Drag show

Racers blasting beyond 300mph never gets old. No wonder Santa Pod is still going strong at 60. JOHN EVANS joins the high-octane celebrations

- JOHN EVANS

If you like extremes, you'll love Top Fuel drag racing.

Some numbers: 0-343mph in 3.6sec, 11,500bhp, fuel consumption of five gallons per second... To these can now be added 60 – as in 60 years of Santa Pod Raceway (1966-2026), the drag mecca in Bedfordshire. Or is it Northamptonshire? Both councils claim it but then nothing's normal in this sport, including Keith Bartlett, the Bernie Ecclestone of drag racing, who owns Santa Pod and a clutch of championship rights and who, like the former Formula 1 supremo, looks and behaves like a man half his age.

“You're how old?” I ask this trim and energetic legend of the strip, whose consortium bought Santa Pod and the surrounding land in 1996. “Eighty next birthday,” he shoots back. It's another remarkable number in a sport that's full of them. But I'm not meeting Bartlett at his Santa Pod HQ to play Drag Strip Top Trumps. Instead, I've come with one simple aim: to find out just who watches the shortest motor races on the planet and why.