A Bloody Paraplegic's Story.

 
   

A Bloody Paraplegic
My first car & Drag Racing (2)

Home
 

 

From memory The Drag Racing thing goes way back before the formation of the 1320 Drag Club of which I was the first president.

June 2011: I need to put some dates together to work out when I actually started to get involved with Drag Racing and when we actually started organised Drag Racing as the 1320 DRAG CLUB and where we went. I am also unsure of what order to put the before and after photo's of my FX/FJ/EH Custom hybrid. Stephanie may be able to help here but I don't think that she is talking to me at the moment.

At one stage I started going out with my first true love Stephanie Carter (apart from my puppy love Jan) and she took over the driving of my car while I was on the microphone at the various meets.

We actually met on a blind date which was organised by Pat Harkins who I worked with at Walsh's Menswear. Don Stein, one of the founding 1320 Drag Club members, was with me that night and I am sure he couldn't believe his luck when Stephanie got into the front seat with me. Neither could I as I thought that she was drop dead gorgeous and was certainly very warm and cuddly.

Twin headlights, Vanguard grille, bonnet filled in, single piece windscreen, EH tail lights, Falcon steering wheel, lowered, wide wheels, undercoat grey.
We drove them on the street like that back in the old days.

Steph didn't actually twig that I was a paraplegic that night and it was only later when we met up for lunch that she found out when she saw me in the fuckn' wheelchair.

   

Above: 1968.

 

We had a great time over the following years and I was very happy (or as happy as I dare let myself be) but in the end Stephanie was starting to get a little restless and wanted to go out with other guys, which perhaps wasn't really surprising given the circumstances. I should have taken the hint and ran but I stuck around for a bit until I got a huge belt in the nuts one day when she said that she wanted to have a talk. She told me that she was going to get married!

She is still married to the same the guy. It shattered me back then and if I am to be truthful I am not sure if I ever really got over it. It would perhaps explain why I tend to push people away as I am often accused of doing.

Stephanie got in touch with me a while back to see how I was going and pretty much left it up to me to get back to her. I would like to but not just now.

I finally rang her in March 2011 to say hi and after a little chat she said that she would call back but hasn't done so as yet. :-)













continued My First Car and Drag Racing 3

The caption with the above photo said. First girl driver to debut at Fairbridge was Stephanie Carter who helmed boyfriend John Dwyer's custom FX to a solid 16.30 during meet. (Remember this was on gravel)

Me in the drivers seat.






Photo's above were taken at  different Drag strips. I have a feeling one of the cars was the rebuilt one but I am not sure which one.

The following photos were taken at the old Caversham airstrip. After WW 11 it was turned into a car racing circuit and we would use the straight as a Drag Strip.

It's big advantage over the other strips that we were using is that it was all bitumen while the others were gravel.



We would drive our street cars there, pull the mufflers off and away we would go.
A Bloody Paraplegic John Dwyer