Drag Challenge 2025
Go to: Day One | Day Two | Day Three | Day Four | Day Five | VIP Park-up | Results & Trophies
Sign-in Day
Dragway at The Bend, South Australia
It’s incredible to think that we started Street Machine Drag Challenge way back in 2014 with just 18 invited entrants. Who’d have thought that by 2025, we’d by running our 10th event with a whopping 250 entrants! Those hardy souls took up the challenge to drive their cars more than 1500km over five days for Drag Challenge ’25, with six cars running well into seven-second territory and numerous tight battles across the 11 racing classes.
This year’s route had us starting and finishing at South Australia’s magnificent Dragway at The Bend. In between was a trip south into Victoria to Portland’s South Coast Raceway, and then up to Atlantic Oils Sunset Strip in Mildura in the north of the state, which hosted a double-header this year due to Heathcote Park Raceway being unavailable for racing. That meant two days of quarter-mile racing as bookends for the week, and three days of eighth-mile action in the middle. With event director Scotty Taylor’s road route taking competitors the most scenic way to each track and mandatory photo checkpoints to hit along the way, each entrant had a minimum of 1450km of road driving to cover – but most would easily nudge north of 1500km over the five days.
But before all that, we had to get the 250-odd cars through sign-in and scrutineering, held at Dragway at The Bend the day before we officially kicked off. This year, we incorporated a test-and-tune into the sign-in day, with the first 100 entrants able to book a spot. There’s always a handful of new or untested cars at DC each year, and for those competitors, having the opportunity to shake down (and potentially break) their cars before competition officially started was vital.
It also gave us an opportunity to scope out all the new and returning entrants, have a yarn, and get a sense of who’d be challenging for top honours both in the overall standings and in each class. Speaking of classes, we’d added another for this year, with Unrivaled Engineering coming on board to sponsor the new Stick-shift class. In previous years, we’d just given out a single award for the quickest manual car from the week, but for 2025 – after much campaigning online from entrants – the three-pedal crew now had their own class in which to argue their case.
The evening’s testing got off to a roaring start, with DC veteran Luke Foley putting the new LS combo in his VH Commodore to use with a fresh PB of 7.58@176mph. Brandon Zito was also testing his completely rebuilt LC Torana, lifting off at 1000ft after a pair of successful launches to keep his true potential under wraps. It was a great curtain-raiser to what’d prove to be a belter of a week for race pace, as we jumped head-first into Day One of racing the next morning.
HIGHLIGHTS:
1. Ashley McBain offers BMW diesel conversions for 4WDs at his Fusion Fab Industries business, and this shop truck, a Nissan Patrol G60 body atop a GQ chassis, was built to show off his wares, with a 7F eight-speed auto and stock diffs.
2. Troy David was keen to subject his PRIMED FJ ute to the rigours of Drag Challenge. “My goal is to run sevens daily,” he said, and with a fresh, Warspeed-built twin-turbo 427ci LS in the grey beast that’s made 1860hp at the rubber, that goal seemed within reach. Unfortunately, a suspected problem with the injectors resulted in a smoky engine, ending his week early.
3. Harrison Dale piloted his 1985 Toyota HiLux extra-cab, which his grandfather bought new! The ’Lux’s LS3, equipped with a 150-shot of nitrous, was fitted only a fortnight prior to DC. “It would run 9.90s with the old combo, and it ran quicker than that at Wilby last week on all-motor,” said Harrison’s dad and crew chief, Justin. The duo ran a best of 9.83@139mph.
4. Sponsor – and eventual winner – of the ITF Hire 235 Aspirated class, Louis Younis crushed it in his 420ci Chev-powered Torana. “It’s hard to make these aspirated combos work; it takes a lot of persistence, but I’ve got a great team,” Louis said. “Jason Mansweto has years of experience with the engine stuff, and my crew chief Daniel Attard knows every nut and bolt on the car; I’ve just got the fun job of steering it.”
5. Nine-time Kemppi Radial Aspirated champion Alon Vella decided to jump ship to the blown ranks this year, adding nitrous to the 468ci Ford small-block in his newer, grey Mk1 Capri. As such, he ran in the PowerPlus Racing Fuels Outlaw Blown class, taking it out on debut.
6. The crew from Kemppi Australia brought a bunch of their finest portable MIG and TIG welders along for the duration of DC and were busy right from the get-go, helping racers repair damage to cars and trailers. One of their first customers was Marvick Attard, who drove from Goulburn in his 351-powered, nitrous-assisted XW wagon to take on his first DC with son Marcus and mate Scott.
7. South Aussie Anthony Spadavecchia’s stunning XW ute rocks a 940rwhp turbo Barra combo. An 8.59@152mph on Day One put him in good stead for the week, and he eventually bagged the top spot in the Speed Pro Six-Cylinder class, as well as the Quickest Six-Cylinder award.
8. Glenn Richards is a DC regular in his tough XE Falcon, but this year he rocked up in a Mazda 323 wagon, bought with over 500,000 clicks on the clock! Instead of the expected rotary swap, Glenn amped up the factory 1500cc four-banger with a Pulsar 35/76 turbo, Jatco auto, Nexus R3 VCU and more. The car was unable to make it through Day One, so Glenn cruised with brother Greg in his twin-turbo ZC Fairlane.
9. Mic House had been frantically putting a rollcage in his nitrous-huffing, LS-powered HD Holden wagon in preparation for this year’s marathon. In 2024, he scored a podium finish on debut in the Tuff Mounts 235 Blown class in an untested car, but sadly, he had to bail after the test day at DC ’25 to head home for a family emergency.
10. We’re used to West Aussie Aaron James campaigning his VG Valiant, but this year he had a freshly built ’77 Centura. “We took the VG driveline and put it in this car,” he explained. “It’s the same 528ci big-block Chrysler, with a 727 and Strange 9in. It’s a father-and-son build – my car with Dad’s engine.” Aaron’s pace was good enough for a podium finish in the ITF Hire 235 Aspirated class and the Quickest Mopar trophy, with a best of 9.30@145mph by the end of Day One.
11. Paul Wood’s LJ Torry rocks a 1053hp, Sunset Performance-built 632ci fatty and ran a blistering 8.32@166mph just a few weeks prior to the event. His goal heading into the week was to take the top crown in Kemppi Radial Aspirated, and he did just that, with a best of 8.35@164mph on the final day.
Day One
Dragway at The Bend, South Australia
With sunny but mild weather and a bumper 250-plus field champing at the bit to get their first runs on the board, Drag Challenge 2025 proper got underway.
Straight away, we were treated to a stack of seven-second passes from the top runners, with Brandon Zito the first to really lay down the pace in his twin-turbo, small-block LC Torana with a fresh PB of 7.54@172mph. Brandon held the quickest pass until the second round of class runs, when Keith Hards pedalled the big FAIRXW Fairmont to a blistering 7.23@198mph. Unfortunately, Keith’s run came at a cost, with the XW’s engine breaking a rocker, which in turn made it drop a valve that then played ping-pong in one of the cylinders. Keith, Frank Marchese and the crew had a new head air-freighted from Dandenong, Melbourne. As for the munched piston, we had the legends at Kemppi Australia with their welding gear following along for the week to help entrants, so Frank nicked their welder, and in true DC bush mechanic spirit, he welded and angle-ground the piston as a temporary fix.
Closely following the XW for second overall and in the Hare & Forbes Machineryhouse Radial Blown class was our 2023 overall champion Mark Drew, clocking a 7.43@197mph in his ‘Crusty’ LH Torana.
More troubles in the top ranks came when DC veteran Luke Foley, who was looking to back up his PB of 7.58@176mph from testing, immediately aborted his first launch on race day after first gear in his Turbo 400 gave up the ghost. He came back around and squeezed a 7.72@184mph out of the VH, leaving the line in second gear and now having to limp through the rest of the week the same way.
West Australian Nathan Jehu in his LX sedan kept in touch with the front-runners, handing in a 7.70@185mph. Jason Kenny’s yellow LS1PWR VN was nipping at his heels with a 7.71@178mph, and Alon Vella’s Mk1 Capri also broke into the sevens for the first time ever at DC, laying down a 7.97@176mph early in the day to take top spot in the PowerPlus Racing Fuels Outlaw Blown ranks.
Alon’s 17-year-old daughter Hayley Vella (below) grabbed top spot – just – in her dad’s old Capri in Kemppi Radial Aspirated, clocking a 9.039@146mph to second-placed Paul Wood’s big-block LJ Torry with a 9.049@162mph.
Despite being just Day One, quite a few entrants already had to bow out. Our own Mark Arblaster didn’t make it past the first day after the trans in his POR440 Valiant gave up the ghost, while Alexis Margaritis’s grey LC from Tassie and the LX of Queensland’s Chris Kaarsberg were also early withdrawals.
With a 486km route to Portland and temperatures rising in the afternoon, the lanes were all but empty for the last hour of racing as most entrants handed in their slips and hit the road. Scotty’s route took competitors down the coast, just nudging Robe before heading to Beachport for the mandatory photo stop. From there, it was further south to Mount Gambier, then across the border to Victoria and down to Portland, where several competitors had run-ins with the local fauna as darkness fell.
The most uncertain fate was that of FAIRXW; although Keith Hards and team were leading overall, they were stuck at The Bend awaiting a new cylinder head long after everyone else had left for Portland.
HIGHLIGHTS:
1. The wheelstanding Kevin Cox spent much of the week battling to slow down his nitrous small-block HK Prem wagon at the eighth-mile tracks to hit the index needed for the PSR 9.5 class. Happily, on the final day at Dragway at The Bend, the Prem’s run of 9.58@139mph turned out to be the only car in class to record a 9.5 that day, which handed Kev the class win.
2. Unfortunately for Jason Waye, the freshly rebuilt Barra in his 8sec FOXSAKE Mustang decided to shear the flexplate bolts inside the crank. While fixable, it couldn’t be done trackside, so Jason packed her up and followed along for the rest of the week, helping out entrants under the Tuff Mounts banner.
3. Keith Hards slotted into first spot overall after Day One’s racing, putting FAIRXW through the traps to the tune of 7.23@198mph. That run came at a cost though, with the XW dropping a valve, causing extensive damage.
4. The damage from the dropped valve in FAIRXW’s small-block was plain to see – gnarly stuff! Rather than throw in the towel, though, Keith Hards and his team ripped the head off and got stuck in. Frank Marchese borrowed a Kemppi welder and repaired the damage on the top of the piston while they waited for a new head to be delivered.
5. Sitting on a Mitsubishi Express van chassis and packing a turbo-fed L98, 4L60E, and Truetrac-equipped 9in, Duane Daye’s 1961 Ford Econoline is certainly an unusual choice for a DC weapon. With no strip time under its wheels heading into DC, the Econoline managed a creditable 12.1sec run during our test day, backed up by a 12.07 on Day One. Unfortunately, a lifter wiped out the camshaft on the drive route to Portland, ending Duane’s week.
6. Anthony Fortunato’s lovely LC levelled up from aspirated 202 power to a 1050hp, RB26-headed RB30 turbo combo for DC ’25. He had a wild moment on the test-and-tune day when coolant under the tyres sent him into a tank-slapper that saw the back of the car just kiss the wall. The Torry managed a 9.55@142mph best on Day One, but would bow out at Portland with a split bore.
7. Even with his Turbo 400’s first gear refusing to play ball, Luke Foley still pushed a 7.72@184mph from his VH Commodore with its refreshed twin-turbo LS combo to stay in touch with the front-runners. Pulling the pan after Day One revealed that the easiest path was to limp on the rest of the week as-is, and despite the handicap, Luke still placed fourth both overall and in Hare & Forbes Machineryhouse Radial Blown.
8. Michael Ryder’s angry VN SS still uses plastic power and all-motor grunt – bloody impressive for a car capable of low nines. His 9.50@142mph put him in second in Enthusiast Motor Insurance Outlaw Aspirated after Day One, behind Mark Clifford’s Mustang. Mark withdrew before Day Two, allowing Michael to finish the week with the class win and the Quickest Holden-Powered award.
9. With only the sidepipes out the guards of his 7sec LX for an exhaust, WA’s Nathan Jehu and his crew were rocking the earplugs on the road to Portland from Tailem Bend. Despite a lack of testing opportunities in Perth, Nathan did well to get his much-changed combo down the track to the tune of 7.7sec on Day One, maintaining that pace to finish third overall.
10. 2024 Street Machine of the Year champion Heath van der Waerden bit the bullet this year and signed up to campaign his Torana hatch at DC. While a true street car, it was by no means built for drag racing, but the barbecue gas-powered iron lion was ultra-consistent, running two 11.93s over the quarter and two 7.93s over the eighth to finish mid-pack in the Unrivaled Engineering Stick-shift class.
===================
Day Two
South Coast Raceway, Portland, Victoria
We absolutely love Portland’s picturesque South Coast Raceway eighth-mile strip, but rain has often stopped play there during previous Drag Challenges. We lucked out this year though, with sunny skies and not a drop of precipitation to be found, and competitors were stoked to get a full day of uninterrupted racing. It seems plenty of locals took our advice to chuck a Thursday sickie to come along and watch the action, with the rolling green spectator hill jam-packed with onlookers.
And boy, were they treated to a show right out of the gate! Coming into the day, Keith Hards had just a 0.197sec margin over Mark Drew for top spot overall. Several front-runners locked in four-second passes early, including Brandon Zito and Jason Kenny, who both clocked 4.93s. Mark Drew was just a smidge off them with a 4.94, and Luke Foley dragged a 5.1 from his Commodore, still sans first gear. Daniel Smith in the Honda K24-powered Toyota Celica was another in the fours, becoming the first in Drag Challenge history to do so on an eighth-mile track using a 235 tyre, with a 4.95@147mph.
While all this was going on, everyone was keeping a close eye on the pits, as overall leader Keith Hards and FAIRXW were yet to arrive. They finally did so with just a few hours of running left on the track, but the Fairmont wasn’t done punishing them yet. After spending all night working to mend the damage from the dropped valve and driving to Portland, the boys found the big Ford would not come onto boost under its own steam. The solution was to run a nitrous line directly into the turbo feed, with the line taped to the outside of the passenger A-pillar before snaking under the bonnet. The wounded XW clocked a 5.51, a 5.23 and finally a 5.18@136mph to stay in contention.
But the day tipped the overall standings in Mark Drew’s favour, who now led by just 0.045sec. While Mark was able to hit the road to Mildura, with a nice pub dinner on the way, Keith, Frank and the crew stayed back in Portland with the plan of yanking the Fairmont’s engine out to replace the wounded, welded piston before also making the 588km mandatory drive to Mildura.
Just 0.399sec separated the top five overall by day’s end, making for one of the most competitive Drag Challenges we’ve seen – and it was only Day Two!
With the following day’s racing at Mildura being an afternoon-into-evening session, it gave competitors the option to break up the near-600km drive with an overnight stay along the way. The route took us via Hamilton to the beautiful Grampians National Park at Halls Gap, Stawell for an E85 stop, then north to Horsham, Warracknabeal, Ouyen, and on to Mildura. Some entrants would bow out on the drive up, while others took their medicine early and cannonballed through the night directly to Mildura, where the week would see another big shake-up.
HIGHLIGHTS:
1. Tom Wright’s HG Premier would go on to nab the win Tuff Mounts 235 Blown, with class leader Dan Smith’s Celica coming to grief on Day Three. With the Celica out, Tom’s pair of 8.7s at The Bend and a 5.59 at Portland helped earn him the class win by just over 1.5sec – his second class victory in the HG.
2. Zane Heath munched a selector fork in his WRX STI’s big-boy gearbox, forcing him to change it and the clutch (which had a different spline count) on the hoist at South Coast Raceway before making a pass on Day Two. His crew smashed it out, and Zane clocked a 6.80@111mph with the spare stocko STI ’box.
3. During Hackshop Garage’s Day Two pack-up, their HZ Sandman slipped off the jack, crushing the sump enough to hit the crank! Luckily, the legends from Kemppi were still onsite, so they helped the crew weld a bolt onto the sump to pull it straight enough to avoid interference.
4. A 4.94@146mph on Day Two was just enough to hand Mark Drew the lead both overall and in Hare & Forbes Machineryhouse Radial Blown, with Keith Hards on struggle street in the XW. Mark came back for several more passes to try and further improve, but had to settle for the 4.94.
5. Sleepers don’t get much cooler than Deni Dave’s Suzuki Vitara, hiding a nitrous LS1 combo! A 10.74@127mph on Day One was his best quarter-mile pass of the week, and he reckons this thing cruises like a trouper on the open road.
6. After taking a decent lead in the Speed Pro Six-Cylinder class after Day One, William Yarwood’s Mk4 Supra struggled to yield a 5.71@131mph as he looked to defend his six-pot class title. Anthony Spadavecchia’s XW clocked a 5.42, giving him the class lead by just 0.043sec by day’s end.
7. Travelling down from Brissy with her dog, Nichole Willett fronted up for her first five-day DC in her turbo LS1-powered HG. Regular racing at Willowbank and Warwick has netted her a 10.51sec best over the quarter, and she managed a DC best of 10.55sec on Day One.
8. Alex Bird’s HZ ute employed big-block nitrous power to great effect in the Pro Street Radials 9.5 index class, finishing the week second in class and running a best of 9.57@139mph on Day One at The Bend. “It’s 489ci, and I’m putting around a 190-shot into it,” said Alex. “The car went a 9.38 in testing at The Bend on Tuesday, so we’ve slowed the ramp down a bit to hit the 9.50 mark.”
9. The Dooen Hotel on the Henty Highway just north of Horsham was our mandatory photo stop for Day Two. Pictured out front is Vince Stigliano’s Mustang, powered by a turbo SBF. Vince’s Muzzy dipped into the eights on Day One and picked up third in the PowerPlus Racing Fuels Outlaw Blown class.
10. DC veteran Bruce Howie completed a herculean head-gasket swap after Day One. A noticeable water leak from the XL Falcon ute turned into something far more sinister, so he and crewmate Leigh Horgan parked up at an OTR servo and pulled an all-nighter, ripping both heads off. They made it to Portland on zero sleep, cracked a 6.80@103mph and then hit the road to Mildura.
==================
Day Three
Atlantic Oils Sunset Strip, Mildura, Victoria
Although not planned, Day Three’s night racing at the Atlantic Oils Sunset Strip eighth-mile fell on Halloween. It seemed somewhat fitting given the zombie-like state of some of the entrants and crew after two big days of drag-and-drive!
With racing from 4pm to a hard cut-off at 10pm, we got underway in the searing 30°+ heat of the Mildura sun. The minor threat of thunderstorms never eventuated, and as the evening went on, plenty of locals came out to see Australia’s finest duke it out with another great showing of spectators at a rural track.
All the front-runners had made it to the track bar Keith Hards, who we heard had pulled an all-nighter. Keith and crew had left Portland around midday to begin the minimum six-hour drive north in FAIRXW, though it ended up taking them a lot longer than that.
It’s well known that the best pace at Mildura is found after dark, but the heavy-hitters couldn’t just wait around until the sun went down. Many found issues spinning off the line in the heat, the quickest runner being Mark Drew with a 5.09@148mph, followed by Nathan Jehu’s 5.10, Luke Foley with a 5.12, and a 5.17 from Brandon Zito. Talk about close!
Three major on-track events caused havoc in the evening. First, an issue with a transmission line fitting caused Mark Drew’s Torana to leak oil down the track just after it’d copped a fresh round of prep. Not long after that had been rectified, Tuff Mounts 235 Blown class leader Daniel Smith in the grey Celica had the burst panel in the intake manifold let go in the deep end of the track. That smashed the bonnet onto the windscreen, causing Dan to lock up, blow both front tyres and careen from the left lane across to the right. Luckily, he managed to avoid the wall and the car in the other lane to emerge unharmed, but the damage meant the Celica’s week was done.
Once we got back underway after another lengthy delay, the final incident of the night saw David Hill’s HQ ute lose a rear wheel not long after launch, sending it spinning into the other lane before the ute’s tub hit the wall hard. We were once again blessed that David also walked away unharmed, but with less than 20 minutes until the 10pm cut-off, we were forced to call racing for the evening.
To add to even more weirdness to the night, Keith Hards and FAIRXW finally turned up during the final delay in racing, running on five cylinders. The boys had been through the wars, with the engine eating two lifters and a camshaft on the drive up, and a converter seal haemorrhaging oil. However, the team revealed that the XW had been flat-towed on the road by another competitor during the trip. While Drag Challenge rules allow a stranded vehicle to be towed a short distance to the nearest safe spot, getting towed for an extended period is a no-go. As such, the decision was made to disqualify the Fairmont.
That saw Brandon Zito rise to second overall and in Hare & Forbes Machineryhouse Radial Blown behind Mark Drew, and the whole circus would return to Atlantic Oils Sunset Strip first thing in the morning for Day Four.
HIGHLIGHTS:
1: Paul Rush’s EB Fairmont boasts a twin-turbo Godzilla, virtually untested before DC. “I’d thought about a Windsor or a Barra, but too many people have done it, so Godzilla it was,” he said. The car has an awesome stance, with a rear end by Kane at HellBent Fabrications using standard pick-up points with tubs and a flat rear floor, 9in and 275 rubber. Paul ran a best of 10.91@125mph at DC ’25, running in the PSR 9.5 Radial class
2: Chris Veleski’s short-wheelbase GQ Patrol is always getting a double take from punters, and rightly so! With proper Patrol TB48 power (stretched out to 5.2L) and four-digit grunt, Chris ran a best of 8.38@151mph. The week wasn’t without incident, with the Patrol’s bonnet knocking out the windscreen on the final road leg back to Tailem Bend, but they got the glass replaced and finished the week
3: An HB Torana isn’t an awfully common site at drag strips compared to its younger siblings, but Dale Palmer’s example has plenty of brawn from its aspo LS. At Mildura, Dale ran a best of 6.28@109mph, and a 9.88@134mph on the first day at Dragway at The Bend was enough pace to earn him second in Enthusiast Motor Insurance Outlaw Aspirated
4: Although not mandatory, we encouraged entrants to stop by and give the legends at the Benetook Farm a show. They come out and support us every year we’ve raced in Mildura, so we love to return the favour and have entrants’ tough machines like Damien Winnen’s Impala getting them smiling from ear to ear
5: After a blistering first couple of days, Jason Kenny’s LS1PWR VN struck issues on his only run for the night at Mildura, breaking the input shaft in his gearbox. Fellow top 10 runner Clinton Kelly had a spare, so he donated it to Jason’s cause and his crew went into overdrive, pulling the ’box and swapping the shaft on the ground in record time
6: After campaigning his Mk1 Ford Capri for a few years, Donnie Zurcas took the aspo small-block Chev from that car and shoved it back into his lovely EK Holden, which he last ran at DC in 2019. Running in Enthusiast Motor Insurance Outlaw Aspirated, he finished fourth in class with a best of 10.23@129mph on the final day
7: Mark Reynolds’s Mk3 1.5JZ Toyota Supra was a casualty from the evening’s racing, forced to bow out with holes in several pistons and a suspected split block. It’s the second year running Mark has nuked a JZ, so he’s vowing to come back with a Dart-blocked package next year in the Speed Pro Six-Cylinder class
8: Mitchell Bloor had a great week, running in Tuff Mounts 235 Blown. His VN is powered by an RB30 with the GT-R-spec RB26 DOHC head, and finished the week with a new PB of 9.08@150mph and second in class
9: David Hill’s HQ ute came a cropper at the end of the evening, losing his left rear wheel not long after launch and sending the ute from the right lane to the left, the rear making contact with the wall. David was shaken but in one piece, and the ute still finished the week
10: After the burst panel in the inlet let go, Brendon de Ruyter’s Tuff Mounts 235 Blown-leading Celica sustained plenty of damage, mostly to its windscreen and bonnet. Brendon opted to withdraw the car from competition to give himself more time to understand the cause of the incident, earning driver Dan Smith the Hard Luck Award.
=================
Day Four
Atlantic Oils Sunset Strip, Mildura, Victoria
Given we were back at Atlantic Oils Sunset Strip first thing for the penultimate day of Drag Challenge 2025, there was no mandatory drive route overnight, but there would be one last road leg after racing to get back to Dragway at The Bend.
With temperatures set to climb pretty rapidly, it was crucial for the front-runners to get a time down early while it was still cool and hit the road for the 375km journey back to South Australia.
Day Four’s racing would see the overall lead change for the third time, with Brandon Zito and his green LC Torana just pipping Mark Drew by the end of play. Brandon’s 5.01@145mph early on was just enough to edge past Mark, who ran a best of 5.35@146mph, with the gap between the two sitting at a measly 0.152sec as they hit the road for Tailem Bend.
While we saw a stack of four-second passes at Portland a few days prior, only Jason Kenny in the LS1PWR VN Commodore could manage a four from the two days at Mildura. He ran a sweet 4.97@143mph on Day Four, which put him back inside the top 10 overall.
You might think that after four days, all sorts of weather and three tracks, margins would be starting to open up in the class battles, but that couldn’t have been further from the truth.
Less than half a second split the top two runners in Speed Pro Six-Cylinder, Anthony Spadavecchia’s Barra-powered XW ute just edging out Mark Mills’s LH Torana by 0.472sec.
Bruce Howie counterpunched class leader Zane Heath in Unrivaled Engineering Stick-Shift, laying down a sweet 6.62@106mph in the nitrous XL ute to leave a mere 0.129sec gap between the pair, with Zane’s G3 WRX STI hatch only managing a 6.91@110mph on Day Four.
In PowerPlus Racing Fuels Outlaw Blown, Stephen Micallef’s HSV Maloo ute was keeping class leader Alon Vella honest, with a 5.23@142mph to Alon’s 5.37 narrowing the margin between them to just 0.237sec.
We finished racing in the mid-afternoon, but most had chosen the one-and-done approach and hit the road by midday to elongate the drive back to South Australia in the searing heat. Following the Murray River, competitors crossed the border to Renmark, before heading to Monash and then Swan Reach for the mandatory photo stop at the Mid Murray Classic Car Gallery. This was a fantastic final checkpoint for DC 2025, with tough cars filling the street right on the river and plenty of locals coming out to check out the entrants filtering through during the day and evening.
Of the 250 starters, around 200 cars made it back to The Bend for the final day of racing, and with tight margins across the board and the threat of rain on Day Five, we couldn’t wait to see how the grand finale would play out.
HIGHLIGHTS:
1: Jude Drew had a fresh turbo LS combo in his VS Commodore, still disguised as an iron lion! He ran a thumping PB of 8.42@167mph on the first day at Dragway at The Bend, with his pace consistent enough for a top 10 finish in Hare & Forbes Machineryhouse Radial Blown
2: Each year, we give the racers an exclusive T-shirt to go with their entry, sporting a unique design not sold to the public. This year’s shirt featured Neville Shears’s XD panel van and Bryce Godfrey’s TOEYAS Kingswood, which Bryce couldn’t stop smiling about
3: Jayden Grimshaw’s stunning HQ ute wasn’t just built as a pretty machine, and he made good on his promise to subject it to the trials of Drag Challenge. He ran an 8.74@159mph on the first day, but found the ute was getting warm on the drive back to The Bend from Mildura after Day Four. He made it though, earning his ‘I Survived’ sticker
4: Mark Mills finished second in the Speed Pro Six-Cylinder class with his 2JZ-powered LH Torry. “This is my best Drag Challenge so far; I’d previously run an 8.6 on DC 2022-’23, but I’ve since downsized the turbos and removed the NOS,” he said. “Now I’m running my old GT42 Garrett at 35psi.” The LH ran a week’s best of 8.91@153mph on Day Five to secure the podium finish
5: Jamie Watson drove from and to his home in Tooradin, Victoria in his green HQ, finishing 9th overall and sixth in Radial Blown. The HQ runs a 403ci iron-block LS with a GTX55 turbo swinging off the side for 1000kW (1341hp) at the hubs!
6: One of the four Volvos participating in the 10th DC, Adam Zollenkopf’s 240 GLE had a great Drag Challenge debut, finishing third in the HP Tuners/VCM Performance Dial Your Own class. The boxy sedan sports a stout, turbocharged 390ci LSX, backed by a 4L80E trans and 8.8in Ford diff. The Volvo ran consistent 10.50s for the podium place
7: James ‘Millsy’ Miller was disappointed not to be able to bring his wild Barra-powered Bedford van down from Queensland to race, but his back-up plan of a Mk4 Supra bore fruit, taking out second place in the new Unrivalled Engineering Stick-shift class, with a best of 9.80 on the final day
8: Stephen Micallef’s HSV Maloo not only finished second in PowerPlus Racing Fuels Outlaw Blown, but he also earned the Quickest Without A Trailer award and a spot in the overall top 10. He ran an 8.12 on Day One over the quarter, with a 5.43 on Day Three and a 5.23 on Day Four during the Mildura double-header
9: Brad Schreiber converted this VB Commodore from a patina-clad stocker to a 7sec rocket in the shed with his old man. “It’s a 6.0L alloy-block LS with rods and pistons and a stock crank, with aftermarket heads and a Kelford hydraulic cam,” Brad said. “The turbo is a 91mm Precision Gen 1, and it runs on E85.” Brad had the car turned down to run in the PSR 8.5 class at DC 2025, and finished the week with the class win, running a best of 8.51@163mph
10: DC virgin Joel Beatson took on the 2025 event in his sleek ’65 XP sedan delivery (SM, Jul ’24), running in Tuff Mounts 235 Blown. The XP packs a methanol-fed, ProCharged 363ci Windsor, Powerglide and 9in, and Joel pumped out a 9.2sec pass during our DC test day, before posting a best of 9.19@148mph during competition to finish the week third in class.
=======
Day Five
Dragway at The Bend, South Australia
With tumultuous weather predicted, everyone woke up back at Tailem Bend with one eye on the sky as they prepared for one final day of on-track action to close out Drag Challenge 2025.
Thunderstorms had been forecast, and several light showers caused minor delays, but full credit to the staff at Dragway at The Bend for knuckling down and turning it around as quickly as possible so we could at least afford everyone one pass.
All but four cars managed to get down the track before the rain really came down around 2pm, and it wouldn’t let up until well after 6.30pm, when everyone had already packed up and left. It forced an early end to proceedings and left entrants with no choice but to hand in their only pass of the day to determine the final standings, but that’s racing!
Brandon Zito continued his strong form from the start of the week, running a fresh PB straight off the bat with a 7.42@191mph – the quickest pass of the week – to seal the overall win. It also gave him top honours in the Hare & Forbes Machineryhouse Radial Blown class, the Quickest Chev-Powered award, and an induction into the Four-Second Club with his 4.93@148mph on Day Two at Portland.
“This morning when I woke up, I was shaking. I didn’t know how today was going to pan out with the weather – what if someone got a run in before us and it got delayed?” said Brandon. “But we got the whole field through, and as soon as I got that run in, we all said to each other, ‘I think we’re done.’ I was so happy.
“Next week, I’m going to the Yarrawonga Rod Run and I’m going to throw the whole family in there and cruise all weekend.”
Second place overall and in Hare & Forbes Machineryhouse Radial Blown went to 2023 overall winner Mark Drew, who ran a 7.85@190mph on the last day with a pedal. He also scored the Fastest MPH award for his Day One pass of 7.43@197mph. And if that wasn’t enough, he took home the Quickest LS-Powered trophy as well.
In PowerPlus Racing Fuels Outlaw Blown, Al Vella’s Capri scored the class victory over Stephen Micallef’s HSV Maloo. Al’s 7.97@176mph on Day One earned him a Seven-Second Club red hat, and he also grabbed the Quickest Ford-Powered award. Stephen’s Maloo won the Quickest Without A Trailer brass for his 8.12@130mph on the first day.
Paul Wood in his thumping big-block LJ Torana did exactly what he came to Drag Challenge to do: win the Kemppi Australia Radial Aspirated class. An 8.35@164mph was his final number for the week, with Hayley Vella chasing him in second in her father’s Mk1 Capri, which had won the class nine times. Peter Haravitsidis’s XY Falcon was the final podium placer in class.
After much campaigning for the addition of a manual class, Zane Heath made it worth our while by winning the Unrivaled Engineering Stick-Shift class in his Subaru Impreza WRX STI Spec R. The EJ-powered machine also scored the Quickest Four-Cylinder award, running a best of 10.16@144mph. Second place in class went to James ‘Millsy’ Miller’s Toyota Supra Mk4, and third was Bruce Howie’s XL Falcon ute.
The PSR index classes were hotly contested and went right down to the wire, with the shortened racing time on Day Five putting the pressure on competitors to get it right the first time. Just three-tenths separated Brad Schreiber’s home-built turbo LS-powered VB Commodore and Chris Imlach’s wicked Chevy Nova at the end of play in the PSR 8.5 index class, with Brad running an 8.51@163mph to seal the class win. Mitch Rogers’s stunning boosted-Windsor-powered XT rounded out the podium.
In PSR 9.5, Kevin Cox’s wheel-standing HK Premier took home the top chocolates in a nail-biting finish to the class. Coming into Day Five, Dave Carnell was leading in his HQ One Tonner, but he broke out heavily on his only run of the day with a 9.23. As a result, second place went to Alex Bird’s HZ ute, with Phil Dynon’s stock-bottom-end BF FPV F6 Tornado in third.
Getting boosted street cars on tiny tyres down the track in challenging conditions is no mean feat, and Tom Wright made a statement from the get-go in the Tuff Mounts 235 Blown class when he ran an 8.71@161mph on Day One at The Bend in his HG Prem. He continued that form throughout the week, edging out Mitchell Bloor’s VN for the class win. Joel Beatson’s XP Falcon claimed the third spot on the class podium.
For the third year running, Louis Younis won the ITF Hire 235 Aspirated class in his jet-black LX Torana sedan. He started the week hot with an 8.96@148mph, and never lost his margin over good mate Jason Mansweto in his XY Falcon ute, who had to be content with second in class.
Would the Barra, 2J or RB emerge as the dominant six-banger platform after five days of Drag Challenge action? William Yarwood’s Supra set the pace early in the week with an 8.34@172mph hit on Day One, but struggled on Day Three at Mildura to surrender the Speed Pro Six-Cylinder class lead to Anthony Spadavecchia’s beautifully turned-out, Barra-powered XW ute. A hard-charging Yarwood was back on the pace by Day Five back at The Bend, but it wasn’t enough to reel Spadavecchia back in, and he had to settle for third in class. Second place went to Mark Mills’s LH Torana.
In Enthusiast Motor Insurance Outlaw Aspirated, we learned that there’s still life in Holden’s venerable iron lion yet, with two of the top three finishers in class being plastic-powered. Andrew Natoli’s BG Engines-backed, Holden-powered VK landed in third spot, while Dale Palmer’s ultra-cool LS-powered HB Torana was in second. But the class winner – and winner of the Quickest Holden-Powered trophy – was Michael Ryder in his epic VN SS, which started the week strong with a howling 9.50@142mph lick at Tailem Bend and was never headed, topping the class each day.
West Aussie Matt Carey has been a Drag Challenge regular for years, and we’re stoked to say that his BLWNQUAD VZ SS ute took out the HP Tuners/VCM Performance Dial Your Own class after five days of super-close racing, with his split by week’s end being a miniscule 0.03000sec. Second place was Kane Spiers’s VS Commodore, with Adam Zollenkopf’s Volvo 240 in third.
With all the silverware handed out and everyone off to the pub to either celebrate the end of a big week or drown the sorrows of ending up with a broken car, Street Machine Drag Challenge 2025 came to a close. With super-tight margins, mind-bending bush-mechanic fixes and mercurial weather marking this year’s marathon, it seemed like a fitting way to celebrate our 10th full-fat drag-and-drive. Here’s
to 10 more!
HIGHLIGHTS:
1: Four of the 18 OG Drag Challenge entrants made it to the 2025 event, with John Kerr, Luke Foley and Greg Mason all bringing the very same cars they entered back in 2014, while Steve Reimann strutted his stuff in his 1967 Corvette. Alysha Teale was a non-starter this year, due to Drag Challenge falling on her wedding day!
2: Clint Kelly was running his HT Premier in Hare & Forbes Machineryhouse Radial Blown. The car is powered by a twin-turbo LS combo and was knocking on the door of its first 7sec pass at DC. “I went 8.0 at The Bend on Day One, so I’m trying to break into the sevens,” he said. Though he didn’t quite get there this time, Clint still scored fifth in class and sixth overall
3: Drag Challenge regular Matt Carey took his BLWNQUAD VZ SS ute all the way to the top of the HP Tuners/VCM Performance DYO class at DC ’25, following a super-tight contest. He travels from Tom Price, 1500km north of Perth, each year for the event, and his split at the end of proceedings was just 0.0300o of a second
4: Twenty-year-old Kane Spiers shocked himself by taking out second place in the HP Tuners/VCM Performance Dial Your Own class in his recently completed, LS1-powered VS Commodore, running flat 12s like clockwork all week
5: A favourite of ours is Chris Imlach’s crusty, turbo iron-block LS-powered Chevy Nova. Chasing Brad Schreiber’s equally crusty VB Commodore for top honours in the PSR 8.5 index class, Chris ran an 8.52@163mph – his best time of the week – on Day Five. But that wasn’t enough to overtake Brad, with Chris finishing second in class
6: Mitch Rogers debuted his XT Fairmont at DC, contesting the PSR 8.5 Radial class. “We only got the engine back in it last week, so it was a bit of a push, but we just got down for a 5.9 at Mildura,” he said after Day Three. “We’re about to put a bit more in it and see how it goes.” Pretty damn well, as it turned out, with Mitch finishing the week with a 9.18 back at The Bend to nab third in class
7: Jason Mansweto has many accolades under his belt, including Summernats Grand Champion in 2022 in his 2ENIL8 XW. His DC car of choice was this XY ute, which ran second to Louis Younis in ITF Hire 235 Aspirated, with a best of 9.18@145mph on Day One
8: Overall winner Brandon Zito holds the DC 2025 champion trophy, flanked by his old man Dom (at left), cousin Jayce Mostacci and brother-in-law Steven Giurgius
9: Only at Drag Challenge will you see some of the best racers in the country taking shelter from pelting rain next to a 7sec street car. The Baker and Vella families are pictured here doing just that, the sudden rainstorm catching out many entrants waiting for a second run on Day Five.
VIP Park-Up!
We held a VIP Park-Up on Day Five at The Bend, with a stack of sweet street cars rocking up to put on a show and enjoy the racing. We awarded trophies and Meguiar’s MotorEx tickets to our chosen top three from the day, namely Troy Dunning in his killer 14B-powered Mazda 1000 ute, Kylee Kappe and her HQ Monaro, and Paul Cini’s tough XK wagon (all shown below).
==============
RESULTS
Overall Winner
Brandon Zito – Holden LC Torana
TOP 10 OVERALL
- 1. Brandon Zito
- 2. Mark Drew
- 3. Nathan Jehu
- 4. Luke Foley
- 5. Alon Vella
- 6. Clinton Kelly
- 7. Stephen Micallef
- 8. Jason Kenny
- 9. Jamie Watson
- 10. Brad Schreiber
CLASS RESULTS
Enthusiast Motor Insurance Outlaw Aspirated
1. Michael Ryder
2. Dale Palmer
3. Andrew Natoli
PowerPlus Racing Fuels Outlaw Blown
1. Alon Vella
2. Stephen Micallef
3. Vince Stigliano
Hare & Forbes Machineryhouse Radial Blown
1. Brandon Zito
2. Mark Drew
3. Nathan Jehu
Kemppi Radial Aspirated
1. Paul Wood
2. Hayley Vella
3. Peter Haravitsidis
Tuff Mounts 235 Blown
1. Tom Wright
2. Mitchell Bloor
3. Joel Beatson
ITF Hire 235 Aspirated
1. Louis Younis
2. Jason Mansweto
3. Aaron James
Speed Pro Six-Cylinder
1. Anthony Spadavecchia
2. Mark Mills
3. William Yarwood
PSR 8.5 Radial
1. Brad Schreiber
2. Chris Imlach
3. Mitch Rogers
PSR 9.5 Radial
1. Kevin Cox
2. Alex Bird
3. Phil Dynon
Unrivaled Engineering Stick-Shift
1. Zane Heath
2. James Miller
3. Bruce Howie
HP Tuners/VCM Performance Dial Your Own
1. Matt Carey – 0.03000sec split
2. Kane Spiers – 0.05877sec split
3. Adam Zollenkopf – 0.06220sec split
4. Ji Ackland – 0.06934sec split
5. Joel Lucas – 0.08116sec split
TROPHY WINNERS
Quickest Without a Trailer
Stephen Micallef
Quickest Holden-powered
Michael Ryder
Quickest Ford-powered
Alon Vella
Quickest Mopar-powered
Aaron James
Quickest Chev-powered
Brandon Zito
Quickest LS-powered
Mark Drew
Quickest Six-Cylinder
Anthony Spadavecchia
Quickest Four-Cylinder/Rotor
Zane Heath
Quickest Stick-Shift
Zane Heath
Hard Luck Award
Daniel Smith
Spirit of Drag Challenge
Larissa Franke
Quickest ET of Drag Challenge
Brandon Zito – 7.425sec
Fastest MPH of Drag Challenge
Mark Drew – 197.67mph
Seven-Second Club inductees
Jason Kenny
Alon Vella
Four-Second Club inductees
Brandon Zito
Jason Kenny
Comments