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16:00

Urs Erbacher said after his 4.833/308 run, "We lost a cylinder on the run and have changed two pistons. The engine looks fine otherwise. Compared with this time last year we are a lot further forward. We now want to go faster in the final against Lex, who's a good competitor and we beat him last year."

U.S. tuning adviser to the Erbacher team Glenn Mikres said "It should be a good race, a 4.83 on seven cylinders is good as you can reckon it was up to 1,000 hp down. I'm getting busy in the U.S. as I'm now Crew Chief for Scott Kalitta's Funny Car, so won't have as much time, but I will come to as many races as I can. There's a lot of new stuff on the cars. We are using electronics to operate the clutch and fuel over here now and we had a slight malfunction with the slide valve in the fuel management system. However, this is the beginning of the year and it's useful to test things here."

Alongside the TV companies filming racing, there is a team from The Gamma Project, a production company that is making a pilot for a planned eight-part series for The Discovery Channel, based on a behind-the-scenes look at the Urs Erbacher team at all the main races they attend in 2007. The Gamma Project already have a series showing world-wide called Engineering the World Rally and are awaiting confirmation for the new series. Watch Eurodragster.com for further announcements.

Lex Joon said that he was delighted to run a 4.75 shut-off early with no damage. "The reason I lifted was only that we were getting close to the centre line and I didn't want to damage anything. The conditions are optimal today and I am looking forward to running the full 1320 against Urs.

John Spuffard said "The run was fine until some tape flew off the injector so I shut off early. To race against Leif will be a good way to sign the car off." The team was solving a wiring problem as we walked by.

Leif Helander said "I am looking forward to racing John and depending how things go in this race we will leave the car here and run it at the Main Event."

Håkan Fallström's problems started when the fuel pump broke and leaned out the engine. The resulting explosion caused the blower to disintegrate and blew the body off the Pennzoil-sponsored Dodge Avenger. The body is taped up but repairable. Håkan said "This is one of the worst things that can happen. I followed the procedure and handled it like I should have done. You don't know how to handle this sort of situation if every run is perfect. It all happened so suddenly. It must have been travelling at about 230mph, there was a big explosion, and a huge pressure wave and it was like suddenly going from night to day. You've got to steer the Funny Cars all the way down the track and I managed to keep it in my lane. Driving a Top Fuel Dragster is a piece of cake compared with the Funny Car. I handled the 'chutes and fuel shut-off. The safety crew asked me if everything was ok and said I had done the right things.

Alan Jackson commented that the bang and flash of flame from under the Camaro Funny Car was due to a head gasket letting go.

14:00

Steve "Splinter" Nash brought his new Street Eliminator Mercury Cougar to the track on Saturday. The car, which is owned in partnership with Crew Chief Mick Franklin, has been built by Chris Isaacs with help from the whole team and others. "We were still working on the car on Friday. We spent all Thursday night on it and all day Friday after one hour of sleep. We finished it on Saturday morning and took it to the MOT shop and from there straight to the track. We're still on a learning curve and on our fourth pass ran a best for the new car of 8.41. We are running it on the safe side and once we have got a baseline we will feed more power into it. The engine, transmission and ECU are out of the old car but everything else is new." Mick, Splinter and Jeff made a carbon composite body based on the old panels and Pro Alloy did the ally work. The wiring harness needed to be new and Harness Engineering built this item. "The loom arrived Friday lunchtime and we fitted it and tested it and it fired up first time.

Splinter said "The car drives really nicely and handles well on the road as well as the track. The team have been great, Ray Perkins has put in a lot of time and my partner Elona Webster has helped rub the body down as well as supplying food and drink for us. I am open to sponsorship offers for a paint job."

Wilf Stacey suffered a nitrous burp at the eighth mile mark in Street Eliminator. "I switched off the ignition system and fuel and coasted to a 9.3. If I had stayed with it, it would have run about 8.9, but I know I was up against it", he said. Wilf has been staying at Santa Pod all week to enable his and Anne-Marie Lazenby's campers to be serviced, and he was mightily impressed by what he saw.

"We came the previous Thursday to set the car up for the Test & Tune. On Friday we tested a new air flow meter and ran an 8.90 at the Test & Tune on Saturday which we were pleased with. After that, we were the only people here apart from the fairground operators.I was amazed by the amount of work that was done leading up to the Easter Thunderball. I watched two trucks move 35 tons of earth each every 15 minutes for 12 hours of the day. 600 tons of tarmac were being laid each day. The two granstands were built up in this time as well. It was incredibly fast and efficiently done. Darren Prentice and John Cross put the fencing up and bins out, working in the dark until 8pm every day. The work started at 6am each morning and was non-stop during the day. Our sponsors Real Steel visited us and they said it simply isn't the same place it used to be. If anyone says there is nothing done here, they should come and see me.

"I am very grateful to Darren, David Lloyd-Jones and the whole of the team, not for just allowing us to let us use the pits for our motorhome servicing work but all the work they put in before each event too. We have had no problems with the power in the pits and it is so nice to work on our cars without the constant noise of generators. The pit surface is spotless. We were given a broom but only had two brush two small stones away."

Ashley Bell (Super Pro ET) said "We're happy to be through to the third round but had a moment on Saturday when the car spun through 360 degrees on its run. We checked it over and there was no oil or water loss or breakage so it looks like a traction-related problem. I had a good run against John Everitt in the first round and a bye in the second round. We are having to change the nitrous bottle before the next round which could be a fly in the ointment and I hope we don't break out. After the fire two years ago we had teething troubles but now things are sorted out. We have a new motor arriving soon, a 565ci big block Chevy. Our aim is to run around the same times without nitrous. The motor is being supplied by Darryl at Fastco USA and Andy Hone who gives us a lot of help does a lot of the work as well as my Crew Chief Steve Jaggs."

Paula Atkin said "We're pleased to be through to the third round of Super Pro ET when I will face Martyn Jones. I have an outstanding crew with my husband Stan and Kevin Cerasale, who has tuned our chassis to make the car so consistent. We freshened the motor and put new tyres on over the winter. Our old Hoosiers were rubbing against the bodywork slightly so we have changed to slightly narrower Goodyears. For the Main Event, we will switch the Nitrous back on."

Lawrie Gatehouse said that some attrition had struck the NFAA with Chaos suffering engine damage, Venom with new cylinder head woes, and Dave Grabham with a broken crank. Dave has a new crew chief, Norm Wheeldon returning to the sport after time out from the sport. On the positive side, new PBs have been recorded by Jim Usher with the Mob, Clayton Round with Rebel T and now Frank Bennett and Bob Glassup knocking on the door of the six second bracket.

12:00

Paul Marston Racing has entered five cars this weekend with six drivers with nine separate entries. "What you see here is a result of six month's hard graft. This is a major step forward," said Paul. "When we started three years ago I wanted to spend the first three years getting established and then expand at a sustainable, controlled manner. We could have grown faster but it is important to be comfortable with the operation as it develops. We have an excellent crew and cars. All of our drivers from last year have moved up a class. We have bought the ex-Mick Cheley Calibra which was a Pro Mod car and is ideal for Super Mod, but won't bring it in until we are comfortable. There are logistical considerations every time we add to the team, not just in working on the cars but storing them, transporting them, and accomodating and feeding upwards of 17 team members.

"My grateful thanks go to Drag Race Engineering, Gary Springford's company which is the team's major sponsor and instrumental in its growth. Gary has a 4,000 sq. ft. workshop and has been generous in his time for the fabrication and mechanical expertise that we need. We refurbished three cars and built one over the winter. The end result is all the cars are more competitive and we are in the top five in most of our entries.

"I am exceptionally proud of how well the four-link dragster has performed at its first meeting. Both Tethys and I drove four link cars at Frank Hawley's Drag Racing School. It is a logical step to introduce a dragster. Junior dragster drivers will want to move up to a full-scale dragster, but we will only put a driver in the dragster if they have had experience in a door car first. It is too big a step to go straight into a car that can run high sevens and drivers will need to get their mind speed up before stepping into the rail. The difference the four-link makes is that it's more forgiving, consistent and safe because the car reacts better under braking, and the rear does not get as loose as with a solid axle."

"The Bruiser that I have been driving is running consistently. Over the winter we installed a Ron's Flying Toilet fuel injection system on the engine and we are double entered. I qualified well in Super Pro but had brain fade in round 1 and pulled a red."

Team Member Steve Bolton said "We are through to the third round where I will race Mike Howling so that will be an intra-team matchup. We installed a new torque converter over the winter, which is why the car is wheelying on the launch. It's fun looking at the sky, but I'm considering a set of wheelie bars."

09:00

Jason Weir was pleased with a PB run of 9.1639/148 in the Plymouth Suburban. Jason said "We've worked our way through a number of problems, but on the cruise a battery failure meant that we failed the hot start." Jason's crew chief said "Webster Race Engineering carried out recent upgrading work on the car. The engine was built by Andy Frost." The team will have to miss the next two rounds as a baby is on its way, but the team hope to be back at the Main Event, running in Competition Eliminator.

Colin Lazenby said "We are pleased with eight-teens but are looking for that magical time. We have done some work on the front suspension and the car now launches better, our 1.31 60 ft time being the best ever. We do have a third nitrous stage but we don't want to use more power to compensate for the launch. I don't get involved in the tuning decisions - Luke and Gary say 'You concentrate on the wheel and stick and we'll look after the tunes.' Whereas other cars are Pro Mods converted to street use, this one started as a street car and we put a Pro Mod chassis under it."

Colin was quite guarded on the subject of tyres in Street Eliminator. "Most of those who were on the Mickey Thompson Drag Radials are now running with BF Goodrich Drag Radials. We have kept with block treads - as Steve Clark said, what makes the class so challenging it is running on street tyres. We want to find a way to get the block treads to work optimally. On our 8.16 the car stumbled at 1.8 sec into the run with a flat spot in the fuel system, so we know there is more there. There are six to eight cars capable of running sevens, and they will find their form."

Kenneth Lorentzen, car owner and crew chief for Håkan Fallströstrom's Funny Car, said "It's been an up and down weekend. When we started the engine on Friday, we had no pressure in the back half and we needed to mend the expernal oil feed to a hole in the block. This morning (Sunday) we had a very soft setup and the car left lazily, the next pass we still had a soft setup to get the car down the track but it drifted towards the centre line and Håkan shut off. We want to compete tomorrow and will step up the power. The funny car is our focus this year and we won't be running the dragsters."

Leif Helander (Funny Car) said "When I hit the wall, I had lost attention as I felt the car moving very well and was concentrating on the 'chute. I compensated but it was too late. I was slightly skewed on the start line which caused the car to head towards the wall. I didn't feel an impact but saw some dust and shut off." The damage was limited to a set of flattened headers and a little scrape on the body. Leif concluded "In future I will pay more attention to where I am going."

Bob Jarrett, car owner and crew chief for the Showtime Funny Car, said "The weekend has been problem free. I'm a lttle disappointed that we're only no.3, as we want to win the race, but the car got loose in the second half of the track. On Monday morning, we need to be three tenths closer to the index than Lex, which is achievable. With only one run on Saturday and Sunday and the team all here we have been taking time away from the track to work on the new car for three or four hours a day. I am really pleased to see the Funnay Car class expanding once again. The Swedish influence can only be good as they will be able to get sponsorship and help push for the class."

John Spuffard said "This is the last meeting for this car, it's going to good hands and will still be running in the nitro ranks. We're bearing this in mind and so I want to run it safely this weekend and avoid blow-ups. It got very loose in the right lane with a narrow groove on Saturday. On the run today, the grip was much better and the clutch pulled the engine down so much the car reacted as if it was nosing over and I got out of the throttle too early. The overall problem we face still is a lack of runs, and we need more to work on the combination betwen clutch, fuel management and ignition."

Urs Erbacher said on Sunday evening "We're pleased with the run today, it went smoothly. Three pistons got slightly singed at the top end but there were no other major problems. We're confident of being in the final."

Eric Teboul said he has built a new higher capacity fuel tank on the rocket bike which will enable him to ignite the rocket for a longer time than before. Up until Sunday, he has been doing test half passes, including a 5.9231/205.27 on Sunday. Today, he will attempt to go further than before. He said "I will be campaigning the Fuel Bike later this year at the UK rounds of the UEM championship and have updated a lot of engine parts, with new heads, cam, blower and fuel system."