All of the pictures on this page were taken by Peter
Jones,
I am indebted to him
for allowing me to reproduce them here.
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Click on any image to get the bigger picture |
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These two pictures were taken at the 1980 World Finals
at Santa Pod Raceway and show the Tre Kronor funny car (or the 'Three Bob car'
as Custom Car dubbed it) driven by American/Swede Harlan Thompson. |
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The next set of Peter's pictures were taken at the 16th
Super Nationals held at Santa Pod Raceway over the bank holiday weekend from 29
- 31 August 1981. |
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A couple of fine shots of Chris
Filsell burning out and launching the Rain City Warrior funny car. This car was
originally raced as The Gladiator by the late Allan 'Bootsie' Herridge with
great success. |
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And speaking of Allan Herridge,
here he is at the helm of the Mark II version of The Gladiator funny car which
featured a Pontiac Firebird body. |
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This is the Stardust funny car campaigned by the highly successful Stones' racing team and driven by Dave Stone. It was actually the ex-Blue Max Mustang-bodied flopper but it is painted in the colours of Don Schumacher's Stardust AA/FC because their previous car had been the ex-Schumacher Cuda which they took over from, you've guessed it, Allan Herridge. |
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Another of the Santa Pod-supported funny cars of the period was The Cannonball driven by Bill Sherratt. The car was named after the film The Cannonball Run. Bill is still active in drag racing and is involved with the Showtime funny car and even has the odd drive from time to time. |
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The Stones' team also ran this rear engined dragster called Hemi Hunter II. Like all their cars it featured Chevrolet (or Chevy derived) engines hence the name. Driver Gerry Andrews is seen here getting some heat into the slicks in front of a capacity Santa Pod crowd. |
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The Krypton Pro Comp (i.e. Top Methanol) dragster was driven alternately by Dave Wilson and Steve Martyn. I see from the event programme that Steve was doing the driving chores when this picture of the 426 cubic inch Keith Black-powered dragster was taken. |
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Sylvia Hauser performs a static burn out in her 440" Chrysler Modified entry. That is undoubtedly her then-husband (and now Acceleration Archive contributor) Geof Hauser with his back to the camera. |
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The Stripteaser Minivan altered was developed into almost a miniature funny car with its one-piece flip-up fibreglass body. It was a hard charging Jaguar-powered car and one of its hallmarks was tremendous wheels-up launches such as this one. Bob Jarrett, nowadays the owner of the Showtime funny car, was driving the car in this shot. |
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Another car famed for its wheels-up launches was Alan O'Connor's iconic Al's Gasser. It was always a fantastic car to watch and fortunately it, and Al, are still going strong. |
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Santa Pod
Raceway built a couple of jet-powered exhibition cars, this is Hellbender.
Unfortunately I can't tell you who was driving it on this occasion because it
was not mentioned in the programme and my memory banks are now about the size
of mole hills. |
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This car is Dave Warne's Mean as
Hell 427 inch Chevrolet Modified entry (now Paul Marston's Insanity). What
interests me though is how it came to be doing a static burn out at the same
time as the late Marion James seems to be driving around him to get to the start
line in her The Instigator dragster. |
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On now to the
1982 World Series meeting held at the Pod. I have no copy of the programme for
this event so I shall have to rely on the mole hills, err . . . I mean memory
banks. |
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The crew man is laying a little 'grip juice' in front of the slicks. Before the days of super-prepped tracks this was a device used to increase traction, the grip juice was put down and the wheels lightly spun to coat them with something akin to Evo-Stik. |
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My thanks to Christer Abrahamson for obtaining a possible ID for this car after he spotted a Norwegian sponsor's sticker on it. Christer's Norwegian friend Arnfinn Thun says that there was only one Pro Comp dragster in Norway at that time and that it belonged to the Åserud Brothers. However, Björn Bergström is of the opinion that this is Hans Holt's car, the mystery continues . . . |
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This is John Hobbs preparing to blast down the 1320 on his 1698cc double Weslake-engined Hobbit. |
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Last but not least is Pip Higham's 1190cc Suzuki-powered Suzuperbike comp bike. |
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All material on this site is copyright and should not be reproduced without permission |
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Contact Peter Jones |
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