Located on the Murray River, about 4 hours drive from Melbourne is the town of Swan Hill; picturesque vistas with activities and a climate perfect for that family getaway.

All true of course. But I want you to turn your attention to a block of land 10kms west of the town know as Chisholm Reserve. This block of land looks very likely to become the next home of a quarter mile drag strip, with the imminent release of a business case study commissioned by the Swan Hill Rural City Council.

Recently I caught up with Lucas Woodburn, Vice President of the Swan Hill Drag Racing Club (SHDRC) to talk about how the project got started, where it’s at and what the future holds.

Take your mind back to 2001. John Howard was the Prime Minister of Australia, Ansett went into administration and the local version of Big Brother went to air.

More importantly for drag racing fans and competitors, 2001 was the last year an ANDRA championship drag race was held at Calder Park Raceway, the home of drag racing during the golden years of the early to mid 90s.

11 years have gone past and a lot of water has flowed under the Calder Park Bridge since then. With the appointment of Greg Humphries as ANDRA CEO back in July 2011, a reinvigorated effort was made to get ANDRA drag racing back at Calder Park.

The 2012 Winternationals didn't quite start out as planned for Steve Reed and the Reed Racing Team. Truth be told, for a split second Steve thought it was the end of his drag racing career.

How did it get to this? Let’s go back a few years to January 2009.

It was the Night Fire Champs at Willowbank Raceway and as Steve passed the 1000ft mark the engine let go in his Top Alcohol Funny Car. A massive fire ball erupted from under the body, obscuring Steve’s vision as he slid out of control into the braking area.

Steve walked away from the crash with some minor injuries but with some significant damage to his back pocket.

Back in 1991 Ray Box had no idea that a one-off meeting for the VW Drivers Club of Queensland would turn into Australia’s most popular and prestigious hi-tech drag racing event – the Sport Compact Group’s Jamboree.

Sick of being hassled by the V8 brigade, Ray, Mark Stanbury, Dave Butler and a couple of other guys approached Dennis Syrmis of Willowbank Raceway to get their own event up and running.

With the green light to go ahead, they contacted all the local 4 cylinder and rotary clubs to make up the numbers and cover the costs.

In 1999 Portland drag racers would spend their Saturdays hanging a few skids down at the local airport. All legit of course, organised by the Portland drag racing community under the watchful eye of the airport authorities.

Like most temporary facilities however, when traffic at the airport increased it meant that the drag racers would need to find a new purpose built home.

So about 15 to 20 of the local drag racers got together and decided to look for an alternative place to race. Step 1 was to register a new club and a few months later the South Coast Drag Racing Association was born.

Question: When was Nitro Funny Car last run as an ANDRA championship bracket?

Answer: 1998 - a one-off event in Perth won by Lloyd Jones.

It seems strange that one of the most spectacular crowd pleasers in drag racing has been on the outer for 14 years.

Don't quote me on this but at the time I recall Nitro Funny Car was struggling with competitor numbers and their on track performance sometimes criticised. The closure of Eastern Creek (1997) and Calder Park Raceway (2001) to ANDRA championship drag racing certainly didn't help the cause either.