Nitro Nostalgia NUMB-er!
By: Bruce Biegler
While it was perhaps lost within all the hoopla surrounding the chase for NHRA Full Throttle Championship glory, during the recent AAA Auto Club Finals event held in California, Edmonton’s Tim Boychuk delivered one of the biggest moments of the season in drag racing….
Driving his Troy Lee Designs nitro-burning Pontiac Firebird Funny Car, a car which Tim co-owns with long time Canadian Motorsports proponent Ron Hodgson, and during a special exhibition run, Boychuk fired a huge performance shot that was heard worldwide within mega popular Nostalgia Drag Racing circuits. Tim recorded an unheard of 5.631 secs at 258.12 mph — by far the quickest run in Nostalgia Funny Car racing history — and reportedly the third quickest run ever in Nostalgia drag racing, including the traditionally quicker Top Fuel category.
Tim Boychuk
Also reportedly, the 258.12 mph is 2nd only to a 258.79 mph recording by Lee Jennings for the all time fastest Nostalgia Funny Car speed.
For Boychuk and his talented group which also includes co-crew chiefs, Roland Leong and Bob Papirnick, the run was a very appropriate nightcap to a simply spectacular 2010 racing season which saw the team win multiple events and obliterate track records at almost every stop.
“We have had a fantastic year and we won our share of races,” affirmed co-crew Chief Bob Papirnick, (who is originally from Edmonton but now lives in Vancouver). “To top off our season by running the quickest ET ever in the class is obviously pretty special.”
Prior to the super quick and fast Pomona run the team had a best run of 5.706 secs at 253.66 mph to its credit. That was recorded while winning at the NHRA National Open event at Mission BC back in June.
“We all work so hard at this so when the car improves it’s usually really not that big of a surprise,” Bob added. “But to be honest when the “63” came up on the board — I had to do a double take. It was a bit of a shock in the sense that it was such a large increment. NHRA does a fabulous job on track preparation for their national caliber cars and we were able to take advantage of that. We stepped on it – and it worked!”
5.631 secs and 258.12 mph at Pomona!
A closer look at the time slip revealed that the car had run 4.70 secs to the 1000 foot mark. Rather remarkably that would have qualified them 12th for the marquee NHRA Fuel Funny Car program after Friday’s 2nd session (!)
The team’s outstanding performance at Pomona was preceded by numerous season highlights including huge wins at Mission, Las Vegas, Edmonton and Boise earlier in the season. In total they won six times prior to coming to Pomona and were credited too with a new IHRA national speed and ET record, and a new Canadian national ET and speed record.
For more information and history on this talented Canadian race team visit their website at: www.boychukracing.com
Ron Hodgson & Tim Boychuk
Canadian co-crew chief Bob Papirnick
(Bruce Biegler Photos)
