This article on Karen’s Valiant first appeared in the January 2019 issue of Street Machine

KAREN Bawden has been racing her ’69 VF Valiant hardtop for seven years, and got her first taste of DC at our inaugural Drag Challenge Weekend in Queensland earlier this year.

She was back for Drag Challenge proper, towing the Val from Townsville to Calder behind a Toyota Coaster motorhome. She then managed to keep the VF in the game all week, with only a few niggles.

“The passenger window didn’t want to stay in its cradle; my deep-dish sump found the road a couple of times but it didn’t rip a hole; and on the last day we had an electrical gremlin, so I ran two really slow passes,” Karen said. “We had spares of everything that we could carry without a trailer. My plan was mainly to survive the five days and to have fun.”

Not only did the Val make it to the end, but it also ran great times in the K&N Dial Your Own class. “I pretty much ran PBs until the last day,” Karen said. “I aim to enter again next year, but would like to do some work on the old boy to liven him up.”