YOU can do just about anything with your car at Red CentreNATS in Alice Springs – cruise the streets, do burnouts at the track, motorkhana, grass driving, off-road driving, and of course, drag racing at Alice Springs Inland Dragway. At this year’s RCN there were plenty of local cars keen to give the straight-line stuff a crack, as well as a heap of toughies from interstate.

Matt Lampard’s HZ Kingswood, LUMPER, hit the track for the very first time with its new 1000rwkW twin-turbo Dart 427 motor. Early in the weekend the track just wasn’t there to put down the numbers LUMPER is capable of, but with more rubber on the surface on Sunday, Matt managed a 9.051@158mph. We look forward to seeing it go even quicker at Street Machine Drag Challenge later this year.

Once again Perth bloke Aaron James made the trip up for Red CentreNATS with his tough VG Valiant street car. This year Aaron’s old man Allan brought up his mega-tough 547ci Plymouth Barracuda too. The ’Cuda ran mid-10s, while the Val went mid-11s.

Allan Applebee’s Gemini was a cool sight cruising the streets of Alice, and it was quick at the track, too. While the Gem used to run a big-cube rat motor on methanol, Allan has fitted a basic LS motor, hyped up with a single turbo and water/air intercooler on E85. As a result, the Gemini runs hard and requires little maintenance.

Even some of the burnout guys gave the drag racing a crack! Harley Davis from Wollongong, NSW, raced his LS-powered Holden Gemini after entering in the Burnout Championship and getting bumped up by the judges to the Burnout Masters! The Gemini ran 12s at the track and was awesome to watch in the burnouts. Unfortunately Harley bumped a wall during his Masters skid on Sunday; otherwise we reckon he would have scored highly.