HOT Rod Drag Week ain’t no picnic. It is hard on both machine and personnel. Even if your car is running smoothly, you’ll be working hard each day.

As Brian Jensen says of his nine-second LX Torana hatchback: “To drive something like this 1000 miles in one week, something that was only built to only go a quarter-mile at a time – it’s out of control.”

And that is if things are going well. Most of the time, even the best-prepared teams will be chasing faults of various sizes, as their car starts to show the results of dual punishment on both the drag strip and the road legs.

In this video, Luke Nieuwhof chats to each of the seven Aussie drivers – including Brian, Richie Crampton, Mark Arblaster, John Faraone, Craig Moar, Jamie Farmer and Harry Haig – to see how their event is going and why they do it.