Sixty year old Ian Ham knows a thing or two about drag racing – the father of Top Alcohol competitor Steven Ham, he has been around drag racing for decades and finally stepped into the drivers' seat himself 10 years ago when he bought himself a Sean Mullins built Modified dragster for his fiftieth birthday.

This weekend, the Beaudesert resident will head to his home-track of Warwick Dragway with that same racing machine to compete in round three of the 2012 JP Racing Eighth Mile Drag Racing Series, expected to host more than 100 competitors.

Ben Patterson (Photo courtesy Fred Dwyer)It’s early evening in Munford Tennessee when Ben Patterson pops into view on my computer. Like most days in the workshop, Ben and the crew have been hard at work preparing the Clay Millican driven MPE Motorsports Top Fuel Dragster.

The workshop is particularly frantic as they prepare for the upcoming NHRA Western Swing; three gruelling events in a row starting with the Mile High Nationals in Denver, followed by the Sonoma Nationals and finishing up in Seattle at Pacific Raceways.

This isn’t new territory for Ben however. For the last few years he’s been making the pilgrimage to the US of A to train under the highly credentialed tuner Lance Larsen, along with guidance from crew chiefs Justin Crosslin and Mike Domagala.

Drayton's Nathan Jannusch is looking to achieve a trio of 'three from three' results when he heads to his home-track of Warwick Dragway next weekend for round three of the JP Racing Queensland Eighth Mile Drag Racing Series.

JP Eighth Mile Racing Series rounds feature a 'round-robin' format which sees each racer able to compete in three races per event (plus qualifying). When Jannusch competed at his home-track for the 2010 and 2011 series outings, he was able to net victory in all three rounds of racing each time.

John Zappia (Photo courtesy www.highrpm.com.au) The inaugural Hidden Valley round of the national Slamfest Series has already broken records and it's still over a week away.

10 Top Doorslammer teams have registered for the drag racing event, eclipsing the previous largest contingent seen in May 2011.

Hidden Valley Drag Racing Association, with support from the Territory Government, has been finalising touches for the big weekend.

"We are very pleased to be able to secure another national motorsport event for the Territory" said HVDRA President Jay Jukes.

"Drag racing is going from strength to strength in the NT and the calibre of the teams who have registered for this inaugural event shows the potential for Hidden Valley Drag Strip into the future."

Peter Kapiris - Hidden Valley Slamfest (Photo courtesy www.highrpm.com.au)The first night of Slamfest 2012 at Hidden Valley Drag Strip saw another 5 second pass added to the books with Peter Kapiris top qualifying in the Top Doorslammer field with a 5.945 second run at 245mph to set the highest MPH and quickest elapsed time of the event so far.

With the Slamfest Series traditionally run over the eighth mile the teams were also keeping a close eye on the times to the shorter distance. Kapiris ran 3.939 seconds at 195.31mph over the shorter distance, bettering the previous Slamfest records from Benaraby of 3.981 and 194.81mph respectively.  Kapiris is now only the third Doorslammer driver in Australia to run a sub 4 second pass to the eighth mile.

West Australian John Zappia also backed up his previous record setting attempts from 2011 with a 5.981 at 236mph (3.950 at 190mph to the eighth mile).

Darcy Muller Junior Dragster (Photo courtesy www.highrpm.com.au)While the interstate transporters of Australia's best Top Doorslammer teams prepare to roll towards Darwin several local families are also busy planning for Hidden Valley's biggest drag racing event this year.

The husband and wife team of Wayne and Karen Harris are set to hit the track on the 17-18th August in the Super Sedan and Super Street categories. Based on old school muscle Wayne is set to campaign a 1972 Holden powered by a 400 cubic inch V8 that is capable of low 10 second passes in the Super Street category.

After seeing the fun Wayne has had in both his current Holden and his plethora of sedans and dragsters, wife Karen has also decided to give the sport of drag racing a try and is set to debut a 502ci 1974 Holden in Super Street. Having not run the car before, she is playing coy on the cars potential.

Local pre event press had suggested that this would be the best ever event for the Benaraby Raceway and the 32 year old track lived up to expectations. With spectator cars lined up for almost half a kilometre to get into the venue, event organisers called for the Doorslammer to delay the start of qualifying.

When qualifying wrapped up at 2pm the National MPH record fell into the hands of Peter Kapiris @ 194.81. Attendance figures were the next to be rewritten with final figure expected to be in excess of five thousand.

In the semi-final Victor Bray became the 2nd driver in Australia to record a 3 sec 8th mile pass with a 3.988 @ 190.68 to defeat Ben Bray 4.200 @ 185.19.

Fiona Reed (Photo courtesy www.dragphotos.com.au)When you think about drag racing and drag racers you tend to picture blokes, blowers and big burnouts.

However, when the smoke clears, sitting behind the wheel you'll sometimes find a woman who's putting a lot of these blokes on the trailer.

One of the great things about drag racing is it doesn't discriminate. If you can cut a light and run the number then you're in with a chance to go rounds. It doesn't matter how old you are, if you've eaten a few too many pies, or in this instance if you're of the fairer sex – drag racing just doesn't care.