SPARTA, ON – There’s a long list of amazing vehicles headed to St. Thomas Dragway this weekend (June 20-22) for the inaugural Family Fun Weekend put on by Drew and Vicki Buchner, the duo behind the popular 660 Sportsman Nationals events.
One of the neatest will be the debut of the ‘new’ Wheeler Dealer Nostalgia Funny Car, driven by Canadian Drag Racing Hall of Fame inductee Paul Noakes in partnership with his father, Brian.
When Brian Noakes raced in the ‘60s and ‘70s, his car was dubbed Wheeler Dealer. This weekend will mark the first time that Paul has raced a car carrying that sentimental name.
“My dad is 83 and I’m excited about getting back together and racing with him,” said Paul Noakes, talking about this weekend’s Wheeler Dealer debut. “He still owns his original Funny Car – a 1972 Challenger. He’d been pushing me for about a year to fix his car up, but that would have taken years. So, when this car came available, we jumped at the opportunity to have something we can race right now.”
The car is a Gordie’s Race Car chassis, which will be the third Gordie’s car that Paul Noakes has owned during his long and successful career. It’s a 1966 Chevy II / Nova Nostalgia Funny Car.
“It’s just a brilliant looking nostalgia car,” continued Noakes. It’s got a 540 cubic inch big block Chevy with a 14-71 High Helix Littlefield Supercharger. It has a 3-speed Lencodrive transmission, with a 9.5” Ford rearend, made by Mark Williams. And the car even has carbon fibre brakes. It’s all updated and it’s a great car. It came from western Canada and was raced, mostly in Edmonton, by Ron Stennes.”
In addition to spending time racing with his father, again, Noakes is also looking forward to be back working with members of his old team. They’re also excited to debut the latest incarnation of the Wheeler Dealer in their own ‘backyard’ at St. Thomas Dragway.
“My old crew chief Tim Rice is back with us, and we have a limited crew and we only plan on ‘match racing’ the car locally with some select outings from Michigan to New York. It will be more relaxed than when we were going hard with my Top Alcohol stuff. We’re just excited to be having fun and hanging out together again. It’s all about being able to spend more time with my dad, crew and my daughter, Brooklyn. She’ll be the one racing this car, sooner or later.
“It would be great to eventually sell her ‘long dragster,’ and we’ll have two of these Nostalgia Funny Cars and we can race against each other in match races.”
Looking at the performance capabilities of Wheeler Dealer, Noakes predicts that it will run in the mid to high 6-second range. It raced out west in a 6.90 Pro Tree class.
“Typically, that’s what the Nostalgia Alcohol Funny Cars run when you go anywhere, in the high sixes and low sevens.”
As for the inaugural Family Fun Weekend event at St. Thomas Dragway, Noakes is excited to be part of it and to support the Buchners and the track.
“There’s such a great friend group behind this group. I’m really looking forward to it. Everyone is reaching out to help and the word is getting out there that it’s going to be very successful. That’s what everyone expects based on what they’ve done with their 660 Sportsman National events.
“And with them offering reduced admission rates for First Responders and students, it really shows that they want to get a lot of people engaged and involved and to bring new and young people out to the track. And it’s special that it’s all happening at Sparta (St. Thomas Dragway) where I got my Alcohol license back in 1988. It’s also great to be teaming up with my father again.
The Family Fun Weekend takes place Friday through Sunday (June 20-22) at St. Thomas Dragway. For tickets and info, look up the 660 Sportsman Nationals group on Facebook.
