There is a lot more to Vee Dubs than Hollywood’s Herbie, there are now some serious machines making the rounds and a wide cross section of them rocked up to the VW Showdown at Sydney Dragway.
The VW Showdown is now an annual feature at Sydney Dragway and though last year’s event was rained out on the multiple attempts that were made to run it, this year’s edition went ahead in blazing sunshine, even if it was a bit hot.
There was plenty to see in the pits from the standard to the bizarre.
After a morning of straight all in qualifying, racing would be conducted on a round robin format, then racers with the most points/wins progressed to semis and on to a final.
In the Top VW class it was wheels up for Wayne Fenech.
Wayne Penrose went 9.27 in his unique turbocharged dragster.
The supercharged Karmann Ghia of Mike Kristen was on song with a 9.38 best.
Quickest on the day was Rod Penrose’s full chassis tubo machine with a 8.75 at 158MPH.
Mike Waldron took a very rapid trip into the sand with his supercharged Beetle in the semi final, causing some front end body damage.
Ben Robinson reached the final of Top VW.
It was Russell Sarten though the final victor in Top VW, running a tight 11.997 on a 11.99 dial.
The VW Other Engine class is for VWs with non traditional engine transplants, Joshua Driscoll’s Suburu EJ20T powered Beetle was ousted in the semi final by Hugh McKinley.
Steve Carter’s 12 second WRX powered bug cruised to the final on a solo.
In the final a 17.09 (16.90 DI) run for McKinley’s Porshe motivated Beetle proved to much of a chase for Carter’s 13.39 (13.20 DI).
The VW Special bracket featured open body machines like these Formula Vees having a crack at the straight line game.
In the semi finals David Richardson ripped a great skid but was eliminated by Todd Herbert.
Paul Zanello looks like he was out for a relaxing drive in the semi final, Zanello would have to cruise back to the pits though being defeated by Sezer Solyali.
In the final both buggies were well off their dial in pace, Solyali’s sweet looking flamed candy apple buggy running six seconds over the dial in.
Todd Herbert easily rounded up his slowing opponent backing off to a 15.98 (14.70 DI) pass for the event win.
By far the bigggest bracket of the day was the Air Cooled VW class hosting a very wide array of machines. After four epic rounds of eliminations, it was all Beetles left in the semis. Andrew Ermel’s war-inspired car went down fighting in the semi final against Dave Becker.
In the other semi Dave Birchell was drilled on the startline by Matthew Berry costing him a holeshot loss.
Matt Berry could not repeat his semi final .03 RT and went red on the tree in the final.
Becker took an axe to the tree with a .011 RT though it was not needed in the end when Berry red bulbed giving chase.
In the Water Cooled VW class featuring the more late model technology, Brad Young suffered a holeshot loss to Andrew Cassie in the first semi final.
Likewise Grahame Rumballe wasted a 15.42 (15.40 DI) lap with a tardy reaction time that cost him in his semi final match against Sebastian Nadjer.
Cassie was way late in the final with a .493 light, coupled with a 12.02 (11.80 DI) was fodder for opponent Nadjer.
Nadjer’s Golf pops and bangs like a WRC car off the line, a 12.09 (12.00 DI) trounced the final win.
Images by CacklingPipes.com – Grant Stephens/Michael Wyllie/Neil Larsen
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