Current Top Doorslammer Champion John Zappia has presented Craig Pedley’s “Crusher” Pro Comp Monaro for local racing at the Perth Motorplex in the team’s lead up to Round 2 of the ANDRA Pro Series Championship at the Goldenstates.
Perth is the blown alcohol capital of Australia, with the Top Comp class highly competitive with the need to run on the National Record or below to stand a chance of winning.
The Grand Opening meeting saw near perfect weather conditions for making huge power – cool temperatures, low humidity and low corrected altitude – and the famous Fremantle Doctor westerly wind bringing fresh oxygen rich air off the Indian Ocean.
“Our first pass off the trailer was a 5.828 @ 245.23mph”, said John Zappia, “but then the air came around and we overpowered the track on the next run. The 82 was good enough for fifth position in qualifying – going 0.572 under the 6.4 index. Unfortunately we had too much power to match the track on that particular day and progressed no further in competition”.
Three members of the team then traveled to Las Vegas for the SEMA Show, where they spent time with sponsors B & J Transmissions and Procomp Motorsports, and attended several drag meetings.
“We were with the Strasburg Top Fuel Team sponsored by Procomp at the NHRA Las Vegas Nationals, and saw Team Rapisarda do really well there, and then went to the NHRA Finals at Pomona, California, before heading back to Perth to prepare for the second meeting”.
The Top Fuel Match race meeting held last weekend at the Perth Motorplex saw completely different weather conditions in Perth – with high temps, high corrected altitude and high humidity.
“We reconfigured the Crusher Monaro to better handle the massive power we are making, and to better equip the car to run five sevens in the future, so we had the setup a little soft just to watch the way it ran down the track and test new components”.
“The first pass was a 6.110 @ 229.00mph, the second a 6.116 @ 236.84 mph as we slowly fed in power to the new setup. That put us eighth in the qualifying list and up against Weston in round one. The Crusher damaged a slick on the run, and with a pedal still managed a 6.079 @ 236.22mph for the loss”.
“I was pretty happy with my reaction times on the day, going 0.004 on that last run. It may seem that we went slow on the weekend, but we have a long history of undergoing development programs that at first seem to be going backwards, but then produce longer term winning results. We broke the world record by going first into the fives by doing that – and we want to jump into the five sevens to keep leading the field in Top Doorslammer”
“It was great to see Craig Pedley from Striker Crushing and Screening get down to the track to see his car in action, but unfortunately we weren’t able to do something special for him. We are looking at the big picture and that is winning as many of the Championship rounds as possible and hopefully win our 4th consecutive championship and 2nd in the Crusher”.
“The 39th Annual Goldenstates is on Friday 3rd and Saturday 4th December at the Perth Motorplex and we hope to see as many of our fans and supporters as possible to cheer us on and to check out some of the new merchandise”.
For more details, photos and videos go to www.zapsrat.com.au
Naming Rights Sponsors
Procomp Motorsports and Procomp Electronics
Major Sponsors
Striker Crushing and Screening, Fuchs, Force Tools Australia, Beta Spuds, Southside Engine Centre, Mickey Thompson, Noonan Race Engineering and PPG Automotive Refinish.
Supporting Sponsors
Santhuff, Victory1, B & J Racing Transmissions, Mi Camcorders, Current Trendz, Veem, Crow Cams, Aero Group – Avtrac Maintenance Tracking, Legend Boatbuilders, Taylor Tyres, Kounis Metal Industries, Bravo Resources, CIC High Performance Coatings, Aurora Bearings and Competition Motorsports.
