Lachie Jones’s day job is defending the backline for the Port Adelaide Football Club in the AFL, so what better way to unwind during the off-season than taking on 1500km of punishing drag-and-drive at Street Machine Drag Challenge! The 2025 event was Lachie’s second crack at DC in his turbo LS-powered Kingswood, running in the HP Tuners/VCM Performance Dial Your Own class. We caught up with him to find out how his week went.

What sparked your interest in cars?

My old man always had cars; he talked about his early Commodore he used to own, and then he bought an HQ ute as well. We’d go to Bathurst and things like that, and I always liked later-model V8 Holdens like VEs and VFs. I’ve owned six Holden V8s since then.

What was your first?

It was a 2016 VF SS sedan that I bought, and quietly, I shouldn’t have, because I was on my P-plates and technically still wasn’t meant to be driving it! I got away with it though. I’ve also had a VE ute, a VT V8, and a few others over the years.

How did this HJ Kingswood come about?

I bought a turbo kit for the VF, but I’d been watching what Dicko [former Port Adelaide player Charlie Dixon] had been doing, and then he found me this Kingswood with the turbo LS1 set-up already in it. He told me to just buy a car already set up rather than bother doing the VF, so I bought it a month before Drag Challenge 2023, and that event was my first time ever drag racing.

And you were back for Drag Challenge 2025! Seems like you caught the bug?

I sure did! It was heaps of fun doing it with Charlie back in ’23, and this year doing it with my mates Ben Larsson and Brenton Tilly as crew was good fun. The car was completely untested this year coming in with a new combo, but we made it through the week without any dramas and with a new PB, which was great.

Tell us about the new combo.

The LS1 only lasted about six months after Drag Challenge 2023, so now it has a 5.3-litre iron-block LS. We redid the whole car from the diff forward, with a beefier Turbo 400, Haltech Rebel LS ECU and all the fruit. It made 550rwkW [737rwhp] on medium boost – around 16-17psi. It has flex-fuel, and we can obviously make a bit more than that when the time comes.

How did you go at DC ’25 – you said you ran a PB?

The best on the quarter was a 10.29@118mph on the first day, and we did a 6.35 at Portland [on the eighth-mile], which works out to a 9.87 on the full track. I want to ’cage and tech the car before next year’s event, then run in the 9.5 index class.

Awesome! So, you’ll be back next year, then?

For sure! It lines up well with our off-season, as it’s hard to do car events during the year with work most weekends. It’s a super-fun week, and I’m keen to get to more car events and use the Kingswood a bit. The eventual goal is to run eights with it, but I want to see how far I can push the standard-style rear with the 255 tyres first.

Any other cars on your wishlist?

I’d love to get back into another late-model Holden, something like a VF GTS. I also wouldn’t mind building something old-school that’s more purpose-built for drag stuff like Drag Challenge. But for now, it’s just the Kingswood and my Ranger for a daily.