MANDURAH (WA)
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1960's - RAVENSWOOD RACEWAY
Ravenswood Raceway opened in 1969, The main man behind the building of the Drag strip was Keith Tyler, Keith was the promoter and the track commentator.
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1969 - ROLLER COASTER FUNNY CAR
This 325 cubic inch Dodge - powered Roller Coaster was owned by the Barry D Gray Drag team from Wongan Hills and was driven by Neil Wilson.
This is a funny car in all the best American traditions utilizing a great deal of imported American gear and boasting in excess of 500 horsepower.
Running in the altered class, the Simca bodied fuel injected power pack will be one of the few cars in the state required to carry a parachute.
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1969 - RAVENSWOOD RACEWAY PROGRAMME
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1970 - RAVENSWOOD RACEWAY CALENDER
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Lost Perth facebook feature
1970's - Street Rod action at Ravenswood. Photo: Paul Hoskins.
1970's - Joe Oliver in the Falcon up against the unknown driver in the Monaro. Photo: Paul Hoskins.
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1970 - WESTERN WHEELS MAGAZINE REPORTED
June 1970
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Geoff Pilgrim's Blown Chrysler 48 series Holden ute that everyone is talking about. Photo: Ron Chell jr collection.
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1970 - WESTERN WHEELS MAGAZINE REPORTED
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1970 - RAVENSWOOD RACEWAY SLIDESHOW
(use controls to pause - forward or reverse 18 images)
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1970 - STREET & STRIP SLIDESHOW
(use controls to pause - forward or reverse 3 images)
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1970 THE BARON (Dragstar)
The Baron was a very fast Chrysler 318 front engined dragstar owned and raced by Dave Gale from the Calder Strip area.
The car was purchased and shipped to West Australia by West Coast Speed Equipment owner Joe Scioro who's shop was in Fremantle.
Orginising a large part of the buying and shipping was a young West Aussie racer who was based in the Calder area and doing his bit for the armed forces, that racer was Des Alfirevich.
1970 - DES ALFIREVICH
By 1970 Des had already made his mark on the West Australian motorsport scene, already well known for his speedway racing at Forrestfield and Claremont as well as taking out the Inaugural State Drag Racing Championship at Bunbury in 1968.
While serving part of his national service duties in the Calder area, Des played a roll in Fremantle's Joe Scioro buying and shipping the rail to WA, as Des was not available to race the car all the time, only when he was on leave, the driving duties were handed to Bob Saint Laurence.
Opon Des completing his tour of duty he returned to the West and took over the full time drive of the Baron.
Disaster would strike as time passed and Des would be very lucky to avoid serious injuries after a finish line crash wrote the rail off.
Des Alfirevich makes another winning pass down the Ravenswood strip Photo: Street & Strip
Bob Saint Lawence gets ready for a pass down the Ravenswood strip
Des Alfirevich recalls: about the time that rules on parachutes were becoming quite demanding with drag cars that ran under a specific time, the problem was not a great deal was known about the fitment of these chutes, our problem worked out to be by fitting the chutes to low (I think it was) when released and inflated it lifted the rear of the rail of the ground and steered me off the strip through some lighting and barriers and ripped the car to pieces.
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1970 - AUSTRALIAN HOT ROD REPORTED
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1970's - RAVENSWOOD RACEWAY SLIDESHOW
(use controls to pause - forward or reverse 3 images)
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1970's - KING BOOGALOO MADNESS ON 2 WHEELS
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(Editorial Ray Read research Ingrid Webber)Photo's Keith Tyler collection |
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1970's - KING BOOGALOO CARTOON
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1971 - AUSTRALIAN HOT ROD REPORTED
WA DIVISIONALS
Australian records to Westerners
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1972 - Rob Birch in the Carbon Automatics Plymouth won with a 13.13 at 113.71 mph. Photo: Kim Lewin.
1972 - Ross Hood was a contender for top Eliminator until sidelined. Photo: Kim Lewin.
1972 - Bill McCrudden Blown C/GAS suffered from a broken blower drive. Photo: Kim Lewin.
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1972 - BOB SHARPE BIKESPrior to Cowboy Bob Sharpe becoming twice Australian Solo Champion, he drag raced a Supercharged twin engine Triumph bike.
In fact on the 24th of October 1972 Bob became the 1st rider in Australia to get into single figures for the standing Quarter mile, also the first to do over 150mph, both happened at Ravenswood, 9.93 was the fastest run and 153.87 was the highest speed. (different runs)
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1975 - RAVENSWOOD RACEWAY
(use controls to pause - forward or reverse 5 images)
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1975 - RAVENSWOOD RACEWAY PROGRAMME
(use controls to pause - forward or reverse 42 images)
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1983 - THE BEGINNING OF THE FUTURE
Ravenswood had a reputation in the early eighty's as a venue with hard and fast racing with masive spectator problems, Vast amounts of alchol being consumed by trouble makers and not family friendly,That all turned around in 1983 when the venue was purchased by Gary Miocevich, Kevin Prendergast and brothers Rosco and Peter Collins.
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1983 - RAVENSWOOD RACEWAY PROGRAMME SLIDESHOW
(use controls to pause -forward or reverse 1 image)
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1990 - NATIONALS
1990 saw the running of the Drag Race Nationals.
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1991 - NU BREED STREET ROD DRAGS
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1993 - RAVENSWOOD RACEWAY PROGRAMME SLIDESHOW
(use controls to pause - forward or reverse 1 image)
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1994 - RAVENSWOOD RACEWAY PROGRAMME SLIDESHOW
(use controls to pause - forward or reverse 1 image)
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1999 - RAVENSWOOD RACEWAY CLOSES
Ravenswood closed in 1999 and Drag Racing relocated to the Kwinnana Motorplex were it co exsists with the Speedway, Dragstar driver Rachelle set the fastest time ever on the strip at the last meeting with a 5.15 second pass, the speed records were set at 295 mph by Ancel Horton in a jet dragstar and Lloyd Jones set a speed of 283 mph which made him the fastest wheel driven car down the strip.
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2011 - RAVENSWOOD RACEWAY WALKABOUT
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2010 - RAVENSWOOD RACEWAY LOCATION
