QUICK AS A FOX!

MAKING AN AMERICAN ICON EVEN BETTER WITH SOME HOMEGROWN AUSSIE HORSEPOWER

- ANDREW BROADLEY

IF YOU don't mind our saying so, Street Machine Drag Challenge has been a runaway success since its inception in 2014. Everyone who tries it loves it, and that extends to our valued sponsors, most of whom have been supporting the event for a good many years.

One such sponsor is Tuff Mounts - purveyors of fine, Aussie-made engine mounting hardware and while proprietor Jason Waye has been a keen backer of Drag Challenge since 2016, he has never been content to sit on the sidelines.

"I love Drag Challenge because it's relatively fresh here in Australia, and it provides a platform to prove that our products really work," Jason says. "It helps competitors understand what we're about, and there's a great sense of camaraderie that only comes from getting away from work to do stuff we all enjoy. It's a week of awesomeness; driving, fixing and racing cars and helping out others along the way."

After piecing together a 10-second Barra-powered VS Commodore ute for the event some years back (SM, Sep & Nov '17), Jason became aware that Barra Fever was sweeping the United States of America, and reasoned that there would be significant demand for a Barra conversion kit to suit what is arguably America's most popular drag racing platform, the Foxbody Mustang.

With that in mind, he managed to source a grandma spec, 2.3-litre four-pot-powered '89 Muzzy from Warrnambool, Victoria, and used it to engineer a comprehensive Barra-into-Fox-body kit. He then figured that a turbo Barra-powered Fox might make for a fairly handy small-tyre tearer in the aptly named Tuff Mounts 235 Blown class at Drag Challenge.