Arr yes; Sugarbeet County Raceway. That would have been in the days when the National Drag Racing Club lost the track to Roy Phelps and the Santa Pod organisation in 1979. I seem to recall there were 3 two day events there that didn’t really amount to much.
There was the
Eastern Nationals held on 23rd/24th June where the meeting was alleged to have an all time British Drag Racing single-event sponsorship figure of over £3000. The entry list included an eight car Pro Comp field and a Funny Car match race between Dennis Priddle in his John Woolfe Racing Monza and Owen Hayward in his SLD Olding sponsored Houndog 9 according the Trakbytes web site, but it rained for most of the event and before the finals could be completed, followed by the
Sports Nationals held in August (11th/12th). According to the race report featured in the October edition of Drag Racing News, the weather was hot, the entry was low and the crowd was small.
The match race funnies of Owen Haywood and Ronnie Picardo kept the entertainment going with Owen running a 7.02 in the ‘Houndog’ and Ronnie carding a 7.5 from ‘The Force’ Monza. Pro Comp featured 5 cars but it was Picardo who took the final against the ‘Black Magic’ Monza of Graham Hawes; a 7.53 to a 7.82.
Dave Tucker, driving the 'Stripteaser' altered bounced out of shape in front of his competitor Ian Witham in the ’Strip Lightning’ Jag powered altered, up the grass bank and back onto the strip reportedly taking the life of an innocent rabbit who was minding his own business and watching the racing. You can see a full results check on Chris Dosset’s Trakbytes web site by following the link;
http://www.trakbytes.co.uk/SBSN79.html.
A couple of weeks later Sugar Beet staged its third and final drag race, the aptly named
Sugar Beet Nationals on September 8th/9th. To find out who did what, again look at the Trakbytes web site
http://www.trakbytes.co.uk/ and follow the 1975 - 1979 link on the left hand side to see Badger’s write up and links to the events programme covers. But what we would like to see are a few photos from the races to support those in DRN. So, if anyone has any post them here!
