Australian drag racing has faced some major challenges in recent years. Disclid between the traditional FIA sanctioned Gavin and Buddy and the breakaway 400 Thunder Group has seen loyalties divide and a lesser quality of a bend for the sports legend of long-suffering fans. The man now tasked with the job of running drag racing down under his grand good ol' and we caught up with him at Colda Park during a break at the 51st Australian drag racing nationals. Well we're here in the bright son of Colda Park for the Australian drag racing nationals, the 51st running of that famous event and we're here with the CEO of the Australian National Drag Racing Association, Grand Good ol' and Grand U, or a relative newcomer in the position. Tell us a bit about your background. How did you end up as CEO of Andrew? Well, I'd moved back from Adelaide to look at a business venture. My background I've been a corporate CEO for 30 years and various organisations, strong in sports administration. I was made aware of the position and asked if I'd be interested in applying. I did and just under a year ago. So in terms of your sporting background, what sports were you involved in? I was a CEO of the largest Australian rules football competition in Australia, the South Australian amateur league. I was chairman of harness racing South Australian rules sell on the National harness racing board. My other thing is sort of there that they're the highlights of the sport inside of things. It's interesting you're coming back to come in with a bit of a football background. Your compatriots at the Confederation of Australia Motorsport, you're doing a rocker. Also comes from a football background, Australian football background. Have you had a, when you began did you have a chance to have a chat with him and pick his brains about a wonderful, a weird and wonderful world of motorsport? Yeah, look we've had a couple of chats and you're right, similar background. But probably a couple of months after I was in the role we caught up and we touched base quite regularly and obviously we're a member of CAMHS and FIA and we're in touch on a number of issues. So what's your role as the IWF Andrew? What are your responsibilities? Well, primarily I'm there to run the operations and the business really. I know the boards put the strategies in place and work with us on those. But primarily I run the business with the team there. We've obviously got the integrity side, the marketing side, the administrative side. So the actual running of the business running of Andrew is my responsibility. So what have you discovered? I mean did you know much about drag racing before you started? No, very little I'd been to events but you know I'm a drag racing novelist. I really was employed more for my business skills and the fact that I've got sports administration. I think the thing that struck me when I came into the sport is that a lot of the issues and we find ourselves in drag racing are very similar to a lot of other sporting areas. There's always issues and particularly membership based and the passion involved in sport. It's surprising how similar a lot of issues are. So look I certainly walked into a challenge. It's a challenging time for drag racing. You mentioned the challenging time and we're here at the Nationals. The Nationals, the big go 51 years back in the golden days. We'd have 35, 40,000 people out here. All of the pits would be absolutely filled to capacity. There's a bit of a schism in the sport at the moment. What is the state of drag racing in Australia at the moment for you to see it? I think drag racing is on the improve. I think those days can be had again not at the moment. We're in a rebuild phase. There's been a lot of disruption involved in the sport that's been well commentated on. I think there's definitely upside involved in the sport. I mean the crowd here today and yesterday is very good. Not to those sort of numbers that you mentioned but I think those days can come back. I think certainly the owners of the track here. I know are interested in putting more back into the venue. I think improving the venue and if we can continue to improve the sport and the participation, we can build and get those numbers back but that's a long-term goal. With the current situation, with the group thunder 400 as they're calling themselves, I mean what's at the basis? What's at the heart of all of that? Why have they moved off? What is it that they want that they don't believe that you can give? Well that's the question for them I guess. I think the move for 400 thunder and the other sanctioning authority really was the strategy was put in place before I got into place. There was frustration in the sport so I think that's a question for them. But we've got a number of people that run events in drag racing. I think the key and look the board met yesterday and our key focus at the moment is to try and engage with 400 thunder leadership and really anyone racing, drag racing, events is a number that do operate under Andrew already. So we've made it quite clear to 400 thunder that we're more than happy to sanction their events and we're more than happy to discuss getting them involved in one series. What we hear from the drivers we've very strongly is that the majority of people would like to see one series. They don't like this split series scenario so 400 thunder run an event. But there's no reason why we can't get parties together and perhaps discuss how we can at least bring them in under one series umbrella. That's what the industry would like and the board yesterday certainly briefed the management in terms of putting some modeling up. We'll consult the industry and then try and put those models forward and see if we can't get a one series approach in the sport again. One thing that I find that tends to be a bit different with motorsport than a lot of other sports that I've been involved with over the years is at the top level you've got the focus here is very much seems to be on the competitors. Whereas when you talk to people from the AFL from Cricket Australia, tennis Australia, those sorts of organisations, the focus is very heavily on the fans. How do you weigh that up? How do you weigh up the needs of putting on a show that the public want to see and also meeting the needs of your members? Well there's multiple stakeholders in any sport, there's spectators and participants and there's venues as well. And caterers and fuel suppliers and there's multiple layers. You've got to get the balance right. But you mentioned the word show to me, elite levels of sports such as drag racing. It's all about putting on a good show. If you put on a good show, people attend good crowd here today and yesterday. You know we are seeing some big numbers at events again over the summer period right around Australia. You get the show right, you get the product right and the crowd will come. One thing that's very different about this particular event this time as compared with the traditional event is that it's essentially a day like come twilight meeting. What was the reason for that? Well the promoters, we don't run the actual event. So we're the sanctioning authority. So it's probably a question really for Pete. He's the promoter of the event. But the answer he would give you is that this is the time period which is quite with the number of cars. So it's the logistics really of getting through the number of vehicles and putting on a good competition. That would dictate a lot of the timing. Long term, where do you want to see the sport in say five years time? United, stronger, bigger crowds attending, bigger participation. And I think with the strategic plan we're having place we're going to achieve that. But you know getting one series, getting everyone around the table and focusing on one series. That's what the drivers want. We get the drivers into better space. The promoters into better space, the crowds will come. You know the venues are an integral part of that as well. So you know it's about our role, I guess, in a leadership role of talking to all those people and making sure we move the sport ahead. Well it's great to see the nationals back at Colda Park. We've had a dearth of drag racing in Victoria for a long, long time now. Hopefully in the years to come we will see some improvements out here and the sport will just go hopefully get back to the grand old days of old. I don't think there's any doubt. You know the quality of this sport, it's the greatest motor racing sport show in Australia. You know the crowds love it to see the top fuel and all the categories race. It's a racing spectacle that I think is very appealing for fans and I think those numbers will come back in future years. Well good luck with it and for now grand good old thanks for joining the Simpit line. Thank you Tom.