AARON JAMES

THERE’S something of a sad story behind Its Aaron James’s 1970 Valiant Regal. some previous owner Jeffro Clarke was given rust, really-not-very-good news about some to which meant it was probably a good idea sell the car before the rust spread and became it as a too much of a problem. So Jeffro sold the roller to family friend Aaron. But it wasn’t Jeffro car that had the rust problem, it was himself, which explains why the big, beautiful Val now has an ‘RIP JEFFRO’ ribbon hanging from the rear-view mirror.

440cube Aaron and his dad Alan dropped in a a big-block. “That process took about we year,” Wa-based Aaron explained. “Then cruised it like that for eight or nine years.” of Under its then-fresh paint, the remainder swap the car was tidy, so with the big-block the Val was a terrific pub cruiser and regular at drag race events in West Aussie. pair Five months ago the father-and-son decided they would enter Drag Challenge 2019 and piece together a new engine combo for more go. out Alan built it using a block they’d bought bush. “It was sitting in the boot of a Dodge that in Phoenix,” he said of the lump of iron left hindsight he reckoned should have been for there. “I had it soaking in a tank of diesel to the weeks, just to get it apart! It was rusted out of shithouse. I had to hammer everything it, even the lifters.”

It was pieced back together with a stroker 528ci. crank to bring the cube count to a Above the head gaskets is plenty of alloy: Texas big isolated runner intake hosting two and a Race Engines modified Holley 950s fellow pair of heads ported by good mate and Mopar man Geoff Ryan. Behind the 630rwhp a 727 engine is a 5000rpm TCE converter and

Torqueflite trans. So despite the headaches fresh he suffered with the early stages of the driveline build, Al concedes that the obviously and well-used block has become a solid Drag reliable foundation for the James family’s Challenge contender.

And a contender it was. With three in the generations of Jameses cruising in style along big Val – Aaron, dad Al and pop Doug, them with good mate Geoff – Day One saw in post a new PB of 9.87, which put them second spot in the Tuff Mounts 235 Aspirated class behind Nathan Ghosn’s Capri. From there, Donnie Zurcas in his Capri leapfrogged Aaron and clung on to second place right up until the final day at Calder, past when Aaron was able to just scrape claim Donnie with a 9.92@135mph pass to

– not 235 Aspirated runner-up bragging rights to mention a trophy for Quickest Mopar!