Arctic Traveller Resurrection « DragRaceCanada.com

Arctic Traveller Resurrection

by editor on Sep.10, 2017, under ACE MFG Northern Exposure

A rather famous Western Canadian drag race team “moniker” is being brought back to life!….

A revelation has come from Alberta’s Sitko Racing team who are on the bounce back trail with their Nostalgia Nitro Funny Car operation.

Recently that popular team endured a set back when a parachute and brake failure resulted in severe body and chassis damage to their Plymouth Arrow Funny Car which the team has campaigned faithfully over the past few seasons.

During that top end incident at Spokane International Raceway in Washington a few weeks ago, driver Nathan Sitko was uninjured however the team’s race car operation was damaged beyond reasonable repair.

The team has now announced plans to return with a new car, new look and some enhanced nostalgia by reintroducing their former “Arctic Traveller” team name on a brand new 1967 Ford Mustang-bodied machine.

“We had been discussing the move back to the name for a couple seasons now,” said team tuner Ken Sitko. “But we wanted to wait until the time was right and we had a program together that would do the name justice. That would have been the extent of the announcement, except that recent events have forced our team to field a new car as well. So now our team is looking forward to campaigning a new chassis as well as the new Arctic Traveller Mustang body in the Nitro Funny Car class in the North West United States and Canada.”

At 32 years of age, Nathan Sitko has driven race cars for 3/4 of his life. The NHRA started the Junior Dragster program in 1991 when both Nathan and his brother Troy Sitko started driving their home built version in 1993. They continued in the class for 9 more years on the local race scene in Alberta, Canada. The next step was a big one, as Nathan stepped into a 230 mile per hour Top Alcohol Dragster at 16 years old. Two years later in 2004, the Sitko’s were enticed by The IHRA sanctioning body coming to their home track in Edmonton to field a funny car for the first time in Top Alcohol trim. The team made the jump to Nitro Funny Car in 2010 when Harold Parfett of ACE Manufacturing started the team off with a Plueger chassis and a very cool 1977 Plymouth Arrow body. The team has been running the Arrow with the ACE trademark red and white paint ever since along with a host of local business supporters.

Sitko Racing had been running this ’77 Arrow-bodied car successfully for a number of seasons.

Through the 1980’s Nathan and Troy’s Dad, Ken Sitko drove a Top Alcohol Dragster named the Arctic Traveller. Owned by Brad Ennis, it was a very competitive car, winning the AHRA World Finals in 1983 and 1985, as well as the Coors Nationals in Palmdale, California in 1985, culminating in the World Title that year. Tragically, Brad passed away in 1986, but Ken and his team continued with the Arctic Traveller through 1996 with driver Bryan Davidchuk (1990-1996). Currently, Sitko Family Racing is comprised of Ken Sitko (crew chief), car owners Nathan and Troy Sitko, their wives Irene, Carla, and Shelley Sitko and the rest of our super team: Mike & Ed Grekul, Dave ‘2-Step’ Wilton, David & Paige Hollman, and Eddy Mitton.