Leon du Plooy finishes fourth while Christo Francis and Gustav Fourie set all new personal bests.
The last round of the National Drag Racing Championships was held at Tarlton International Raceway on October 25.
The day looked to be full of rain when the local guys from eMalahleni left for Tarlton but when they arrived at the track it turned out to be hot and with a well prepared track the day’s racing promised to be nail-biting.
Michael Ludick didn’t race this round in his Ludick Bro’s BMW and will be ready for next year’s Nationals as he is still in the process of fitting a G-Force Gearbox into his BMW, the same type of clutch-less gearbox that Leon is currently running in his Turbo Extreme Clinic Nissan Champ bakkie.
As for the Jack Daniels bakkie, fans can look forward to seeing Mark van der Westhuizen back behind the wheel of it during next year’s nationals.
Leon du Plooy in action in his Turbo Extreme Clinic Nissan Champ bakkie.
During the qualifying runs Jacques du Plessis managed a 9.37s at 231km/h in his Nissan Champ which was built by Leon. Leon himself managed a 8.9s with an exit speed of 240.6km/h. Christo Francis racing in his 1400 Nissan Champ with a Nissan SR20 engine – the same build as the Jack Daniels bakkie – managed a 11.3s run at 206km/h, this however isn’t his best performance as he normally does the 400m in a 10 second run.
Additionally Gustav Fourie, racing in his normally aspirated V8 T-bucket ran a 12.2s against Wouter Havenga who pulled off a 10.78s. Kalen Arumugam went up against Leon in the qualifiers and managed a 9.8 but that couldn’t compete against Leon’s 9.0s run.
During the competition eliminations Leon ran an 8.9 which saw him through to the next round where he ran a 9.0 against Jan Lubbe who ran a 10.13, in the final though Leon hit a red light losing to Simon Slooten. Leon did however manage an 8.7 during the day even though he was under-boosting his Nissan Champ.
Gustav won his first round elimination but was knocked out of the competition in the second round when he got off to a hopping start – literally in his run against Bradley Slooten. Gustav will need to work on his V8 T-bucket to fix the launch issues he has been having.
With the next Test and Tune taking place only in February 2016, the local guys Leon, Mark, Michael, Gustav and Francis should have enough time to get their rides ready to tear up the track.
Make us proud.
