Rick Gauci

The show was head-lined with four fuel cars. This saw the two fuel altereds of Graeme Cowin – the “Pyscho” and “Berzerk” T Buckets being joined by the pretty FED of Dave Armstrong and the nostalgia funny car of Morice McMillen. The “Berzerk” T Bucket was being steered by Rick Gauci and he was paired with opponent Shane Olive in the Cowin and Johns “Pyscho” car. Gauci won the first round running Australia’s first five second fuel altered pass with a 5.941 at 238.79 mph.

“As we were so close to that 5-second pass at Willowbank Raceway, we didn’t want to change too much for the Sydney event. The only major difference was the car was faster in the first half of the track”, Gauci said after the run. “We are super excited, I have to thank the entire Aeroflow (sponsor) crew,” he went on to say. Gauci backed that up later with a stout 5.982-second pass at 236.36 mph.

While Gauci was setting the record Olive was having troubles in the other lane when his car broke as he explains. “It wasn’t the result we were looking for, the car is really strong early in the run in fact it was faster in the first half of the track than our 6.01 second pass a few weeks ago.  However, in typical fuel altered style it just keeps picking the front wheels up off the ground, which makes it rather hard to steer! Congratulations to Rick and the “Berzerk” team on getting the first ‘five’, we will keep pushing as we would really like to get that 5-second pass in “Psycho” for Graeme and Wendy Cowin,” he added.

Morice McMillen

When Gauci couldn’t return for their third match up Olive was paired with New Zealand driver, Morice McMillen in the “Bad Kiwi” Trans Am.  McMillan took a slight lead off the line and both cars were glued together until the 330 mark but Olive again had his front wheels in the air and with the T Bucket skewing off course he shut the car down allowing the Kiwi to take a 5.973/237.30 win over a second best 8.291.

McMillen had earlier had two runs against the gorgeous front engine digger of David Armstrong .The first was a qualifying pass with McMillan’s 5.984 being good enough to slot into second behind Gauci’s 5.941 time. Armstrong ran an exploratory 6.378 to slot into third in front of Olive’s 6.879.

Round one action saw Armstrong take on McMillen and after a very even leave the digger took the long way there as it trailed the flopper all the way down the track resulting in a 6.011 to 6.204 result.

After returning to the pits, the tear down commenced on the Armstrong car and it soon became apparent that the clutch had cried enough. The unit was locked up and as such it couldn’t be adjusted, meaning that on the run it was completely fried with the engine dropping cylinders all the way and giving his opponent an easy win.