Gary Phillips is the man when it comes to racing Top Alcohol.

The Lucas Oil-sponsored Funny Car racer provided an object lesson during the recently completed Santo's Super 3 Extreme Drag Race at Willowbank Raceway.

Phillips, who is regarded as the Aussie version of Frank Manzo, made a clean sweep of the event by claiming wins on both nights and setting a new elapsed time record.

Phillips got off to a tough start in qualifying during the first night, but found his groove in eliminations by beating Debbie O'Rourke in the final with a 5.61,

"After day one, we felt the combination was extremely close to being right," said Phillips. "The track was fantastic, the air was ok, and the car was close. We knew that only small tweaks had to be made, because the ET's were still quick despite pedalling the car and shutting off early on both runs." Phillips said.

During the second night of the event, Phillips and his team hit the tune up spot on, by top qualifying No. 1 with a 5.470 elapsed time at only 250 mph.

"I had been shutting off very early every run so far because of the poor visibility I was experiencing once I got just past 1000ft," explained Phillips. "On that pass it ran nearly 213mph to half track, and I shut off at 5.01 seconds. We knew there was definitely more there, however it's very hard to drive under full throttle into pitch black, it doesn't feel natural."

In the first round, Phillips became the quickest Top Alcohol driver in Australian history with a 5.438 elapsed time at 262 miles per hour to reset the National Record, with the previous 5.470 as a backup run.

"It was all over the track, definitely not pretty, and far from the perfect pass but we've got some great data to work with now," Phillips said. "This car is fast and we feel there is still more there."

Phillips proved he can win even when all goes wrong. In the final round, he smoked the tires and still reached the finish line first.

"We didn't touch the tune up for the final, but with the dew coming in late at night, it just wouldn't handle it," said Phillips. "Overall, we're extremely happy with our results this weekend, especially for our long time and much treasured naming rights partner Lucas Oil Products, who are like family to us, and all of our associate sponsors."

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