Easter Thunderball 2012

The Easter Thunderball has always been one of those events where the weather decides to change throughout the four days and this proved again to be the case. However it has never failed to bring the closest of Sportsman racing over the many years since the event was created.

It was Friday morning and an extremely cold one too, the temperature gauge showing -3 in the earlier hours and this posed all sorts of problems for all the racers, but more so for the quicker classes including our class Super Pro ET. The decision was made by the team to not make a run for the first round of qualifications due to the track conditions and this was the same decision made by the majority of other teams too, just 7 cars who went out for the first qualifier. Luckily, the weather did improve slightly in terms of temperature and so we set ourselves for the first run of 2012 with a dial-in of 8.10 seconds. Unsurprisingly, the conditions were still too cold for the dragster to make a good run, resulting in Dave having to come off the throttle in the last third of the track due to the car moving about far too much, rolling through the quarter with an 8.45 at 148mph. Plenty more opportunities to rectify that! Next run then and the decision was made to bring the dial-in down to an uncharacteristic 8.21. This time the car hooked up nicely and ran what it’s supposed to run, an 8.08 at 166mph. D’oh! The breakout meant that we were lower down the field at this time. This run was the last of the day.

Saturday morning was an improvement on Friday morning’s weather, for the reason that it wasn’t below freezing. Waiting around most of the day for the fourth round of qualifying was something that we were used to by now and we all agreed on an 8.08 dial-in. The look on our faces when Dave went through running 8.07 at a terminal speed of nearly 168mph could only be described as frustrating, Dave’s even more so when we collected him from the end of the track! Unfortunately, that was the only run of the day.

The plans for Sunday were to have two more qualifying rounds and then go into eliminations. Well, the two more rounds never happened and it meant going straight into eliminations at a very late 19:45. What a good way to spend a Sunday evening! We were up against the newly built Fuel Altered being driven by Jim Draper and what a beautiful car it was, entering Super Pro for testing. The sun had nearly set at this point making it near enough night racing. We had gone for the dial-in of 8.07 and the altered with a quicker 7.40, giving Dave the start line advantage of 0.67 seconds. Dave used the advantage to his full potential cutting a +0.04 light, the altered was struggling up the track with what sounded like mechanical issues, if not then apologies! The dragster ran through with a much better 8.11 at nearly 165mph, 0.04 off of our dial-in. Not too shabby!

Yet again, the power that is Mother Nature meant that the Monday was a complete and utter wash out, with torrential rain and wind, giving Race Director Robin Shone no choice but to call the rest of the event. So, in a way, Team Rampage can come away from the event feeling relatively happy with the cars performance and consistency.

Thank you very much to all our Sponsors for their contributions, as always they are appreciated.