All of the pictures on this page were made available to me by Dennis Priddle,
I am most grateful to him for the opportunity of reproducing them here.
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All of the pictures on this page were made available to me by Dennis Priddle, |
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Click on any image to get the bigger picture |
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On page 1 we charted Dennis' career up to 1971. For
1972 things got decidedly serious when the team debuted this absolutely stunning
slingshot dragster for an all-out assault on running the first 6 second run
outside of the USA. |
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Team member Pete Stanford beckons Dennis forward into stage after the burn out. |
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Dennis Priddle
stands behind the rear slick of this posed shot with Pete Stanford to his left.
This shot was taken at a fete at Bradford Abbas which is south-east of
Yeovil. |
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Dennis pulls the 'chute after yet another quarter mile blast. |
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The new fueller is the centre of attention in the Santa Pod pits. |
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What a superb looking car this was - it just had to go well looking as good as this. |
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Back in those days
they used to start the burn out very close to the barn at Santa Pod because it
was believed that burning out over the start line would cause the track to be
less adherent not more. The tyres were therefore smoked in a restricted area
only to get them warm. |
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At the Whitsun Big Go meeting held on 28 and 29 May 1972
Dennis blasted his way into the history books with a 6.995/185 pass which he
backed up with a 6.93/208 run later in the day. Click here to see a
picture of the timing clocks showing that first 6 second run. |
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Dennis and Mr Six over-powering the slippery Blackbushe surface somewhat! This picture dates from 1973. |
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Another great shot of Mr Six burning out, one of many taken by ace photographer Peter Quinn. This was taken in August 1972 at Blackbushe. |
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This picture was taken at the International Sprint Organisation's world records meeting held at Elvington in 1972 where Mr Six re-set the mark for the outright FIA World Record for the standing start quarter mile at an average time of 6.70 seconds. |
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The car had three different paint jobs in the relatively short time that it was driven by Dennis. This was because the team were trying to satisfy the demands of its sponsors. This picture was taken at an NDRC meeting at Blackbushe in 1973. |
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Dennis is pictured receiving a trophy at Santa Pod. Pete Stanford is on the extreme left of picture,then Barry Dufty (who was Dennis' Crew Chief until 1981), Dennis Priddle and Irven Axe. |
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From left to right : Pete Stanford, Dennis Priddle, Barry Dufty and an anonymous trophy presenter. |
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This timing ticket records Dennis' 6.73/185.19 pass on 24 September 1972. It's a pity that Dennis did not keep all the tickets for that meeting because he did his best ever run in Mr Six of 6.59 seconds. Don't forget - this wasn't an imported rail, it was all built down in the West Country. |
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Yet another new car for 1973 this time in the form of the ex-Norm Wilcox slingshot. The original plan had been to buy Bill Simpson's state of the art rear engined car named The Skyjacker but the deal fell through. The car was sponsored by Revell and was called, unsurprisingly, Mr Revell. This picture appeared in a Revell brochure. |
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Dave Riswick recalls that after picking up the car they took it down the road to Ed Donovan's shop, bought one of his latest 417s, fitted it and then fired up the dragster in the street outside in Torrance, California! |
A fine overhead shot of Mr Revell. This car held the front-engined Top Fuel Dragster ET record for many years after Dennis ran 6.04 seconds at 218 mph at Santa Pod on 20 April 1975. |
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A couple of unusual
settings in which to see a Top Fuel Dragster - click on the pictures to read
what was going on. |
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There's more to
being a Top Fuel pilot than getting strapped in and scaring yourself witless,
sometimes you get to meet interesting people too. . . |
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I have drawn extensively on
information from Chris Dossett's excellent |
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All material on this site is copyright |
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Navigate through the |
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Dennis Priddle was inducted into the
Dennis was further honoured |
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