work at all. If the car moves around too much in the 60ft area, then it is hard to make it work well and especially when there is alot of wind. So Tony changed the set up to come off the T/stop sooner on timer 1 and go on the top end stop timer 3 to see how it works out with this new motor with it´s higher mph and also to slow the car down for the bump.

Last Time Run Delay box .070 Reaction time .002 Timer 1 T/stop on .005 off 2.1 Timer 3 T/stop on 8.00 off 14.00 60ft   1.496 330ft 4.170 1/8  5.996 1/8mph  137.09 1000ft 7.532 1/4  8.850 mph 163.16 (timer 3 killed 9mph) temp 8.65F / 30C humidity  28.0% bar 29.57 altitude 1613

The details from the last time run show that Tony lost 9mph but was still too fast, however if Tony had hit the brakes when the top end stop came on then even more mph could have been lost. The car would have run around a 8.83 if he had ran it out wide open. So some good info for the future was gathered and maybe used well on a further occassion, but for now Tony had to concentrate on round one. Tony ran round one at 5.10pm in the left lane, he was running against a big block chevy dragster, who´s driver was new to Tony - so he added .010 to the delay box as he did not want to red light. As you may have read in an earlier blog - Tony won first round after his opponent red lighted with a -.012 Round two is Sunday morning, so check back with us later to see how we did.

1st Round Delay box .080 Reaction time .025 Timer 1 T/stop on .005 off 2.2 60ft   1.495 330ft 4.205 1/8  6.040 1/8mph  136.65 1000ft 7.580 1/4  8.881 mph 172.91 temp 76.0 humidity  48.0% bar 29.64 altitude 1289

Saturday March 10th 2007
"1st Round"

Tony has been in touch to let us know that he is through round 1 with a 8.881 after his opponent caught a red-light.

Tommorow morning we will have all the details of his last time run from Saturday morning and first round, at the moment Tony is on his way home to get a good nights rest for tommorows raceday.

On another note Tony´s good friend from Germany Peter Schöfer who drives a Top Methanol Dragster in the FIA European Championship received his Trophy for the Club Championship of the German Drag Racing Club 1st. DVD e.V. this evening in Aschaffenburg Germany - Tony sends his congratulations to "Pat". Tony and Pat go back a long way as they used to race eachother in back in 1980`s in Competition Car.

Andrea

Saturday, March 10th 2007
"Time Runs"

So two weeks after Gainsville and Tony`s out at the three for a further round of the division 2 championship. The racers at Orlando Speedworld seem to be having a lot more luck this year with the weather than last year as this weekend looks to be rain free again. Tony arrived at the track just after 12 after working a few hours at BLP Products on Friday before heading for the track. As right now the guy´s are realy busy. The racing got under way at 10am this morning and just as Tony arrived at the track, they were calling Super Comp up for their first time run. Tony knew that he was going to lose the first run as he wanted to get some new Goodyear Slicks slick mounted before making a run. He stayed with the same size #2556 which seems to work well with his set up. After the slicks were mounted the dragster was driven to tech which passed with no problems. After tech Tony set the car up for his first time run, first thing he checked was the front tyre pressure as this will change your reaction time if not check all the time, right now Tony has been running around 30psi. Next Tony droped the rear slicks down to about 1/2 pound over what he runs which is 4 3/4 psi - then of course the warm up which takes a while. Tony likes to get the car up to 180f water temp with around 130f tran temp. While warming the car up Tony always checks the T/stop rpm when the car is in first gear Tony turns the T/stop on then hits the throttle to wide open while holding the transbrake button down. This shows him where the rpm will go to, today it went to 4150rpm which was the same as in Gainesville, if it had gone down then a small adjustment can be made to the T/stop or less time has to be taken out of the timer than before. So some good results for fridays time runs. Today Super Comp gets one more time run then first round at around 4pm.

Here is the info for Tony´s first and second runs

1st Run left lane 2nd Run right lane Delay box .040 .080 Reaction time -.034 .019 Timer T/stop 2.3 2.2 60ft   1.500 1.495 330ft 4.244 4.209 1/8  6.089 6.049 1/8mph  136.07 135.77 1000ft 7.635 7.592 1/4  8.940 8.896 mph 172.57 172.24 temp 80f 73.5F humidity  39.3% 52.8% bar 29.60 29.67 altitude 1428 1182

Friday, March 9th 2007
"We´re off racing again!"

This weekend Tony is out racing again at Orlando Speedworld for the 3rd NHRA LODRS, so keep an eye out for updates and info on how the car and Tony do.

Sunday, February 25th 2007
"1, 2, 3 down...."

Tony has been in touch with news from his runs Racing is going well at Gainesville Raceway with about 500 racers, 84 of which running in Super Comp.

After the weather changed dramatically, Tony set up his Dragster for the first with .060 in the d/box and 2.20 in the timer.
His R/T on this run was a .008 and ET of 8.907

Tony´s opponent S. Muller had a .038 light and Tony was pleased to be racing him again, after he had beat Tony in 2005 at the Gatornationals throwing him out in the third round by .001!

Tony came up behind him at about the 1200 foot mark and blipped the throttle twice as his opponent dumped at the finish line.

3rd Round
The set up for this run was .062 in the d/box and 2.22 in the timer. Tony´s opponent F. Altilio red-lighted with a -.013 against Tony´s .010,
Tony´s time was a 8.898 @ 172.61mph

After runnin in both lanes and knowing where he has to be at the starline, Tony is not bothered which lane he gets for the 4th round.

4th Round
Tony lost against Jim Nash in round 4. Tony´s R/T was a .030, ET 8.881 @ 172.97mph against Jim´s R/T .009 and ET of 8.921 @ 146.77.

Saturday, February 24th 2007
"last time runs before first round"

Tony´s first time run this morning was at 11.30 he was in the right lane, he caught a red-light at -.009 and his ET was 8.868 @ 171.62mph - the d/box was still set at .50 and the timer at 2.28 for this run.

The second time run was a throw away!
Tony set the d/box up at .60 and the timer at 2.38 for this run, figuring he had a 3 to 1 ratio and should be close to 8.90.
The weather had changed by then and there was a head wind, a slight gust and it was sunny.
Tony got a .015 light and ended up with a 8.970 @ 169.87mph but the information was not usuable for this run - not to be figured out. Due to wind and track conditions Tony lost two hundredth at 60 feet and hundredth between 60-330 another hundredth between 330-660 and another hundredth between 660-1000 foort mark. As the car went down the track it made a big move because of a gust and lost yet another hundredth between the 1000 foot mark and the finish line, when added together all in all Tony lost seven hundredth. Tony reviewed the data from his run and said it all didn´t make sense and went and spoke to his opponent who had the saim deal, they both could not figure it out and decided to ignore the data for that run and call it a throw away.

Tony estmates that they will probably call SG and then SC tommorow morning for first round.
Tony´s happy with his R/T and said he knows were he needs to be at the startline, now he will just wait to see what the weather will be like. He has not planned to make any changes other than the t/stop timer according to weather conditions.

Friday, February 23rd 2007
"First report from Gainesville"

Tony has been in touch to let us know how his first time runs went today at Gainesville.

Tony arrived at Gainesville this morning and spend a while in the line behind an estimated 50 trailers to get in the pit gates. With about 300 participants allready in the pits Tony found himself a space and went straight to work on the fine tuning he had planed on doing to the new 1250-BLP carburetor. Tony slowed the t/stop to get more speed knowing that the racetrack at Gainesville is a little slower, he also changed the rear tyres from left to right.

The weather is great with blue skies and 15% humidity and temperatures between 78 - 82 F.

Tony´s first time run was in the left lane, he caught a red light with a -.008 and ended up with an ET of 8.905 @ 171mph. The set-up was 0.40 in the d/box with the t/stop slowed down by 1 turn and 2.40 in the timer.

On the second time run Tony took 20 numbers out of the timer setting it up at 2.20, which he did to check out the ratio. He also added 10 in the d/box setting it up at 50.
After switching to the right lane Tony caught a .006 R/T on the lights resulting in an ET of 8.834 @ 172.01mph.

That´s it for today, tommorow morning Tony will get another time run, before Super Comp goes into it´s first round on Sunday.
For the rest of the day Tony is going to kick back and check out the racing. At the moment he ist enjoying himself on the grandstand watching Competition run.

Friday, February 23rd 2007 - 8am
"Next Stop Gainesville"

This weekend Tony will be at Gainesville Raceway for the next round of the Division two Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series Championship.

The weather is looking good and you could even fo so far to say that it probably will be just perfect for this weekend of racing, maybe with a slight chance of rain on the late Sunday evening.

Tony should get three runs again on Friday and one on Saturday with round one being run on Sunday this time.

Tony said he was pleased with the way the 1250-BLP carb ran at Bradenton last weekend and how well it repeated in the 60ft, so he said "That carb is staying put in the car".

Tony will be doing some fine tuning on it as the weather should be about 10-15F warmer than last weekend, plus Gainesville is a little higher as Bradenton in altitude.

Tony´s set up in Bradenton for the second round was:

Delay -.075 Start line 4800rpm
Timer-on .005
Timer-off .2.80
Shifting on time 1.00

Tony said he would be in touch with us, to give us his results so come back and check it out.

Andrea

Monday, February 19th 2007
"Weekend wrap up"

Well Tony got in touch to give us some information on his 2nd round win. He lost the coin toss for lane choice and ended up in the left lane.

Tony caught the lights with a .004 R/T and launched to the 60 foot mark in 1.424 his time was 8.906 and he said it the run felt good before it even started. Everything just seemed to be right and he was very happy with the result.

Tony said he is sure that the good mood he was in put him up to this result, as his racing buddys Dave Hartmann, Joe Holifield and Paul Marston where their and made the weekend just awesome for Tony. So he said for me to be sure to say Hey Guys thanks for a great weekend!

After round 2 the race was postponed, but Tony said he was in such good spirits and even though he had to head for home, because of business commitments today, he is not at all dissapointed that he can´t be in Bradenton to run today. He said I am just happy to know that everything is were it is supposed to be - he is now looking forward to the next Div. 2 race next weekend in Gainesville.

Andrea

Sunday, February 18th 2007
"Racing Postponed at Bradenton"

We have just heard that racing has been postponed because of the temperature. The race will resume tomm Monday the 19th. and racing will begin at 10am.

Andrea

"2nd Round"

The weather today was very cold and windy making it hard for many drivers on a cold track.
We hadn´t heard from Tony for a while and after looking at the clock, I looked on www.dragracecentral.com too see if their was any news and yes there was news and it wasn´t good. After an accident in Top Sportsmann racing was on hold, I was glad to read that both drivers are o.k. allthough one driver was taken to Hospital for observation.

Because of the damage done to the track during the accident, it took a while for racing to resume. Tony had called in between to let us know how things are going, at that time he was still waiting and said the weather was bad being cold and windy and making the conditions of the track bad.

It is now quarter to one in the morning here in Germany, so we decided to check dragracecentral one more time before hitting the pillow and what do you know, we are going to get a good nights sleep with the news we read!

Tony won 2nd round, we don´t know the circuimstances yet, but we don know he has a bye run in the third round. His opponent in second round was L. Freer. Hopefully Tony will let us know what happend and what set up he was on for that round soon.

Andrea

"Saturday wrap up"
Tony contacted me last nicht to give me the details on his last time run in the morning and his first round win yesterday afternoon:

Time run:
Tony did his last time run on the right lane, the weather was similiar as when he did his runs on Friday, so he decided to leave the set up as it was, which meant the d/box was set up at .075 and the t/stop timer at 2.70
The run started off with a .012 R/T and ended with a 8.875 @ 172mph - Tony was really happy with the results, with his 60 foot times being within .008 of eachother and his fastest 60 foot time being 1.420.
So he was set and ready for first round.

First Round

At 4.00pm it was first round for Super Comp. Tony had set his t/stop timer at 2.68 because he felt the weather had slowed down and figured he would be setting the car up for a 8.90 run. So when Tony let fo of the button and saw that his opponent had red lighted (by .004) he realised this would be a free time run for him and ran the ride out. His time was 8.889 @ 171mph with a R/T of .011 with the same d/box setting as on his last time run.

So now I am just sitting back over here in Germany, while Tony is still fast a sleep over the Atlantic in Florida. As soon as he is up I am sure he will give us a buzz and let us know what the weather is like and what the schedule for today will be.

Andrea

Saturday, February 17th 2007
"Bradenton Motorsports Park"

Part 2 - Saturday 1st Round

I just checked the results on www.dragracecentral.com and was pleased to see that Tony is on the winners list for first round.

His run was a 8.889 so -0.011 off the index, so hopefully he can work that out for the next round.

Part 1 - Fridays report

Tony has been in touch to give me some news on how things went yesterday at Bradenton Motorsports Park.

Friday morning started out very cold and clouldy and almost raining, but as the day went by the cleared up and it got rather sunny, allthough the temperature had an unsual high of only 55 Fahrenheit with a strong tale wind which made it even colder.

On arrival Tony got the chassis certified as planned, everything went well and Tony decided while he was at it, to get the chassis upgraded to an advanced ET specification.

1st Run
Tony´s first time run was a 8.839 @ 173mph with the Timer for the t/stop set at 2.6. The delay box was set up at .04 which resulted in a -.019 R/T for Tony.

After the first run Tony changed the Carb from a 1050 BLP to a 1250 BLP.

Friday, February 16th 2007

This weekend is the being of the Division 2 championship in the Southeast. Over five hundred race cars are expected to be attending the event which is being held at Bradenton Motorsports Park on the Gulf Coast of Florida.Tony is going to be running in Super Comp in his dragster, which has been still since November when he last raced it also in Bradenton. He will be arriving at the track on Friday morning where he will meet Dave Hartman who has been taking care of Tony´s Car for him.Tony´s first job on arrival at the track in Bradenton, will be to get the chassis recertified, then go through tech and then if there is time Tony would like to try and change the carb from a 1050BLP to 1250BLP. He is looking for some more mph so let´s hope his shedule works out as plans.Round one is going to be on Saturday afternoon around 3.00pm, with the other rounds following on Sunday.The following weekend Tony should be in Gainesville at the next divisional race. Tony will be in good company with British drag racing school owner Paul Marston who is over visting from England for a few days. Also on hand will be Tony´s new racing partner Joe Holifield. Joe and Tony both work at BLP. Joe has been with their boss Bo Laws on and off since 1973 and has owned several race cars himself. Joe is building a 240 inch Mike Boss dragster for the new "Top Dragster" class in Division 2. The dragster will be powered by a 477ci blown big block chevy and run on Alky. The good news for Tony is that Joe has asked him if he would like to drive the dragster, which of course Tony was delighted about said yes after getting up off the floor.
The car should be ready sometime around May, then Joe and Tony can then go ahead testing and getting the dragster ready for the late summer debut at the Division 2 race at Atlanta.Tony will keep us posted on his runs so keep checking back
cya thenAndrea

Friday, February 2nd 2007
"What´s going on?"

As we have reported on many other occasions in the last couple of months, Tony has been very busy on most of his weekends, working down in Merritt Island on his buddys Plymouth Duster. Tony has enjoyed working on the Duster and watching the progress on the car. We have posted two pictures above of the car how it looked when he got started last spring and what it looks like at now after months of preperation. At present we are also getting ready for the new season. We have allready put our race dates on the website, as you can see we have not planned on participating at any National Events this year. There will be some changes this year, for now all we are going to mention is, that Tony shall be running in Top Dragster this year besides in his Super Comp Dragster. But we will give you the whole story on that shortly. Andrea

klick to see larger image

 

Tuesday, January 9th 2007
"Happy New Year"