A JAUNTY JAMBOREE

Words and photos by Jon Van Daal

In the late nineties the Import drag racing scene seemed to be the next big thing for American drag racing.  Like the general import arena it seemed to just grow with unbridled vigor with various import drag racing Associations being set up and new techniques being applied to ensure front wheel drive cars broke the 200 mph barrier. Just a decade later the GFC seemed to have put the nails in the coffin of US import sanctioned events but the scene down under is in a much healthier state as correspondent, Jon Van Daal found out when he attended last week’s Sydney Jamboree.

I guess I know a little bit about import drag racing as I was on staff when Drag Combat was launched in Australia in the early part of the new century. The import scene had hit Australia with much vigor and as the Japanese also drive on the right hand side of the road soon many high performance imports were being imported into Australia. Cabin Promotions ran the most successful indoor import shows or Auto Salons as they were known. They hoped to attract a large part of their audience over to the drag strip to take in this new type of drag racing, Drag Combat. The short answer was that they didn’t.

The very first event at the new Western Sydney International Drag strip (WSID) was actually a Drag Combat but the crowds never came. More problems occurred when another round was run on the hottest day in Brisbane for some 40 years with government agencies warning people not to leave their homes – it soon became apparent that Drag Combat would not be around for long.

Fortunately this wasn’t the only game in town. Back in 1991 an event called the Jamboree was started by a group of drag racing enthusiasts from the Volkswagen Drivers Car Club of Queensland and was run at Willowbank Raceway outside Brisbane. Club members Ray Box and Mark Stanbury ran the Jamboree for the next five years and gave lovers of small and import cars a special event to race at.

Not long after, Ray and Mark registered Small Car Productions and then it later morphed into the Sport Compact Group to run and promote the Jamboree and other Sport Compact events throughout Australia. In 2010 Ray Box bought out Stanbury and has gone it alone.

While the early going was provided by Volkswagen enthusiasts as time went on a larger and larger number of Mazda Rotary engine cars started to dominate the scene and this is still the way it is in 2011. In addition to a large number of half and full chassised cars being built and run in Australia, a number of the 2JZ Toyota powered turbo cars from America also have made their way to this country as places to race started to dry up in the USA.

The Brisbane Jamboree is the second biggest event at Willowbank after the ANDRA Winternationals. Originally the Jamboree was run on the weekend after that race in mid June (the height of our winter) but the last few years it has moved to the early part of spring in the late August/early September period. At this time some 500 entries flock from all parts of Australia and overseas to perform in front of solid crowds over 10,000 spectators.

As more and more Pro Turbo cars appeared they needed places to race and the Sydney Jamboree was established as a second tiered event to the main ”Jambo”. Like Drag Combat it hasn’t been easy for the Sport Compact Group to obtain the same loyal following from the Sydney fans but as the Group cover their costs and put better and better events into the books so the return will come. Certainly if it may surprise you that the world’s quickest and fastest import car is New Zealander, Rod Harvey who has set the Jamboree records for the Pro Turbo class at 6.41 and 221.71 though has gone faster again. On the rotary side of the fence local racer, George Rehayem of Pac Performance fame has run the quickest rotary marks in the world with a 6.589 at over 208 mph so import drag racing is alive and well down under.

Back to the Sydney event and some 150 entries were on hand to show an enthusiastic crowd of around 3000 what import drag racing is all about. Firstly the race was blessed with sunshine – the first major event to actually finish at Sydney Dragway since late last year. The action was pretty hot as well as many drivers set their own personal bests during the course of the day with a small but enthusiast bunch of Pro Turbo racers on hand to battle it out in the top bracket.

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