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Autosport International 2009 took place against the background of the global recession, and the atmosphere of the Show could easily have been muted in the face of cutbacks both within the motorsport industry and amongst the sponsors funding that industry, not to mention appalling exchange rates rendering race parts and sponsorship deals more expensive even if their native prices had not changed. Eurodragster.com attended the show in association with American Car Imports and although we can't speak for other forms of motorsport, those to whom we spoke were quite upbeat about the prospects for drag racing in 2009.

For fairness' sake, the interviews below are presented in the order in which they took place.

Thursday

Simon Barker of Eurodragster.com News sponsor Nitrous Oxide Supplies explained that the company was setting up a nationwide refilling network. "We have 150 dealers", he said. "We supply dealers in the Outer Hebrides and in Penzance so we have pretty good coverage! But we are looking for more companies to join our network. We supply Motorshack, Webster Race Engineering, Nimbus Motorsport and a lot of others, and we don't fleece people like other companies. Our market is almost all drag racing but the Time Attack and Drifting people are starting to pick up on it."

Nitrous Oxide Supplies is part of Blended Products and has been in business for four and a half years. "Our MD is a petrolhead!", said Simon. "Big companies such as BOC were telling potential customers to go away because for all they knew people might be buying nitrous to breathe it in - and it can and does kill. But I have a way of telling if people are calling us to get nitrous for breathing. I ask them to tell me what car or bike they have. If it's a racer then they will go on so much about their car that after half an hour I'm looking at my watch. But if they're not using it for their car or bike then they'll say "Erm...", or they'll say "I've got a Skyline" so I reply "What type of Skyline? There are several" and if they can't tell me then I know they are not genuine. Nowadays BOC tell people to come to us. One guy asked me "I've got a Suzuki Swift, what should I put on it?". I told him "A For Sale sign"!".

Les Downey of Eurodragster.com News sponsor Lucas Oil UK said that business is good. "We are half a million pounds up on 2007", he said. Lucas Oil were promoting three new products at the show: TB Zinc Plus, which lubricates and puts zinc back into cams; Fuel Stabiliser which prevents degradation of fuel if the motor is not started for a long while; and Biomedic which prevents damaging fungal growth within motors using biofuels.

The day before the Show started, the news broke that FIA European Top Fuel Dragster Champion Andy Carter, whose primary sponsor is Lucas Oil Products, was to race at the NHRA Winternationals at Pomona with backing from Lucas who had just added another two years to Andy's deal. "Andy is a brilliant representative", said Les. "Very professional and we've never had anyone better. That's why we extended the deal. He does a lot of work which no-one knows about and he is very highly regarded in America."

No sooner had Les finished telling us how good Andy Carter is than we managed to catch up with him to find out more about the deal to race in Pomona. "We had looked at taking Per and Karsten's car to the USA but it was just too expensive", said Andy. "Dave Bryant told me that Terry was looking for a driver for his Top Fueller. Terry had already spoken to another European racers, and he called me just before the PRI Show. I was going to the Show so Sarah and I met up with him. We got on really well, Terry is a really nice, down to earth guy. I said to him "I'll be honest with you - I haven't got the backing so I can't make any promises. But if I can find the money then I'd be interested and I'll call you". I spoke to Forrest Lucas on Tuesday this week, we did a deal, and as soon as I put the phone back on the hook I picked it up again and called Terry and said "I've got it!". That was Tuesday night and how you found out about it on Wednesday morning I don't know (Ah, but we don't reveal sources - Ed)!

"I did have an NHRA licence but I had let it lapse. So I had to have the medical yesterday so that I could get the forms in the mail to NHRA in time for Pomona. Sarah is booking the flights, hotel and hire car. We'll be in Florida that week so we'll fly from there to California."

A regular attendee at Autosport International is ATI Europe Distribution who not only sponsor Eurodragster.com but the Showtime Fuel Funny Car team. Allegheny Technologies pioneered the use of titanium within motor racing and Nigel Hoskison brought us up to date on the latest developments. "Titanium Alloy 6246 is usually used for compressor blades in jets", he said. "We're now evaluating it for high-stress applications. Engines are making so much load now that ordinary titanium isn't enough.

"The Showtime car was the first to use engine studs in Allvac 38-644. It's now used widely in the top reaches of motorsport. You can look at any qualifying list or any grid and I can tell you that a large proportion of them will be using our product.

"This year's success story has been Nickel Alloy 625. It has high strength and high temperature tolerance. We use it for exhaust systems because it is stronger and there is a weight saving because at its thickest it is 0.9 millimetres. The market has gone from nothing to nine tons in twelve months. It has great potential throughout motorsport but the only restraint is that nickel is a commodity and so its price is volatile.

"We're pleased to say that we are continuing to support the Showtime Funny Car for the foreseeable future. We had a sister company's customers and potential customers at Hockenheim in August and as a direct result we now have a thriving presence in the German motorsport market. For us that is a tangible return on our involvement in the Showtime team.

"We have increased our motorsport business year on year and it increased again in 2008. The motorsport industry is our third biggest customer after aerospace and petrochemical. We demonstrate to our customers that we are involved and we can prove it with our knowledge of the technology and their requirements and that's where we differ from the others."

Barry Miller of hose and fitting manufacturer Brown and Miller Racing Solutions said that business was a bit slow but that that was to be expected. "Nascar had a ban on testing", he said. "It is picking up now, though". BMRS back Andy Carter, Pro Mod racer Andy Robinson one of whose motors was on display on the BMRS stand, and Top Methanol Dragster racer Dave Wilson. "It's the same old crew - we stick with the people we know!", said Barry. "But we want to broaden our penetration of the European market."

With a large number of US customers BMRS exhibited at the PRI Show but all the talk was of a rival show to be held in Indianapolis this year. "It's meant to be the Performance Racing show, but it's getting away from the racing", said Barry. "For example they had a machine there to analyse golf swings. That's not really racing is it. It will be interesting to see what happens with this new show."

FIM/UEM Top Fuel Bike Champion Ian King was there in his capacity as a director of Puma Engineering, the company which he and Gerard Willemse took over in 2008. "We have various projects on the go", he said. "We are involved in two new four-cylinder Top Fuel Bikes. We are builsing a new V-Twin motor for Chris Hannam, and we have cases under construction for customers in America including Larry McBride."

If you have checked out Eurodragster.com News recently then you will know that Swedish Top Methanol Funny Car racer Leif Andréasson is to contest a number of races in the USA in 2009 as well as the FIA European Championship. Leif said that his itinerary included six NHRA National and Divisional races before returning to Europe to run the FIA tour, and then another four NHRA National and Divisional events.

"We will have some American guys", said Leif. "The team will be fifty-fifty Swedish and American. "The American guys will include Tim Anderson of Racepak, who wants to be my clutch guy, and Vince Bitteto who used to build Milodon engines and now sponsors me from his company Bitteto Towing. We will also get our engine maintenance free from Bittetto Motorsport.

"We have already signed sponsorship deals with Hoosier Tyres, Dan Olson Racing Products, System 1 oil pumps, Hedman Hedders, DMPE Injectors - we will be testing their new injector - ARP nuts and bolts, PAC Valve Springs, and Friction Unlimited clutch disks. There are more companies to come."

Leif said that his US tour could benefit European drag racing. "The US guys would like to come here", he said. "You could easily see ten of them. They are interested because of the travel. That's why I do it - I get to see different places and to meet new people. My chassis builder at Eagle 1, Brett Williamson of Gilroy, California, would like to come to race in Europe and we are trying to raise sponsorship for him to do it. It's an uphill struggle in the US at the moment but we are trying. Some Pro Mod racers would like to run here too. I would like to see more Americans here in Europe in various classes."

Leif's US tour has been in planning for three or four years. "You can't just ship a car over there and borrow a trailer", he said. "A Swedish driving licence is no good anyway. Luckily I have a lot of friends who made it possible. To do both of these Championships properly, in Europe and in America, you need 1.4 million dollars if you want a tuner, crew and so on. I am doing it with nowhere near that money."

Import racer John Bradshaw has impressed this season since moving into mainstream drag racing in the Abbey Motorsport Nissan Skyline, clocking a best of 7.7 seconds whilst running in Super Pro ET and Comp Eliminator. John said that he and Mark Gillam of Abbey Motorsport are thoroughly enjoying themselves. "It's fantastic, and it's contagious!", said John. "A couple of years ago no-one in our scene would have thought of it. We got a warm welcome with racers coming over for a chat and offering help."

John originally raced bikes but after a series of crashes and broken bones settled down a a family life before buying the Skyline in 2004. "I did track days and a Run What You Brung at Santa Pod and I was hooked", he said. "I made eleven or twelve runs in one day and ran thirteen and a half seconds. By the next year we had 800 hp and we were still street-legal. We were snapping drive shafts for England but we got down to a 9.9. Then it was decision time.

"Andy Robinson phoned me and offered to save me a lot of time. After two meetings with Andy we forgot about the street and concentrated on drag racing. The first time out after Andy worked his magic, in 2007, we ran 8.5. We lost three engines in eleven runs due to an oil surge. We fitted a dry sump, Abbey Motorsport took over and the car became more reliable. Andy talks to Mark and he also comes to track days to advise. I have to say a massive Thank You to Andy.

"We have now run 7.7 with more to come. We can put in more boost and we would like to add nitrous. We spent 2008 logging absolutely everything. We have masses of data and we worked with tyre pressures, the rear wing, all the basics. We are averaging 1.1- to 1.2-second sixty foot times and we'd hope to see mid-sevens and maybe get down to a 7.3. But we are still gobsmacked how difficult it is to go in a straight line!

"It is great that the HKS Drag Series will be running at mainstream events and it is good to see the fields growing."

Friday

Steve Wood of Motorshack introduced us to James Rumsey and David Gammon who have built an Evo 8-bodied Sport Compact for an assault on the world four-wheel drive record. The Evo, which has already made a few test runs at Santa Pod Raceway, packs a turbocharged 1998 cc Evo 4G63 motor producing 1500 horsepower from 85 lb of boost (yes, 85 lb, that is not a typo) built by NHRA World Sport Compact Champion Marco Pissante. A sister engine of that built for James clocked 6.98/199 on Puerto Rico with a smaller turbo.

"It's the most advanced 4WD on the planet", said James. "We built it over two years in regular consultation with Geoff Martin (who heads up the UK Tech Crew - Ed). We have run at Santa Pod but it rained! We will be running in the HKS Drag Series and Marco will be attending several of the races. He would like to bring some of the Americans here too". Steve Wood has been helping with fuel advice and sponsorship.

The last time we saw Swedish Supertwin racer Anders Karling he was sat atop a large explosion in his motor. Anders has tested since then and thinks that he has found the answer to three torched heads, and the bike, in attendance for the first two days of the Show, looked just fine to us. "We tested in Finland instead of going to the European Finals", said Anders. "At Alastaro we tried some shorter cams and there were no problems, and now we are working on new heads suited to the cams we want to have. Everything else works fine, it was only the torched heads which were the problem. We will test in May, I don't want to take a chance on Easter."

Anders has been hard at work with his CAD software and Uddeholm steel. "The new crankshaft is what we call pork chop style rather than round", he said. "It is more streamlined and is chamfered. We have also developed a new kind of cylinder head seal, a copper gasket with a steel wire which lines up with a groove in the block. It seems to seal perfectly. We have also worked on a development on a clutch designed by Top Fuel Bike racer Larry McBride in the USA. The clutch certainly works well because Sverre Dahl set a speed record with it and a bike which Larry supports has run 1.0-second sixty foot times in America. We make the clutches here, I sell them to Europe and Larry sells them in America.

"We are working with a new material from Uddeholm, a pre-hardened steel which is easy to machine. We also have a low-friction steel for clutch and valvetrain parts. It is like a regular forged steel but has very low friction. The crankshaft is made of a new material developed for forging tools but good for crankshafts and rods. We are now working on an oil pump for Buell Pro Stock Bike motors."

We found 2008 UK National Super Modified Champion Nigel Payne working on the Nimbus Motorsport stand and he was pleased to tell us about some sponsorship deals. "Dave Powell of Performance Unlimited has done us a deal for Total Seal rings", said Nigel. "We have collared Steve Clark for another year and he has continued and expanded his support from Nimbus Motorsport. Cam Autos and Goodridge are helping with lightweight hosing for another year.

"We are changing all sorts of things on the car to catch up with Andy Hone! We'll be out in the sun at Easter and hopefully do some pre-season testing."

Steve Clark of Eurodragster.com News sponsor Nimbus Motorsport said that business is holding up well even in the face of current exchange rates. "Ninety five per cent of our business is in dollars", he said. "Our support of drag racing won't look a lot different. We will continue with those deals which work for us. There will be a few changes in our circuit racing support. Last year we backed one of the pick-up racers and he won the Championship. Now he wants to run five trucks in 2009. That could be an interesting conversation!

"Over the next couple of months we'll be introducing some new products of interest to drag racers as we tied up some deals at the PRI Show."

Showtime Fuel FC driver John Spuffard said that work was already on the car for 2009. "Bob Jarrett is taking care of things in the USA, getting stuff and we have sent parts back to him for checking. Bob has been spending time with Jimmy Prock and Robert Hight. We are still searching for that four which is hopefully not too far away now. We have had a lot of people E-Mail wanting more of the same after the race with Thomas Nataas at the National Finals. It's nice to hear from people like that becasue it makes it all worthwhile". Spuff mentioned that 2009 is the twenty fifth anniversary of his first Fuel Funny Car drive.

Nigel Hoskison introduced us to Zeke Urrutia of Ferrea Racing Components who supply the Showtime team with valves, retainers, valvetrain components, screws and springs. "We supply to Top Fuel, Funny Car and Pro Stock", said Zeke. "I would say that we supply sixty per cent of the market from our facilities in Florida and Argentina. We get good exposure in the UK through our affiliation with Showtime and we share a lot of common knowledge."

Chris Brown of fellow Showtime sponsor ARP Racing Products said that the company supply the team with nuts, bolts and studs as used by the top US teams including John Force Racing with whom ARP work closely. "Ours is a relatively small company", said Chris. "We started in aerospace in 1982. We got involved in drag racing when Don Prudhomme, whose shop was down the street, wanted solutions for parts which kept breaking. We now supply all forms of motorsport producing everything in-house from the raw material to the finished product. We started to do business in Europe in the 1990s when we started to supply Ilmoor. That gave us credibility and there is a certain amount of monkey-see monkey-do in motorsport so we quickly started to supply others and we continue to supply Ilmoor and Mercedes up to the present day.

"We develop and test in-house before releasing on to the market. For example we are now pushing head studs and rod bolts for the new Evo. But drag racing is an important market for us; we work with the teams to work out their requirements and to deliver quickly. We also have a representative at every NHRA event. Over here the Showtime team help to promote the ARP name to the European market."

Amongst other work Eurodragster.com Home and News sponsor Andy Robinson has two Pro Mods on the go at Andy Robinson Race Cars. "The Vegters' Camaro is nearly done and we have started work on Marc Meuhuizen's '68 Firebird", said Andy. "Jon Giles' Super Gasser has a new front end and some other updates. Mick Begley's four wheel drive car will be soon be coming in for a new roll cage, which we have to build into the existing car."

We asked Andy if he had traced the cause of the problem which badly damaged two engines in his own Pro Mod towards the end of the 2008 season and which prevented him from running at the FIA European Finals. Although Andy was reticent to reveal the exact cause he said that it had indeed been cured. "Everything is back with us and repaired", he said. "The only way you can tell that the blocks have been repaired is the slightest change in the colour of the aluminium. The heads are immaculate as well - you can't tell that they had been damaged. We'll be there at Easter and we are looking forward to the FIA tour. We will be staying where we are with the set-up, there will be no major changes."

Top Methanol Dragster racer Dave Wilson said that he planned to take up where he left off with his injected-nitro combination in 2009. "I've been waiting for April since last September!", he said. "We had only sixteen runs last year because of the weather conditions and so we didn't get very far up the development curve. I was with Bill Reichert in the USA and he was then on his ninety eighth run of the year! We need far more runs under our belts.

"I had more fun last year than I've had in a long time. It's definitely and obviously different, and the car has even more potential than I thought. We learned a lot of valuable lessons last year. You find an answer to a problem and it might not be the ideal answer, so you try other things at the next race and you end up realising that there might not be an ideal answer. But we feel that we're a lot nearer now, within the window. Because it was an untried combination we found things we had to do to the chassis and the aerodynamics at the same time as we were trying to work out the motor. We won't be building a new chassis because we think that we can make this one work. It will be an interesting year for us."