A group of students sponsored by the Institute of the Motor Industry (IMI) were given a tour of the pits and Steve Loader, crewman on Jason Phelps' Funny Car, spoke to them about nitro racing. The IMI is the professional association for individuals working in retail motor industry and runs training courses for qualifications and an apprenticeship scheme. More details can be found at www.theimi.org.uk and www.autocity.org.uk.

Super Gas racer Jon Morton is assisted by Rob Stanley this weekend. He said 'I've had problems with the gearbox and convertor at the last three meetings and have a newly refurbished gearbox from Kev Cerasale and also thanks to Paul Letchford for lending me his convertor out of his Camaro. Everything else is fine'.

Super Comp racer Nicky Frost is making her first appearance on track since the 2012 Euro Finals with an upgraded chassis. 'We had the floor taken out and more chassis bars to get it tagged to 7.50. We will first run it in Super Comp and may progress to Super Pro ET later in the season. The engine and transmission have been refreshed by Kev Cerasale who worked with us in-house to improve our skills'. Nicky has a Monster Energy partial wrap on top of the traditional orange including Money 4 Nothing signeage on the hood scoop.

Super Pro ET racer Gary Gooding started racing in 2005 with a Mazda RX7 which after being back-halved at Webster Race Engineering ran in the Jap Series until a crash in 2010. During the rebuild Gary met Team Extreme and crewed for Mark Smith. The decision was then made to buy and modify Leon Green's JPS Motorsport car for Topspeed Automotive Street Eliminator. Leon had ran 7.2/196 on methanol and slicks. The injectors have been changed to allow the car to run on V-Power (and E85 later in the season). Gary is running in Super Pro ET this year as a rule change for capacity of dual power adder cars from 3 litres to 3.5 litres will come into force in 2015. He said 'We are just using nitrous to spool up the turbo now and it comes off at the launch'. Despite this Gary ran a 8.5/164 at Shakey and hopes for a seven soon. The engine is a stock block Toyota 2JZ with stroker crank and Powerglide trans.

Pro ET racer Lee Guy is at his first meeting as driver after crewing for Mike Lacey. Lee said 'This will be my first time in the car today, doing licensing passes. The car is from Carl Burton with a fresh stroked 383cu in SBC with TH400 gearbox and pro ratchet shifter'. The car has been repainted in metalflake orange with a Cosworth body kit.

Super Pro ET racer Mark Flavell had big engine problems on his first pass that put him out for the remainder of the meeting. 'The engine sounded sweet on the burnout and the oil pressure was perfect. I ran it to the eighth for a planned shut off to ensure we had enough fuel but the car got full of smoke. There must be a lot of damage and four of the spark plugs are damaged. So we think the valves and pistons came into contact'. Mark is pleased that support from Prestone and Gold RV have enabled the team to acquire a carbon fibre Firebird body from the Mongoose car. Plans for this season are for Mark's son Andy to race the car at a couple of nostalgia meetings.

Super Pro ET racer Jayne Kay has a blown alky altered to replace the Pink Lady Funny Car. She said 'It's a handful, it's the same wheelbase as the Funny Car but a bigger 480cu in engine and 14/71 blower. The trans is a Lenco air shifted. I had three tries at my first pass, on the first the timing system crashed, on the second the shift light didn't come on. It 'hunts' so we have calmed it down as I had to keep the brake on hard when reversing and staging. We couldn't test it yesterday so on the pass I took it easy'. Jayne's car was bought turnkey from three-time NFAA champion Clayton Round and treated to a pink paint-job. Support is from Simpsonlids.co.uk, Wheel-whores.com, Custom Coach Trimming and Trophy Queen.

Pro Modified racer Mats Eriksson has made modifications to the Green Goblin. He said 'We have a new rear end as we found it had cracked last year. At the same time we made a new four link suspension set-up with new geometry. We did five launches at Malmö last weekend and ran a best 60ft time of 0.98, so we will be looking for full passes from the start'. Mats has two new crew members at the track, Pro Mod racer Adam Flamholc who will be working on the clutch and mechanic Jan 'Exon' Eriksson. Lars-Goran Eriksson is crew chief. Mats also mentioned success in supplying Docol tubing for race car construction and a boom in race-car building, including rallycross.

Top Fuel Dragster racer Chris Andrews suffered an accident setting up his pit area, slipping and dislocating his shoulder or collar bone. Crew chief Eddie Corr said 'He aggravated a previous injury and is in Bedford Hospital awaiting a possible operation to be done this morning. We are awaiting confirmation as to whether an operation will be necessary and are not even thinking about what would happen if Chris is unable to race this weekend'. Everybody from Eurodragster.com wishes Chris a speedy recovery and a fast return to the track'.

Super Street racer Matthew Seamarks has his Ford 100E painted in nostalgic two tone Ford colours.