Doug Hegge Mission pre race

Doug Hegge Mission pre race

This weekend marks the first Top Alcohol Dragster event for Vancouver Washington driver Doug Hegge in his home division.

A long time sportsman racer in the Super classes as well as a top performer in Top Comp, Doug Hegge stepped up his program and now fields an A/Fuel Dragster. In his case, it is not the huge step that many experience, as his Top Comp Dragster was one of the quickest in the country. He raced a 740-inch Buck racing engine with four nitrous systems on it and it ran in the 6.30’s and 40’s on a regular basis. His new ride actually his old car with a number of additions and modifications, and yes there is a big difference from 6.30’s to the 5.30 range or better, but the team is taking small steps to get to that point and for the race at Mission this weekend, they are hoping to work on a tune-up that will work in the rarefied sea level air the 24 foot elevated track in Mission British Columbia is famous for.

The team has tested extensively already this season and a few times last year and competed at the Las Vegas national event at the start of the year, just missing the field in the #18 spot.

As stated earlier, this weekend marks the first time the teams A/Fueler has had a chance to run in sea level conditions and they are very excited to see if they can use the knowledge gained so far in their brief foray in Top Alcohol. Doug a computer tech by day, has utilized some of the best brains in the Top Alcohol world, including World Champion Bill Riechert who supplies the power plants and base line tune-up as well as Spitzer Race cars to help modify the dragster for A/Fuel racing. The teams best so far is a low 5.70 but the best speed of 268 mph indicates they are well on their way to running sub 5.50 passes.

Day one at Mission produced another one of those learning curves for a young team. The car did a strong burnout, but right at the launch, the crank trigger for one of the mags broke leaving the car with only one magneto to fire the nitromethane. It completely killed four cylinders and Doug laboured down track to a low seven second time slip a@ 211 mph.
They got the trigger replaced and are ready for round two Saturday afternoon.

Doug would like to that his sponsors for their support to get to this point and they include Radford Trucking, Total Impact wear, Certeon, Snap-on Tools and Spitzer Composites. His very capable crew includes David Walter who works the right side of the motor and the fuel system, Ralph Fox works the left side, Casey McGowan is the clutch guy, Kimberly Guidici is the bottom end expert, Jim Hegge is the go-to guy and Molly Fox works every other detail on the car and for the team.