The Venom NFAA entry of Tony Betts is adorned by a snake known as Mr Venom. The car also has a new design in vinyl from Ian Plumb. Tony said "We did our best 60ft time ever last weekend thanks to a new fuel system. We have new sponsors which Kevin Miller has helped us with. Details of the teams sponsors are here. Tony told us that he has acquired the fuel altered of Matt Wright and would like to hear from anyone interested in buying it.

Sponsor of the Nostalgia Fuel Altered Association Lawrie Gatehouse is pleased with the preparation of the Chaos altered to be raced by John Wright and that was echoed by advisor and US Fuel ALtered pilot Dave Benjamin. "Fibreglass Repairs did a great job on the body. The new rear wing produces 600kg of downforce at 220mph and to compensate for this a weight bar that can carry up to 40kg of lead shot is bolted to the front of the chassis". The rear of the wing says "In memory of Choo-Choo". Dave Benjamin said the engine preparation "left me with nothing to do." Dave mentioned that at the recent Bakersfield March meet the '72 Plymouth Satellite nostalgia FC he drove launched the body over 200ft into the air.

Pro Mod racer Mats Eriksson has support from Valvoline as you can see from the bug catcher. Merchandise on sale includes a superb 2009 calendar. Mats aims to run six teens with no shake. Away from the track projects in hand include new cars for long-time competitors Monica Oberg and Leif Helander.

A welcome return for one of the longest-standing competitors in the sport Dick Sharp. This is the seventh generation of Dorset Horn and the A35 has got many historic features. Dick said "The body is mainly new apart from the boot; the chassis is new forward of the bellhousing including the front of the rollcage. The body is made from the same moulds as the 1997 incarnation. Pat Cuss did the bodywork and Terry Selman helped me put the car together. Darren West designed the paint scheme and my son Dan applied it." The 434cu in Pontiac engine includes historic injectors seen on Barry Sheavill's original Stagecoach altered which is now owned by the team. The heads and cam are from the Moore brothers. The aim for this weekend is to run straight but future plans include improving on the car's bests of 9.5/142.

Wild Bunch organisers Chris Hartnell and Clare Meaddows have devised a replica canopy based on the original Malibu Express car which was reborn as Backdraft ten years ago. We were informed that Spud made it from aluminium, Chris welded it and Skippy painted it. In order to use it in racing trim it requires to be fixed to the rear of the car with emergency release clips. Chris said "The sound inside with the motor running is awesome."

Street Eliminator competitor Dave Murdoch has this wonderful '33 Willys. "I bought the body from Pro Car ENgineering and can supply copies from moulds I have made. The chassis is by Andy Robinson Racecars and the drivetrain including blown 540 big block Chevy is from Jim Oddy. The Powerglide is from Mike's Transmissions. I put the car together myself; it's my first ever car and my first time on track. My day job is a refrigeration engineer on North Sea oil rigs so the project has taken five years in between jobs. Many thanks to Colin Lazenby who has given me a lot of support."

Super Gas/Comp racer Jon Morton (left) and Pro ET racer Dan Page (right) have renewed sponsorship deals. Firecrest have renewed with Jon. Dan said "My Uncle Gary paid for a new clutch which Glen and Chris of Protek Engineering replaced in my L200 after it failed after last weekend's rwyb." Dan also revealed he is getting a Super Comp license in Jon's Camaro this year before attending Frank Hawley's racing school for the TA/FC license in 2010. Sister Heidi will drive the Pro ET Firebird at the Summernationals, Hot Rod Drags and Mopar Euronats.

S&K Racing's Roger Sinclair is pictured hard at work on the repainted Super Pro rail. Driver and co-owner Roy Wilding helped pay for the new scheme applied by Barry Woodford and designed by Terry Bull.

John Everitt's Super Pro altered Alien is displaying a new pair of "Hellraiser" slicks. John said "Usually we go through three sets of slicks in a season but with the weather last year we only used up one set."

The new dragster of Martyn Jones has a blown Brad Anderson engine. Martyn said "The engine damaged a set of main bearings on the checkout passes last Saturday and looking at it the damage was worse than originally thought and it's difficult to tell why so we have taken our time to investigate."

Peter Walters' Super Pro ET dragster is called Reloaded referring to Dad Richard's Apple County Cannon altered. The colour scheme was designed by Peter and applied by Richard. The engine has new internals.

Top Fuel and 9.50 Bike pilot Jon Webster is pleased with the preparation of the Top Fuel dragster assembled and tuned by the McDonald Brothers team and owned by Rune Fjeld. Jon said "The controls are similar to the Peter Knight car that I previously drove in 2005. However the fuel shutoff is on the opposite side and the safety equipment is different including seven point belts and Hans device. My first pass will be a familiarisation one."

Danny Bellio stands between his new Dodge Charger body and the Junior Dragster of Lisa Selles.

Turner Motorsport team are ready for the season with a bright new look.

The front wing of this Top Fueler proudly displays the McDonald team prepping and maintaining the car this weekend with Jon Webster driving.

Pro Stock Bike racer Herman van Driel has a tidy and colour co-ordinated pit area.

Draper Tools sponsors the ex-Paul Watson Pro Stock bike run by Mark Smith and named the Punisher.

Dave Benjamin, Lawrie Gatehouse and driver John Wright are happy to be back at the track after the Chaos rebuild.

Your pit reporter approvingly samples Mats Eriksson's new freshly-ground coffee machine.

Dorset Horn returns to the track after a four year hiatus looking better than ever.

S&K racing's cartoon depicts Roy Rogers/Wilding firing on all cylinders...Yee-ha!

A couple of welcome returns, Pat Talbot with her Super Pro ET dragster and Eurodragster.com honorary staff member Sharkman .

Super Pro ET new entrant Steve Taylor has a gap where the engine should be...

The engine's internals lie shining while the block is away being re-machined by Karl Harrison after no oil pressure on starting up.

Mark Flavell is joined by Concierge Bear (kidnapped from the Apple Store in Cambridge) in a cockpit escape test...

...Concierge Bear emerges first via the roof hatch...

...closely followed by Mark Flavell...

...who is seen for the first time in a Hans device purchased from Bob Glassup.

Top Methanol Funny Car racer Danny Bellio has a new state of the art Dodge Charger body acquired from a Californian racer, the first of this type to be seen in Europe. He said "We had our old body since 2002 and damaged it in Germany - the new body cost us less than the repairs to the old one. We need to test with the new body as the field of vision is narrower." It is also lighter by 25kg which means the car is now only 40kg above the minimum weight. The main mechanical change is a Molineri titanium clutch. Danny is looking to run consistent 5.8s and will be on the FIA Tour and at Drachten as well as car shows. "Thanks to Hans Peters of Recrea Media we have more sponsors. We are now looking to get support to get an on-board computer."

Top Methanol Dragster racer Rob Turner has a bright new colour scheme designed by wife Carmel and applied in vinyl wrap. This produces a weight saving of 20lb. The aim is to refine the tune-up for the top end of the track. Sponsorship is from Lucas Oil and Deep Stage, Carmel's new venture designing and producing hats and tee-shirts for racers; she said "We can now do this in-house for other teams." Rob will be contesting both the FIA TMD and SPR Methanol championships.

Nitro FC driver John Spuffard will be in this beautiful ex-Robert Hight body. To mark the new item, Showtime racing have launched a new website from today. Webmaster Nigel Holland said "The site will include a mailing list, a fans gallery that can be uploaded to, and an opportunity to ask questions to car owner Bob Jarrett and John which will be shown on the site." There is also a clever morphing feature from the old to the new body. The site is on www.showtimeracinguk.com. Editing was courtesy of Eurodragster.com sponsor Nigel Hoskison of ATI Europe.

Top Fuel racer Linda Thun Tonseth had a shortage of crew owing to illness. On Friday members of the Islanders TMD team flew into the UK to spectate and received a call from Linda asking them to crew. Pictured are Konrad Ree, Odd Rune Olsen and Tor Larsen. "We got the call at 3pm yesterday and had to cancel our sightseeing plans", said Konrad.

Top Fuel racer Jon Webster is driving for the McDonald brothers this weekend. Stuart McDonald said "We knew that this would not be a turnkey ride and have been happy to get involved in building the car. There have been some delays to the updates to the car and Jon has been fabricating a bottom pan this morning. It's good to be operating as a team again; we helped on Joran Persaker's and Thomas Nataas's cars last year to keep our hand in."

The ACU Top Fuel field includes four Super Twins. Two are from Zodiac racing and pictured is the ride of Job Heezen. The unblown machine has a new Zodiac billet blockfollowing the destruction of the previous one at the European Finals. Vincent Pels said "We will race both bikes on the UEM Tour including Hungary if this becomes a firm date and have made the necessary transport arrangements."

Funny Bike racer Tim Blakemore is selling Kawasaki-branded tee-shirts from his pit area. Also displayed are the products of new sponsor and Kawasaki partner Rock Oil who approached the team having been impressed with the sponsorship support displayed. "We are appearing at a Swindon Kawasaki dealer with the bike, which gives us a great opportunity to fire the bike up in front of a crowd, sell merchandise and publicise drag racing." Tim is looking to start where he left off performance-wise, the bike running 6.8s at the end of the season. "Thanks to Chris Wiseman for rebuilding our transmission over the winter break," he said.

ACU Top Fuel racer Ian Turburville has added Super Crew of Pete Bellenie and Joe Lann to his team. New on the bike is a Super Ignition from Dynatek to help increase the spark and burn more fuel. Pete will ride his Super Street bike at test days and support daughter Rhiannon in Junior Dragster which now shares the pit area with Mr Spokehead.

ACU Top Fuel Bike racer Chris "Cannon" Hannam will be competing on an ex-Rob van Geffen machine. The unique aspect to this is the engine. "It is a V-Twin with a block based on the design of a Top Fuel engine. We ran the original last year to a 7.4/174 shutting off at 5.8s and with a soft launch. Rob ran a 6.63 shut-off pass, so we are expecting 6.6s this weekend on 80% nitro and down into the low 6s after tuning it to conditions. We had an oil bearing failure over the winter and Puma engineering are producing a redesigned version (the new block is pictured). The heads are four valves per cylinder with overhead camshaft, which enables the engine to rev to 8-9,000rpm." Cannon has been on a training regime and lost three stone. Team help on the bike is from Neil Midgley, Mike Vickers and Al Smith and the bike will be seen at all SPR rounds of the ACU championship.

The Relentless NFAA team suffered a broken lifter in the warmup yesterday. Eurodragster.com blogger Luke Bennett said "Thanks to Bob Glassup for lending us a replacement set which are on their way from Somerset." The team is supporting MacMillan Cancer Trust by running a raffle at their pit, with the draw taking place on Monday. Also available are excellent tee-shirts from sponsor Slick Attire.