Daniel Cassar has spent years building a hot rod that can turn heads on the street and mix it with some of Australia’s quickest naturally aspirated drag cars. Now, after a six-month rebuild and a last-minute dyno setback, he’s brought his matte-black 1933 Ford coupe to Street Machine Drag Challenge with one big goal still in his sights: a seven-second pass.

The timing is tight. The car has only recently been fired up after being pulled apart and rebuilt, and a marathon dyno session failed to deliver the power Cassar was hoping for. With test ’n’ tune kicking off today and the five-day racing and road adventure starting tomorrow, there’s little time left to iron out the gremlins.

But that’s part of the appeal for Cassar, “I want it to still look like a hot rod, not a race car.” he said.

The chopped, matte-black Ford coupe packs a 598-cube big-block Chev running E85. Built by Daniel’s Fast Lane Speed Shop, it combines old-school hot rod looks with the hardware needed to handle serious drag racing, including an independent front end, four-link rear suspension, roll cage, Wilwood brakes and Weld wheels.

For Cassar, Drag Challenge has always been the ideal place to put that combination to the test. He loves building high-end street cars, but he’s equally drawn to the challenge of making a car run hard over multiple tracks while still being capable of covering the road miles between them.

His Drag Challenge story started with a ’32 Ford coupe. He won in his first two years with the car, before a rushed return with a freshly built, barely tuned engine left him narrowly beaten and runner-up.

He then brought the ’33 to the three-day event and won again. Since then, family, business commitments and the cost of racing have made it difficult to return. The unfinished business stayed with him.

Last year, he and a mate decided it was time to pull the coupe back out and have another crack. The plan was to get the car running properly and see what it could do, but the rebuild grew into a major project.

The car was rewired, given a new intake setup and converted to electronic fuel injection. Interior work and lighter panels were also part of the overhaul. From the outside, it still looks much the same, but underneath, there’s been a lot to sort out.

Cassar took three weeks away from work to get it finished, putting pressure on both the business and the family budget as money went out faster than it came in.

“It’s just been so stressful not having money coming in, money going way faster out than what it is in,” he says. “But luckily I got the right support by everybody, especially the wifey. Because without her, this would never happen.”

Then came the dyno session. What was expected to be a four-hour job stretched towards six hours, with the team unable to find the power they expected from the new combination. The engine remained healthy, and Cassar suspects the issue could be something relatively simple, such as ignition timing, but there wasn’t enough time to keep chasing it.

Rather than hold up the dyno and the people who had helped squeeze him in, the team called it and took the car home to review the data. The next answers will have to come at the track.

“We think it might be just a simple thing such as timing in the wrong spot,” he says. “We’ll go through our data, what we found, and hopefully we’ll be able to make it a better race car.”

There’s a lot riding on the result, but Cassar is realistic about what he can achieve this week. He’s confident the coupe should be capable of a very low eight-second pass, while the seven-second target remains the dream rather than a promise.

“I have no doubt we should put on a really low eight second pass,” he says. “But, you know, is it going to go seven? My fingers, my legs, everything is crossed.”

The seven-second goal isn’t about beating one particular rival. Cassar wants to prove that a traditional-looking, street-engineered hot rod can run those numbers and still take on the demands of Drag Challenge. Making the pass is one thing. Getting the car through the week is another.

Cassar knows that this year’s Tuff Mounts Outlaw Aspirated class is going to be tough on engines and driveline components, with naturally aspirated combinations working hard across repeated passes and long road legs. There’s little room to simply wind the power back and cruise through the week.

That’s why he has so much respect for the other racers in the class. He was keen to see Steve Micalleff’s LJ Torana, along with the other serious aspirated contenders, and says he’d love to see everyone keep getting quicker.

“The faster we all get, the more fun it is for everybody,” he says.

Cassar isn’t one to make a big noise about his own car on social media. He’d rather build, test and work out the details behind the scenes. That development process is a big part of what he enjoys, even when it means long nights, expensive lessons and a car that refuses to cooperate on the dyno.

For him, a seven-second pass at Drag Challenge would be especially rewarding because it would come as part of the full event, not a one-off run at a single track. The coupe needs to be quick, but it also needs to survive the distance.

And with test ’n’ tune starting today, there’s not much time left before the real test begins.

Street Machine Drag Challenge, presented by VPW, runs from Tuesday 27 October to Saturday 31 October 2026, starting and finishing at Victorian Motorsports Park in Central Victoria. The event combines drag racing at multiple tracks with the road trip between them, challenging competitors to get their cars to the finish under their own steam.

Cassar is heading into the week with a fresh combination, plenty still to learn and a seven-second dream he’s not ready to give up on.

The first job is to get the Ford sorted. After that, he’ll see just how close this old-school hot rod can get to making history.

Street Machine Drag Challenge, presented by VPW
27–31 October 2026
Starting and finishing at Victorian Motorsports Park, Central Victoria.

More information: dragchallenge.com.au