We’re officially past the halfway point of Street Machine Drag Challenge 2022/23!

One of the coolest parts of DC is watching the landscape change as we tour country Victoria, and this year’s Day two/three journey delivered in spades. The twisty mountain roads of the Grampians gave way to the scrubby expanses and wide open stretches of Mildura as we hit the Sunset Strip eighth-mile.

The checkpoint at the 78 billion-litre Lake Bellfield prompted lots of racers to hole up in Halls Gap for the night, and hit the road early on Thursday morning for racing from 4pm. The scenery was awesome, but it was a tough day to be a beefy stall converter in the hills.

Racing got off to a destructive start when Bruce Christian’s SBC-powered FJ40 LandCruiser pulled a massive wheelstand, snapping the shorty’s front end like a toothpick and no doubt gaving Bruce a major jolt.

An ominous sky turned into drizzle and then outright rain by 5:30, which put a stop to racing for a solid few hours. Mildura’s awesome volunteer track crew (helped along by racers including Harry Haig, Luke Foley and Jarrod Wood) thrashed to dry out the track, and things were pumping again by 8:30.

ETs were tumbling by the time the lanes closed around 11, with Harry Haig extending his overall lead with a 5.12@148mph late in the game. Second-place Luke Foley responded with a 5.21@141 on the final pass of the night, while Chris Kaarsberg handed over a 5.29@139mph to hang in contention.

A number of entrants chose not to bet on the weather clearing up, including Pacemaker Radial Aspirated leader Keith Hards in his angry Camaro. Unlike last DC, he’s so far been mostly immune to the “big-block curse” of valvetrain damage, only breaking one valve spring on the way to Mildura. Keith laid down a 5.45@128mph on his first pass, packed up his trailer, and hit the road back to Heathcote. “Racing’s easy, driving’s hard,” he mused today. “We’ve gotta make it to the end first!”

Tim Ackland’s owned his Series I AU XR8 since he was 18. It now runs a 540hp 347-cube Windsor with AFR heads, a tunnel ram, twin Holley 600 carbies and a 100hp of giggle gas on top for an old-school solution. It’s only been together for three months, but the Geelong bloke’s already had a tilt at Ballarat’s Western Highway Shootout and Portland, with a PB of 10.50. “An alternator bolt broke, but other than that we’ve had a pretty cruisy run,” he grinned today.

Kyle Jarvis has come all the way down from near Newcastle with his 2JZ Toyota Cressida to take on our Drag Challenge marathon. “I saw the event online and saw how much fun it was, so I wanted to have a crack,” he says. The big turbo mill has propelled Kyle to sixth place in the Speed Pro Six Cylinder class, with a best of 10.14@139mph on Day One at Heathcote and an eighth-mile best of 6.34@119mph at Portland.

Ricciardo Pontonio not only bombed it all the way up the mandatory route to get to Mildura, but went even further in the twin-turbo LS VK. “My dad lives in Wentworth, so we drove an extra 100 kays last night to stay with him,” he says. Ricc entered Day Three at Mildura in fourth place in the Haltech Radial Blown class, and kept running late into the night to eventually hand in a best of 6.34@84mph to end up fifth in class.

Young gun Chevy Barnes-Librio struck bad luck from the start of racing at Mildura, his Barra-swapped XB ute having to be pushed away from the start line after developing an oil leak. That leak turned out to be the pump seal in the C10 ’box, so Chevy and his dad Paul ripped it out in the pits and were still on the hunt for parts when we last spoke to them.

Clinton Kelly has been building his HT Premier for the last five years to get it ready to tackle Drag Challenge, and so far his week with the big lion has been going well. The Prem was speared to an 8.87 @158mph on Day One at Heathcote thanks to its killer twin-turbo LS combo, and as a result is currently sitting inside the top 10 in Haltech Radial Blown at the end of three days’ racing.

Check out the class results below. We’ll see you for more action back at Heathcote Park Raceway from 4pm this arvo!

OVERALL TOP 20

VIBRANT DYO TOP TEN

KOOL WRAP 235 ASPIRATED

TUFF MOUNTS 235 BLOWN

Speed Pro Six Cylinder

GJ DRIVELINES OUTLAW ASPIRATED

TURBOSMART OUTLAW BLOWN

PACEMAKER RADIAL ASPIRATED

HALTECH RADIAL BLOWN