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At Perth’s 42nd annual Western Nationals it was Peter Kapiris extending his Top Doorslammer Championship leading gap driving his outrageous supercharged ’57 Plymouth Saratoga Fury.

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Kapiris used a 5.868 second time, the quickest of the event, to defeat Victor Bray who was appearing in his second straight final. Bray had to abort his run early after tyre shake.

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En route to the final Kapiris defeated number one qualifier Maurice Fabietti and then hotshot local Daniel Gregorini.

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Kapiris blamed his own driving for the shoddy qualifying effort on the first day of the Westernationals, where he barely scraped into eighth spot in the eliminations field.

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“I just want to thank everyone, I’m a bit lost for words today,” Kapiris said. “Yesterday my driving was just shocking yesterday. (Crew chief) Mark Brew and my crew sat me down and told me that if I drove the car well, they would work to win us the meeting and they did.”

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For Bray it was a consolidation of what has been a season where he has returned to form. He defeated Russell Pavey and long time foe John Zappia in the early rounds before going down to Kapiris.

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“The car has been running good again and we’re getting her down the race track,” Victor said. “This is as much fun as I remember it being.

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“The air conditions threw us a bit of a curve ball but those who went fast did and those who didn’t, didn’t.”

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Meanwhile in Pro Stock, Wayne Daley backed up his top qualifying performance by going to a win over Chris Soldatos in a 7.11 to 7.16 final.

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It was Daley’s second consecutive victory, following on from his Australian Nationals title in November. He defeated Kirsten Cannuli and Tyronne Tremayne on his way to the final round.

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The win propelled Daley into the points lead for the Pro Stock championship.

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“To get a second event in a row is totally unexpected, after qualifying number one it was expected of us to have a win,” he said.  “(Crew chief) Michal Marriott did an extra good job on the calls with the car throughout the day.”

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Soldatos’ run to the final saw him defeat Shane Tucker, John Galea and a controversial semi final against Jason Grima where the race was re-run following a protest concerning staging procedures.

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The next round of both Top Doorslammer and Pro Stock will be at the Nitro Champs at Sydney Dragway in May.

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The Aeroflow Sportsman Drag Racing Championship saw ten new national records set as racers put it all on the line at Western Australia’s only event where records can be claimed.

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Winners included Ryan Moresby (Competition), Brett Glover (Super Stock), Ross Smith (Competition Bike), Don Freind (Supercharged Outlaws), Craig Baker (Modified), Mike Craig (Super Sedan), Justin Townson (Modified Bike), Tyron Begg (Super Street) and Brayden Naylor (Junior Dragster).

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Wayne Newby confronted the scene of a dramatic crash in April 2012 to come back and win in Top Alcohol at the Aeroflow Summer Speedfest (Feb. 24th).  It was just 10 months ago that Newby was left with a written off race car following a 200 kmh impact with the safety barriers, but this time he left with the ANDRA trophy and the first win since shifting into his new JBS Tools funny car.

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When his car began to spin the tyres in the final, Newby says he had a flashback to his crash.

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“It was playing on my mind, especially in the final there when it started spinning the tyres again,” he said. “I was nearly to the point where I was going to get off the throttle but you can feel the funny car moving around better than the dragster.

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“We’ve only done four races in it (the new car) so to get its first win is pretty good. There’s still a long way to go but we are starting to get there.”

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Newby defeating Gary Phillips in the final in a 5.10 to 5.81 race, with Phillips aborting his run early after having to get on and off throttle to find traction.

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Phillips did leave Adelaide with his points lead still in tact.

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In Top Bike Chris Matheson returned to form, winning his second event in a row in Adelaide with a 5.42 run in the final defeating points leader Chris Porter’s 6.44.

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Porter had to shut off early when he got close to the centre line and Matheson was about to stride away.

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“We’re chasing Chris (Porter) in the points and catching up fast,” Matheson said. “It has been a good weekend to get through on a challenging, hot track.

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“We’ll have to keep it up so we can catch the other guys and keep pushing on through the season. We got all the points we could this weekend and we still need to get some more.”

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Maurice Allen took his new Milwaukee Tools Suzuki to the winner’s circle for the first time, with a massive holeshot win, defeating Luke Crowley’s 7.34 with a 7.55.

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“The bike is responding well and we are rapt, we just had to get our heads around working with this temperature this weekend,” he said. “Even though we started the weekend off slow we knew we had a strong motor and we were just a bit out on the set up.

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“We had a tough draw running Scott White in the first round, Locky Ireland in the second round and Luke Crowley in the final. We had to grind it out.”

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Allen said the holeshot win was reward for improving his own reaction times. He knew the pain, losing in the first round of the Australian Nationals on a holeshot in November.

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“It’s a great feeling as a rider and my goal for this weekend was to get the reaction times right,” he said.

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The Aeroflow Sportsman Drag Racing Championship saw over 170 racers duking it out for national points with winners including Craig Geddes in Competition, Mario Barbon in Super Stock, Paul Harrison in Competition Bike, Luke Marsden in Supercharged Outlaws, Kenny Stewart in Modified, Steve Fowler in Super Sedan, David Argent in Modified Bike, Joe Jurkovic in Super Street, Brodie Tedesco in Junior Dragster and Kym Oberauer in Super Gas.

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