Max takes night one

Old timer and multipule championship/WSS winner Max Dumsney sprints to the win in what 'read' to be a great feature race on night one of the 2011 Australian Championship. Max know every inch of the Premier track and found the turn four patch of bite needed to pass former champion Garry Brazier. Take this link to the Premier Speedway website for an excellent report on night ones racing.

Just a reminder..

For my loyal readers.. If you click on any of my blog images, the image will magically expand to a big one before your very eyes. Give it a try.

Riding with The King

G'day..

Will 2011 be the year Marcos Ambrose gets his first win against the big guns of Nascar in the Sprint Cup Series?? This year our Marcos has moved camp, has a new Ford charriot and will be racing for King Richard Petty's race team. In Marcos' words he says.. "We need to win, no doubt about it. We expect to win." Them's fightin' words. Marcos has shown us how the good old boys have a hard time of it when required to turn right and has had several wins on the road courses but there is a lot to learn about driving the ovals. Marcos has had a few seasons experience now and maybe he will serve up some good results for the King this season. I'll be watching.

The 39th running of the Grand Annual Classic..

Steven Lines (#7) emerged from the pack

to take the victory (pic: Ash Budd)

..and I missed it. There was a time when it also was on my calendar but since they stopped the casual campers from pitching the tent in the speedways car park we haven't made it down to what was (and still is) the biggest sprintcar event in Victoria. Premier Speedway is about a five hour drive from my place at a sleepy little town on the south coast, Warrnambool. The race attracts drivers from all over Australia including any of the left-over Yanks before they return home to the US. This year Warrnambool is even more bustling as the Australian nation title race is held the following week at Premier. That's two weekends of racing. With 62 cars entered for the Classic and take that to 94 nominations for the title getting a bed in Warrnambool at this holiday spot at this time of the year is impossible. I must say the times that we have gone down has been fantastic, the parade of rigs down the main street on Saturday morning and on the Sunday mornings a drive around town showed us just how 'speedway' the town becomes at this time of the year. Every motel has sprintcars getting a hose down after Saturday's racing and all the petrol stations would have a couple of cars parked on their driveway's with a teams of crew in lolly-pop coloured Tees at it spannering away. A great atmosphere.
The 2011 Classic has been won this year by South Australian driver Steven Lines. We saw this guy at Avalon a few weeks back and man.. he's faaaast. You can read the full race report here. So who will win the title. I think young James McFadden will have a race on his hands to keep that #1 on his car this year. This is a track for the brave and experienced. We shall see in a few days time.

Mini electric guitars

Squier MINI

A friend was asking me if Fender had susch a thing as a 3/4 sized Strat. Well, infact they do in their budget Squier brand.. the Squier MINI. This is the perfect instrument for a g-kid. Forget the kids-sized acoustic guitar, this and a baby Fender amp is the go. If it dosen't work out and the little bloke decides to go down the clarinet road then Pops can take the MINI and the baby amp back, add one of these nut hookies and have one heck of a blues lap steel rig.

Extention nut

Check out this thread on the Strat-Talk forum for some big kids thoughts on the MINI.

Oh no, not Google ad's ??

Yes, I see that. Actually it's my doing. Google promise me that it will only take a few days and they will be serving up electric guitar and racing car related adverts. It will be quite interesting to see just who it is I'll be advertising. Be sure to click through the links as it's all dollars (well, possibly cents) and it could mean a set of strings for next Christmas.

Kevin Swindell wins the 2011 Chili Bowl

For any miget racing fan, oops! speedcar fan, the annual Chili Bowl race in Tulsa Oklahoma would have to be the on the top of the destinations for the January Holidays. Well you could go to Sydney for the 50g's to win sprintcar show and watch Donny Shatz win it for the tenth time but that's another story. For now we're at Tulsa for the greatest midget show on earth. With an entry list of over 250 cars for the five night spectacular at this tempory indoor 1/4 mile dirt track, I know it's near the top of my lotto list of things to do before I die.
It took 25 years for a back-to-back winner to happen at the Lucas Oil Chili Bowl Nationals and it was only fitting that it was a Swindell to do it on the event’s Silver Anniversary. Kevin held off a late charge from his father and five-time Chili Bowl champ, Sammy, on the final lap to take the victory in the 50-lap main event. Caps off to New Zealander Michael Pickens to pedal home for third place. Check out the size of this showgrounds pavilion, ear protection would have to be a must. Check it out.. http://www.chilibowl.com

In comes the dirt.

Sterling by Music Man

After a few weeks of tracking I finally located a Silo30 (by Music Man). This is the 'off shore' version of their Silhouette. I love these guitars and presently have the first incarnation of the Silo30 when it was under the OLP brand as an MM4, the red one in the insert. The MM4 is a little beauty and it has been my go-to instrument these past few years. For a 400 dollar instrument nothing comes near it for around that price. The Sterling Silo30 was produced by Music Man as a limited run in 2010 and only available in black/maple or white/rosewood. There were only two that came to Victoria so I picked the closest to check out. This is not supposed to be a guitar review but I do have to say the (white) Silo30 was immaculate in it's glowing high gloss pure white with its white pearl pickguard, white H/S/S pickups and chrome hardware. At 1200 big ones (retail) it is at the top of the price range for a Chinese made three pickup style instrument and is up against a Mexi Strat with the F name on the head. The Silo30 is a players guitar and would be a keeper so if you're a buyer looking for a great instrument and don't want to put it on the 'Bay after your first broken string then.. if you can find one, grab it. Unfortunately I didn't and for one reason alone, the ultra slim neck. It would be 'fast' if you're into fast, shredding I think it's known as these days. For me, the original slowhand, I prefer the baseball bat, big C shape neck. While I may eventually get use to 'slim', I think I am too-far-gone to try and will continue to enjoy my MM4. Check out the Music Man forum for the praise the Silo30 gets and take a look at the Sterling Guitars website and their other models.  

World Series Sprintcars - Rnd 8, Avalon Raceway.

David Murcott

I got my annual sprintcar fix for the 10/11 season and it was a great night of racing at Avalon Raceway 'The Place For Pace' for Rnd 8 of the World Series Sprintcars. James McFadden (A1) the current Aussie Champion was on the track early for his time trial and set a good time of 12.330 which put him third fastest and pretty much landed him a guaranteed start in the A Main. I was impressed for a first timer however his time was to place him at the rear of his heats where he stayed for both. With the track being probably the best I have seen it, there was bite from hotlaps to the A Main and the whole 49 car field where flying from the get go. The half time grader races are a thing of the past these days and the sprinters race on what they have and in the case of R8 the track held together. The top 8 point scorers from the combined heats and time trials were towed out for the shootout to determing the top 8 starting positions. This is a new thing for this season and IMO pretty dumb. Its basically another time trial where the bottom four space themselves around the track and at the green go for two laps with the slowest two cars taking up position 7 and 8. The next two join the two still on track determining P 5/6 and so on. The C Main were then pushed off but had rollovers on two attempts at a start and the race was abandoned. The B Main was run with the top six finishers taking their positions on the back of the A. What a race.  David Murcott took the dollars with great pressure provide by Brooke Tatnell in second and Steve Lines in third. And if you're wondering how McFadden went he bought it home in 11th, a lap down.

You can check out how the race unfolded on World Series Sprintcars.