Nitro Funny Cars compete maiden Bend battle

For the first time the Nitro Funny Cars flew at the new Dragway at The Bend and Brandon Gosbell leads the way ahead of today’s finals.

Gosbell wowed the crowd by recording the first sub-five second pass of the weekend in the opening heat.

Although come Q2 others would join him in the window, his Q1 effort was enough to be the top qualifier ahead of today’s finals.

“This is our first time to Dragway at The Bend and the atmosphere has been incredible. It has been amazing to have the crowd interacting with us so much,” said Sydney round one winner Gosbell.

“Our first qualifier certainly went well in the heat of the day, seeing us run a 4.87 second pass (at 298.51mph/480.40kph). 

“Then we tried to go out there in Q2 and go a bit quicker in the cooler conditions, but we overpowered the track. Even so, we were happy to keep the number one qualifier spot.

“We are feeling good now ahead of the final – we have made some big changes to the car since the last round in Perth and it looks like we are heading in the right direction in terms of consistency.

“We are definitely looking forward to getting back out there on Sunday, we will just try and repeat what we did today and hopefully we can string three good passes together!”

Next best proved to be Justin Walshe while championship leader Morice McMillin was third fastest despite being unable to improve on his Q1 effort.

Damian Moscatt overcame an engine change to be fastest in Top Fuel Motorcycle. Image: Cackling Pipes Photography

Anthony Begley and Adam Murphy had they times deleted due to knocking out the finish line timing blocks and crossing the centre line respectively.

In Top Doorslammer Russell Taylor raced into the top spot in Q2 with a 5.741 second pass at 257.58mph (414.53kph).

As a result, he will face the previous round winner and fellow rookie Ronnie Palumbo in the first round of racing on Sunday.

Meanwhile John Zappia crossed the centre line and into Lisa Gregorini’s lane and was disqualified.

In Top Fuel Motorcycle Damian Muscat changed an entire between Q1 and Q2 and still claimed top honours with a 6.593/157.07mph (252.78kph) effort.

Defending Spring Nationals winner Benny Stevens (6.630/220.05mph/345.13kph) was second quickest after topping Q1.

“This result is great,” smiled Muscat.

“In Q1 we hurt the engine, we broke porcelains off the spark plugs and hurt one of the exhaust valves, so we changed the guys thrashed it out to change the engine and we just got it out there in time to go out and ran our quickest time on this bike to date.

“We have got a little more work to do on our tune up but overall, we are extremely happy with where we are at and hopefully we can improve from here.”

In Aeroflow National Sportsman Championship, qualifying was completed for Supercharged Outlaws, Competition Bike, Super Stock and Competition Eliminator, with Milan Dokic, Chris Allen, Steve Norman and Matt Forbes top qualifying in those brackets respectively.

Qualifying will continue for the rest of the competitors, with Andrew Ricketts (Super Street), Brian Alvisio (Modified Bike), Kym Driesener (Super Sedan), Simon Barlow (Modified), Lachlan Walker (Junior Dragster) and Vlado Turic (Top Sportsman) leading the way for their respective brackets so far.

The Festival State Nationals will continue with day two at Dragway at The Bend today, with the conclusion of qualifying for the Aeroflow National Sportsman Championship from 10.30am and racing for all brackets from 11.40am through to approximately 6.30pm. Nitro Funny Car, Top Doorslammer and Top Fuel Motorcycle are scheduled to hit the track at 1.00pm, 3.15pm and 5.50pm local time.

Image: Cackling Pipes Photography

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