Twenty years ago, the kids in Victoria with car posters on their walls weren’t waiting for some guy in a fur suit to hand out eggs at Easter – they were hanging out for Easternats at Sandown Raceway. Founded by motorsport identity Jon Davison (son of four-time AGP winner Lex Davison, uncle of Bathurst winner Will Davison and a Formula 5000 driver in his own right), Easternats was an event that dared you to explore the limits of your car’s capabilities. From the first event in 1997, Easternats seemed to get bigger and wilder each year, until the very antics that led to its success resulted in its demise.

Johnny Ricca of Victorian Motorsports Park and Tuff Streeters remembers that era fondly.

“It was something we attended as teens and loved it, and we thought with having VMP, now is a good opportunity to have a crack at bringing it back,” John says. “So, Rory Higgins reached out to Jon Davison and got the deal done.”

Easternats hasn’t had a place to call home since the last event at Winton in 2012, where Davison relocated the event for two years. Prior to that, there was the aborted attempt to host Easternats at Calder Park, and the decision to cancel that event ultimately resulted in the infamous Bob Jane T-Mart ‘riot’ in Oakleigh in 2010.

To say that Easternats has had a colourful past would be an understatement, but John and the VMP team are keen to make their own history. “I think we can do massive things with it with the way we promote things,” John says.

The revived Easternats is slated to kick off next year at Victorian Motorsports Park over the Easter long weekend, 26-28 March. So, what can we expect from Easternats in 2027? And will there be a cruising component?

“We’re in early discussions about it, but we’re going to make something happen,” John says. “We’ll pretty much have everything the old event had: drag racing, burnouts, roll racing and cruising. We’ll make it like a bit of a festival as well; we’ll put our sort of twist on it.”

Right now, Johnny and the crew at VMP are concentrating on getting the facility ready for its inaugural event in a few months’ time. That was to be the Pro Mod 660 event in August, but that’s been pushed back to November, which means our first look at the rejuvenated facility will likely be King Of The Street on 3 October. VMP will also play host to the first and last days of Street Machine Drag Challenge 2026, presented by VPW, on 27 and 31 October.