“Fadi?” This particular question has been asked so many times now by our illustrious Phil McGovern that the lengthier “when are we going to see the Fadi Tammour piece, and what the hell’s taking so long?” version is no longer required.
But this isn’t just bone idleness on my part. For starters, the aforementioned Mr Tammour has already made his crankandpiston bow, last year with a 4.8s run in a three-seater dragster at the Yas Marina Dragstrip. Secondly, the subject at hand is a 6.5l V8 Pontiac GTO boasting – and I quote – “780hp on pump petrol, 810-815hp on race fuel and – with a few extra mods – capable of over 1000hp”. You don’t really want to rush a piece when you’re dealing with figures like that.
Put simply, quarter mile sprints are kind of Fadi’s thing, and have been for many years. So in early-2005, he set about developing his own sub-10s drag monster from, curiously, a standard family coupe. Just two months ago though he took that same GTO to a quarter mile from standstill at the Yas Marina Dragstrip in a staggering 9.825s.
“There’s around 50,000 cars in the USA at a similar performance level to mine. When I did my 9.9s run, I went to 127th overall. Then I did 9.8s, and I was 8th.”
