Marty Dack has made a bundle of changes to his Ford Mustang Pro Slammer ahead of his appearance at Nitro Up North on July 21 and 22.
The West Australian driver will need every advantage he can get at Hidden Valley Drag Strip, with the news that 16 cars have already entered for the Pro Slammer division.
Dack faces something of an unpredictable response from his 3500 horsepower machine, with the supercharged V8 now paired with an automatic transmission, new cylinder heads and updated suspension to try and chase down the top racers in the category, all of whom will be appearing in Darwin.
“With the game changing times being laid down (by other racers) early this year, it takes a special few to be able to dig deep and try to gain every last percent of performance from their team,” Dack said.
“The Mustang has thrown us many hurdles, but in the true never-give-up style of a drag racer we are working hard. This is a completely different animal to our old Ford Falcon race car. We can throw a lot more at this car early in the run and it is showing a lot of promise. With our new cylinder heads from Noonan Race Engineering we hope we have the horsepower to hit it out with the big boys.”
With the pace of the Pro Slammer field now seeing regular 5.6 and 5.7 second passes, Dack believes a team needs to be running at least 5.8 second runs to figure in the results.
“Having taken a year off racing due to business commitments, the team is back hard at work preparing the car with some new goodies. We aren’t here to fill the gaps, every racer wants to
win and we don’t want to do anything half hearted.”
Dack will be taking on the stars of Pro Slammer including ten times Australian champion John Zappia, 400 Thunder Professional Drag Racing Series reigning champion Mark Belleri, former champion Ben Bray and Darwin’s own Scott MacLean who has been running strongly in recent times.
Dack will be carrying new support from GPS tracker provider MacTrack at Nitro Up North.
“Grant Mackie from MacTrack has been outstanding in his support, we can not thank him enough. The transporter, race cars and pit vehicles are all fitted with GPS trackers which are all controlled from a dedicated app. The product is second to none.”
With additional support from SP Tools, Allwest Haulage, Valvoline, Speedflow, Marshall Custom
Cams, Competition Fuel Systems, Midwest Pumpcrete, Dunnings Fuel Supply and Illusion Vinyl Wraps and Graphics, Dack is ready to take on the greatest adventure in drag racing.
“Most importantly we would like to thank the Northern Territory Government for supporting what is becoming an iconic event in drag racing. We can’t wait to let the ponies loose in Hidden Valley!”
The Pro Slammers will be joined by Top Fuel Dragsters and nitro Top Bikes in the 400 Thunder Professional Drag Racing Series, plus the opening round of the Summit Sportsman Series’ national 2017/18 season.
