ROUND 4 - CASTROL EDGE JAMBOREE
MEETING REPORT
The event that everyone had been waiting for, the Castrol Edge Jamboree 2008, was a great success. There were strong fields in all categories as competitors from across the nation, and across the ocean, made the journey to the home of Sport Compact racing in Australia, at Willowbank Raceway in Queensland. The final round of the Toyo Tires Sport Compact Group Drag Racing Series Championship is always the highlight of the series, and racers and fans were treated to a memorable weekend.
Saturday dawned to traditional Queensland winter weather with clear skies and no threat of the evil rain around. Saturday Kicked off with the Show n Shine event with a good range of owners displaying their pride and joys, keen to get that last minute polish and detail completed before the fans rolled in. Qualifying for the street-tyred classes kicked off in the morning with plenty of tough streeters hitting the strip to get in their qualifying runs before lunch time. There were also some tough race cars mixed in with the street cars, with Theo Woollett providing plenty of burnout smoke for the fans in the stands in his 9-second Castrol Edge GTR, and Theo also took out top qualifier in HKS by Performance Wholesale Street AWD. The Haltech Nissan Skyline GTR R35 also drew plenty of punters when the bonnet was popped at the Haltech stand and laid down an easy 11.5 at 113mph on the strip. Shane Crichton was chasing eights in his Blacktrack Performance Cressida but settled for the top qualifier in Turbosmart Street RWD with a 9.37. There was a very strong field in OCD Racing Sports Bike too with everyone getting a baseline before the tough eliminations on Sunday.
Slick-tyred qualifying kicked off after lunch, with the jam-packed Pro Classes appearing for three evenly spaced qualifiers. McKern & Assoc Pro Turbo and Haltech Pro Compact both saw record fields for this event, and there were plenty of good times set in qualifying. One of the highlights was Rod Harvey’s Rayglass Celica in McKern & Assoc Pro Turbo which rattled off an easy 6.90 at 199mph pass on the first qualifier, a figure which stood atop the leader board even at the end of the session. Rodney Rehayem set up a nice battle in Haltech Pro Compact with a 7.50 at 168mph in his back-halved RX-3, but it was Anthony Rodrigues from Maztech of Melbourne who was in the number one position after an easy 7.36 at 180mph run in his 13B powered Cougar. It’s been quite a few years since Anthony competed at the Jamboree, and the good old Maztech vs Pac Performance battle reminded us of the good ol’ days. Gas Motorsport Street 28x9 was shaping up to be a cracker with most of the heavy hitters in attendance. One of the sports long time competitors Wayne Dyson tamed the wild Dyson Rotary RX-3 beast with a smooth 8.03 at 168mph pass. Damien McKern also performed well with an 8.15 at 170mph run in his Pac-prepped GRUMP2 RX-2, and Archie Kajewski from Mazfix also impressed with an easy 8.04 at 167mph pass. The boys from TAS performance in Toowoomba also impressed with Tom Horton’s new 20B RX-7 and Darryl Parker’s 13B RX-7 both recording great numbers in the eights. There were too many good runs to mention in most of the other classes, but it was good to see Glenn Anderson reset his PB in his twin turbo 13B altered with a 7.38 at 175mph in the Power Cruise Extreme class. Fred Karam had a wild start to his Jamboree when the intake manifold of his VL Commodore exploded on the start line flicking the fibreglass bonnet up and doing a fair bit of damage.
While the action was hotting up on the track the large number of girls entered in the Northfield Moorooka bikini competition kept the crowd entertained on the main stage, with plenty of sponsor giveaways for the crowd as well. Trade Alley was well patronised with over thirty trade stands providing customers with a good variety of products and expert knowledge.
Sunday dawned to more awesome weather again and a slightly later start to the morning let many fans and crew recover from a big night out at their favourite local hotspots!
McKern & Assoc Pro Turbo saw plenty of great passes throughout racing. Kiwi Rod Harvey was very impressive in the Celica edging down to a stunning 6.73 at a strong 205mph, a great job considering what little track time the team has had so far. Pac Performance were feeding plenty of horsepower into the trusty MX-6, after not quite completing the new Mazda 6 in time for this event. Tyre shake was the result on a number of passes but the team still recorded a tough 6.90 at 198mph for the rotary fans. There were more RX-3s than you can shake a stick at in McKern & Assoc Pro Turbo, Stanbury, Skaramuca, Sadek, and Tsoltoudis all with some tough passes. Tsoltoudis ended the event with a 7.26 at 179mph although we are not sure how he steers when the front wheels aren’t on the ground for most of the run! Sadek edged just ahead on the day with a 7.25 at 186mph and plenty of smokey burnouts for the crowd. The final was a bit of a surprise with Nick Tsoltoudis matching up against former Pro Stock champion Tony Wedlock in a classic Piston vs Rotary battle. Wedlock took the win after Tsoltoudis had a wild ride after a wheels-up launch.
Haltech Pro Compact saw a very healthy field, great to see the support since the introduction of this two-rotor/four cylinder class. The final was what we expected and hoped with Rodney Rehayem from Pac Performance lining up against Anthony Rodrigues from Maztech. Anthony showed his consistency in the final with a 7.16 at 174mph to defeat the yellow Pac RX-3. Anthony’s times on the day all in the “teens” made him the quickest two rotor in the country and it will be interesting to see when they will drop into the elusive sixes, it will also be interesting to see if Rodney upgrades to a Pro car to give chase!
Rapid Magazine Outlaw Sports Bike was smaller in numbers but just as impressive with ETs as Leonard Azzopardi returned with his silver bullet to take an easy win over Darren Griffin. Leonard went 7.74 at a stomping 192mph in early racing!
Gas Motorsport Street 289 had a huge field, ranging from newcomers to veterans of the sport. Wayne Dyson took his RX-3 into the seven second zone for the first time with a stunning 7.90 at 172mph, also vaulting him to the top of the 28x9 leaderboard. The final was again a Piston vs Rotor battle with Gary Halpin at his first Jamboree final up against the quick accountant himself, Damien McKern, with Damien taking an easy win after aiming for consistency on race day, rather than blowing the tyres off!
Sport Compact Drag Racing Magazine Super Mod was a great mix of cars with everything from 4WD racers to tubbed RX-3s battling it out. Nick Zervos blitzed his previous PB with a record-smashing 8.07 at 176mph in his APC Racing Mitsubishi Evo. Mark Jacobsen was another on a mission in his Godzilla Motorsports GTR with a string of passes in the sevens. The VLs were well represented with Julian Barbara’s C&V VL launching hard and Anthony Maatouk’s VL went an impressive 8.54 at 158mph.
Carline Mufflers Powercruise Extreme saw some highs and lows, especially for the Anderson Family. Kim Anderson was involved in a braking area incident in late qualifying on Saturday, rolling her beautiful dragster. Fortunately Kim was OK after the incident and returned on Sunday night to watch her daughter, Megan Anderson, make it through to the semi-finals, good enough to clinch the Extreme championship. The finals were interesting with Peter Duffy, who has raced every year at Jamboree since the event first started, defeating Ron Newton in a close battle, Duffy winning by six hundredths of a second.
Speed FM All Motor has matured into a great class with VWs, Hondas and Rotors all battling it out. It was great to see Dave Butler flying the Volkswagen flag in his 11-second Beetle, with Dave cutting a great 0.411 light in the final to defeat David Johnson in his 20BPP RX-2.
HKS by Performance Wholesale Street AWD was won by the most unusual Mitsubishi RVR of Michael Southwell, after some class racing all day. Michael was too good for Jason Dean’s WRX in the final.
Turbosmart Street RWD was won by Adam Hackett in his Datsun 1600. Adam is a regular at Willowbank and is certainly no stranger to the podium, defeating Russell Archer’s RX-4 in the final when Archer red-lit. It was a tough field with the largest number of entries and both racers should be proud of surviving the many rounds to make the final.
Hi Power Racing Street FWD was combined with Front Mod for this event, and the name that has appeared regularly in the winners circle was that of Andrew Bode, taking a well-deserved win again in his Mazda SP20 over Zane Glover.
OCD Racing Sports Bike was well subscribed with plenty of experienced racers making for a tough battle all day long. Jason Hammelswang who toured around the country this season once again took the win on his Yamaha R1 defeating Robert Simmonds on his Suzuki Hayabusa by just seven hundredths of a second.
Toyo Tires ET class was a good mix of cars once again, with John Calleya in his bizarre 12A turbocharged Daihatsu ute from SA taking the win over Mark Forzatti who had a ball in his hand-controlled RX-4.
Mixed in with the racing were plenty of good grudge runs towards the end of the day with some interesting and varied match ups giving the crowd plenty to watch as the racers were eliminated. The Club Display in the morning was well attended with Nissans and Datsuns well represented along with a good range of rare Holden Geminis also on show. The main stage saw the Ange and the Million Dollar Babes Dance show light up the stage, preceding the ever popular Northfield Moorooka Babe competition. There were plenty of first timers entering both the Bikini and Babe contests and all contestants put on a good show for the healthy crowd.
Once numbers and positions were tallied at the close of racing the presentations began, with all event winners and championship winners receiving their trophies and cheques in front of a good crowd of racers, crews, and fans.
It was relatively smooth sailing for “J18” Castrol EDGE Jamboree with spectators treated to perfect Queensland weather, some great numbers on the track and probably the highest quality fields that we’ve seen in Australia. Details of the 2009 rounds will be announced shortly, as always keep an eye on www.sportcompact.net.au for all the details. See you next year!
For all the Castrol EDGE Jamboree results click HERE. For all the Toyo Tires Sport Compact Group Drag Racing Series results can be found HERE.
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2008 Toyo Tires Sport Compact Group Drag Racing Series
