MATT McCarthy has recently given his Datsun Bluebird a bit of a makeover in the search for even quicker ETs. The twin-turbo small block-powered Datto already has a PB of 6.96@206mph to its name, and now Matt has stepped up a class to 76mm turbos and is pushing around 2500hp out of the 400ci Dart Little M.

We caught up with Matt at Willowbank Raceway for the Kenda Radial Riot. Unfortunately the event itself was rained out, but Matt was around on the Friday before putting in some test laps on the new combo for the first time.

But the car almost didn’t make it. Two days earlier it was on the dyno at JW Automotive, where Justin Wilkinson was tuning it with its new Billet Atomizer injectors. It ended up snapping one of the straps and almost walked off the end of the dyno. Fortunately Justin was able to save it before it did any damage.

Anyone who has seen Matt’s Bluebird in action will know that it loves to pull the front wheels off the deck, which looks really cool, but is far from ideal. In fact, while he was giving the engine a freshen-up, he also had to straighten out some of the bodywork, which had twisted up from the hard launches this radial-tyred monster had experienced over the past couple of years.

Now with even more power on board, keeping the wheels down is proving just as difficult when she’s turned right up and Matt is hitting it with commitment. In testing at the Radial Riot the car popped a big wheelie, sending it bouncing down the track. Earlier in the day Matt ran a [email protected] over the eighth – a little way off his eighth-mile PB of 4.51@166mph, but pretty good for the first time out with a fresh set-up.