28/05/2026
**FIA Main Event Summary Post**
Well we had the time of our lives at Santa Pod Raceway over the weekend! Such a total scorcher with that said - seeing temperatures rise over 35°c giving us a total heatwave to remember!
Our weekend actually started from Thursday when we arrived at Santa Pod Raceway to prepare for the FIA Main Event, being our second Funny Car Cup event of the year.
We got ourselves dug in and set up on Thursday as we wasn’t going to be racing till Saturday.
With that said we used most of Friday to set up our new AllValve Fuel system - it’s an up to date fuel system that’s entirely new to us.
A lot of current teams are running on this system and Dale wanted to update the car, so it was installed! There really are some huge risks with installing these types of upgrades, not getting it correct can result in the body being blown off the car, so you really have to get it right!
The hardware had been finalised, our crew chief Shane now needed to match our old curve to the new fuel system which is always filled with obstacles in itself - Shane was completely confident it could be done!
Q1 was a planned launch to the 330ft mark to see if the new system would work as planned, it actually worked beautifully well! We were the fastest qualifying team at this point which gave us much to look forward to over the coming days.
After Q1, engine came back to the pits looking absolutely beautiful with no scuffed pistons, fuelling was looking pretty good! Slight problem with one of our cylinders which turned out to be an electrical issue which of course we resolved.
Q2 our plan was to follow in suit with Q1 but to go further down the track! So we decided 1/8th mile was our next target.
We put down a real strong pass on this one! We went 0.9seconds to the 60ft - This was probably our strongest run to the 1/8th mile!
Q3 Dale felt the car could reach the 1000ft! But just to make sure the new fuel system and everything else was still running as it should, crew chief Shane asked that on this run that Dale is to click off between 1/8th mile and the 1000ft mark just to make sure everything was genuinely doing what it was supposed to be doing! After all, we’re working with new products, parts and upgrades from our last event. The car did exactly as planned, held itself down and ran into the 4s again as planned. The car checked out wonderfully but we’d hurt the rear main - which left Dale making the decision of whether to polish up the rear main or swap motors. We really didn’t have the time to swap motors, and Dale was adamant about keeping the other motors for the race days to come. So the decision was to try and get away with it.
Q4 came and Dale performed a heavy burnout which after reversing up, further analysis showed this to have caused a drop in oil pressure - things like this can happen when you damage a rear main bearing. As a result of this we shut the car off to prevent any further issues - meaning we never got to run this round but it was the right choice as we knew we’d be changing motors by the evening anyway.
E1 was approaching fast! We swapped our motors around during the night - Things were looking brilliant and going to plan!
Our first Eliminations round saw us going up against the well seasoned Kevin Kent of West Ten Motorsport team! - “you can never play it safe against Kevin! If he hooks up he’ll fly” says Dale!
So we laid all our cards out on the table for this run.
During the run Dale hit over 288mph which is a personal best mph record for Dale and also the fastest the car had ever been over the 1000ft in its history. Dale says “As a driver, that’s the first time that car really got my attention, I was like wow, this feels insane! I loved it”
Everything came back, The motor checked out beautifully, we truly felt we’d got a baseline set up for the car with the AllValve and all its other upgrades - with the car running in the 4s we was proud and happy! Especially as an upcoming team. We got ourselves into second place spot on the points table which was a truly great place to be at this stage.
We then had our final elimination round up against veteran pilot John Spuffard who knows his way round a fuel funny car! Showtime Racing had been struggling a fair bit during the weekend so naturally Dale had in mind that there was always a possibility of them smoking their tyres or something else happening, but above all Dale says “I was racing my lane, whatever happens happens”
Dale done his job, cut a light got down the track in another 4.4 seconds at just over 275mph over the 1000ft. Dale says “The motor let go on the finish line, we had a small fire going through the shut down area, nothing serious, I stayed calm, shut all my systems down and pulled the fire bottles, sat in the car as you should, got the car stopped, climbed out the roof hatch! The safety crew were there who I can’t thank enough for their efforts and care! They were straight on the car ensuring the fire was put out, We picked up fairly minimal damage.”
Dale continues “John got the win, but to be in the other lane next to John Spuffard for me was super cool, he’s done so much for me and taught me so much, to just race him.. I mean it’s ’John Spuffard’ so that’s cool! He went over 300mph with the winning ET, They deserve it, they’re a top class - top tier team, if you’re going to get beaten by anybody, it’s pretty cool to be beaten by them! Obviously I want the win and I will get the win at some point, I’m trying real hard.”
Dale also adds “But the team is the unsung hero here, I’m just the lead singer of the band, obviously I get all the limelight but there are so many people within the team that are working so so hard this weekend! I’ve really got to hand it to Shane Bigg, there was concerns that we’d blow the body off the car but Shane got it right. We had the most minimal amount of damage we’ve ever had on fuelling - we used the same rack of pistons all weekend, never changed one and I feel that is unprecedented. I just feel like we’ve found a place where we can really move on now - yes I’ve got a little bit of work back in the workshop to get the motors freshened up! But that is the run of the mill maintenance anyway. Overall I’m so pleased with the performance of the team; and Shane making the calls on everything, I really want to press on the fact that Shane did so much. I’m so proud of all he achieved and he should be really proud of himself; it’s not just me saying this, other teams have come over and said they’re amazed with what he’s achieved too. Looking at my short numbers and my back halves, stitching them together I believe that as it stands, with a few more passes we can surpass the 4.3s and go straight into 4.2s - I think it’s massively possible. As always it’s great to have Dan ‘The Man’ Wagner analysing all the data, jumping in with any jobs that he can do, he really is a key member to the team! And my sister (Hayley) being thrown in in the deep end, she’d been doing all the clutch all weekend, she does it all back in the workshop, gets them all prepped up with the assistance of Sam who usually helps her, who unfortunately on this occasion was called out for work meaning she was in the deep end, doing it all on her own at this meeting, she worked so so hard, my dad jumped in to help her out but was really there passing bits but yes she done such an awesome job. The whole team worked so hard in all of that heat, I can’t complain about sitting in there for 30mins here and there and getting all hot during heat because they worked in the heat of the day, turning that car around, we never missed going down to the start line once, the teams all coming together and gelling really well - That’s what’s important”
Dale finishes with “Thanks to everyone who came down and supported us! Thank you to everyone who purchased merch! It was really cool to see people wearing the car on their t-shirts walking around showing their support! Thank you to everyone for all their support”
The driving workforce of the team during the heat was a true testament to the people they are, without the team none of this would be possible.
Onwards and upwards, as it stands we are now 3rd on the Funny Car Cup points table and it’s getting extremely tight between us and Showtime Racing with Kevin Kent still in the lead.
Our next Funny Car Cup race event will be Bug Jam 39 held at Santa Pod Raceway on 24th-26th July !
See you all at the track soon!
📸: Eliot Ruben/Cult Of The V8, Hayley Tourle, Simon Campbell and Lauren Cox
