TODD FOLEY
TODD Foley stepped it up for Drag Challenge 2016. His stunning VH Commodore used to run a screamin’ aspo Holden motor that pushed the car to a best time of 9.59@140mph and lived through two previous Drag Challenge events. This year though, the 383-cuber was replaced by a ball-tearing alloy 6.2-litre LS3 combo with a Magnuson Heartbeat 2300 supercharger.
Turbo LS set-ups are all the rage at the moment, so why go blown? “Adam Rogash from MPW had the blower at his shop collecting dust; he offered it to me so I thought: ‘Why not?’” Todd said. “Plus turbos add a lot of weight once you add all the manifolds and piping, so I thought this would be the best option.”
He turned out to be right, because straight out of the box on Day One the VH went 8.99@151.7mph. “We did a test pass a week before Drag Challenge and it went 9.30@138mph backing off before the finish line, so there was the expectation that it would go eights, because that’s what we built it for,” Todd said. “But I honestly didn’t think it would happen straight away.”
Driving between tracks, Todd switched from E85 fuel to the more readily available 98-octane juice. Being our quickest competitor without a trailer, Todd couldn’t tow along a tanker full of fuel, so being able to fill up at country servos was a must.
Unfortunately for Todd, Drag Challenge didn’t finish quite the way he would have hoped. On the final day at Calder, he crossed the finish line at around 140mph, and after he lifted off the accelerator, the motor let go and sprayed oil under the car. As we all know, oil and drag slicks don’t mix too well, especially at 140mph. Once it was under the rear wheels, the car made a hard right and spun pretty violently.
“I was going backwards and as it came back around it just collected the passengerside guard,” Todd said. “Even though it was far from an ideal ending, I’m just glad I was still able to hand in a timeslip at the end and actually complete the event.”
As well as winning Quickest Without A Trailer, Todd finished the week in 10th spot overall. “I’m absolutely stoked; I didn’t expect that at all after seeing the calibre of cars and twice as many entrants as last year,” he said.