The Drag Challenge is Australia’s take on Drag Week, and as much as we’ve been able to learn from our counterparts on the other side of the Pacific, it’s pretty much a near-duplication, complete with stops along the road trip portions. Naturally, to our eyes, it’s a feast of everything Australian that we could ever want, with Fords, Valiants, and Holdens out having a blast doing the same deal we do over here.
One such vehicle that we certainly enjoy is John Di Mauro’s 1971 Holden Belmont ute, nicknamed “FarmUte”. Outside, this thing out-sleepers the infamous “Farmtruck” Chevy…you would think that it just got drug out from behind someone’s shed, hubcaps and all, but underneath the hood is a LQ9 6.0L LS with a homemade turbo setup. To say that this thing hauls ass is an understatement: during Drag Challenge, Di Mauro was kicked off of Sydney Dragway for running a 9.8 quarter-mile (Sydney requires cages for anything under 11 seconds…whoops!)
When Drag Challenge took the ute past Castlemaine Rod Shop as one of the stops, Di Mauro couldn’t resist a little showboating. Or maybe he was goaded into it…either way, the FarmUte left it’s mark upon Castlemaine’s parking lot, complete with a U-haul trailer on the back and everything. We completely approve:
