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Click on any image to get the bigger picture |
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Trevor Young's beautiful Competition Products sponsored top fueller is seen here in the pits at an NDRC meeting at Blackbushe. |
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Dave Lee Travis (aka DLT and The Hairy Monster) was a Radio 1 DJ and first got into drag racing driving the Stone's 5 litre Chevy powered Mk 1 Escort Tender Trap. He progressed to this fueller called The Needle which is pictured in the pits at Santa Pod. |
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DLT burning out in The Needle at Santa Pod. I believe that he got into the sixes with this car and certainly drove it to 200mph+ terminal speeds which makes him no mean driver in my book. |
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Roz Prior's Maneater car has gained sponsorship from Cords The Ringleaders. The venue is obviously Santa Pod for reasons explained on page 2. |
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Kent Persson's heavily sponsored top fuel dragster seen on the strip at Santa Pod on a fine day. |
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Kent Persson's car has undergone a re-vamp and seems to have lost most of its sponsorship. Those of you who look at the enlarged picture will see that the little squiggles next to the 'T/F' read 'Top Fool'. |
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Kent Persson's top fueller in the pits at Santa Pod. Fat chance of being able to get a picture like this today! |
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Tog from Eurodragster.com has been in touch to say that he thinks this car was driven by Norwegian Ludvig Bjørnstad. |
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Dennis Priddle was committed to front engined fuellers until the great Don Garlits allowed him to drive his rear engined Swamp Rat car. This must have inspired Dennis to build this beauty which he named Mr Six. Dennis Priddle was the first man into the sixes in Europe and he named that earlier car Mr Six also. Dennis has told me that the rear engined Mr Six was his favourite car to drive. |
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Another shot of Mr Six in the pits, this looks like Long Marston to me. Dennis Priddle is the suave figure on the right holding the spanner. |
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Does this car look familiar? Replace the blue stripe with a red one, change the Mr Six name and you have The Hitman which was campaigned by the late Tony Boden. This picture was taken at Santa Pod. |
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Tony Boden was a great showman and very popular with the crowd. Here he is, in a not terribly well exposed shot, burning out in the pit lane at the Pod. |
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As I mentioned above Dennis Priddle named the car that first ran a six second run Mr Six. It then passed to Roz Prior who ran it very successfully as The Fast Lady. It is seen here still called The Fast Lady but this time with Tina Page in the hot seat. |
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Tina Page in The Fast Lady just about to fire the engine up in the pits. Tina Page (now Osborne) has been in touch to tell me that these pictures were taken during her first try out in the car at Long Marston. |
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The first top fuellers I ever saw were slingshots and that must be why I like them so much. This is one of my favourite pictures - shame I didn't ask them to move the plug spanner which is hanging down over the headers! |
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This is Andy Craddock's Frontline Video sponsored car in the pits, location unknown. |
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Dennis Priddle (in the firesuit obviously)
and the crew are seen here pushing his last Top Fuel Dragster in the pits at Long
Marston. |
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In those far-off days the top end at Long Marston was a bit on the bumpy side, particularly if you liked to travel as quickly as Dennis Priddle, and this was causing the car to ground. No problem if you have built as many cars as Priddle had, he did no more than cut a couple of additional bracing members and had a bloke braze them in for him. |
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Here is the newly altered car on the strip on what looks like a very gloomy day. The track at Long Marston was noticeably narrower than Santa Pod and must have seemed like a country lane when travelling at speeds of over 200mph. |
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The dragster has now been smartly painted and
is pictured back at Long Marston burning out with gusto. |
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