Kathy Fisher Looks To New Supercharger To Help Capture PDRA Top Dragster Title

12 May 2017

A storm system rolled through and pushed back the schedule. The finals will be run in August

Kathy waits out the weather in her trailer at Virginia Motorsports Park

Kathy Fisher has a secret weapon. And with it the Performance by Fisher team plans on dominating the Top Dragster Class in PDRA competition. Except it’s not a secret anymore as the F3-121 Procharger that replaced the F2 supercharger she’d been running is in clear view of competitors and fans. And although they’ve not had the new set-up on the dyno, it’s expected to produce 2,300 to 2,400 horsepower, which is a 200 to 300 horsepower increase over the old set-up.

Nonetheless, Kathy and her husband Kevin, who run the team from their shop in Lima, Ohio, see 2017 as their best opportunity to take the Top Dragster championship in the 1/8 mile PDRA series. Last year Kathy finished fourth in the championship and was only able to attend six of nine races. In addition she’ll be running at NHRA Divisional and National events not just for the 1/4 mile experience, but also to further support her marketing partners.

While she was knocked out in the second round at the first PDRA event of the year, at the NHRA Divisional at VMP she qualified second. The event couldn’t be completed so it will be run as part of the August race. In the meantime, Kathy made it to the semifinals at the NHRA Nationals in Atlanta.

With only an 1/8 mile course, timing is extremely important to PDRA racers

Kathy, alone with her thoughts before her run, planning out each move to the microsecond

For those of you not familiar with Kathy, you’re clearly among the 15% of Americans who don’t own a television (though that’s no excuse). Kathy has appeared in a number of automotive-related programming including the just-wrapped season four of Performance TV, which is currently in the midst of a 26 week run on Saturday mornings on Velocity. Kathy’s also appearing in a 13-week series called Bidding Wars – where the crew follows the bidders instead of the cars. Kathy has also appeared on Inside Drag Racing, World of Trucks, LoCar Car Show Series , Married with Dragsters, and others. You can catch many of the shows online.

Kathy got her start drag racing like most kids – competing in her father’s Nova. While working to establish her career in broadcasting didn’t leave much time for drag racing, but she was slowly drawn back in. First it was racing her own Camaro (on which she installed her first K&N filter), and then through various steps ended up working for Frank Hawley's NHRA Drag Racing School. While working for Frank she earned her Top Alcohol license and she was on her way.

Now her sites are set on becoming one of the top 1/8th mile Top Dragster racers in the country. And she has the car to make it happen.

The Top Dragster class is growing as the cars look like T/F but are easier on the equipment

Warming up her Mickey Thompson slicks before a run. Top Dragsters run automatic transmissions.

In a class where almost anything goes in terms of engine configurations, you have to get the sums right, which is why Kevin and Kathy have trusted Stan Ray at Ohio Crankshaft with their engines.

Stan started with off with a Brodix Big Block punched out to 547 CID. Heads are aluminum B3 units from Brodix as well. Pistons are from J&E and the crank is from, of course, Ohio Crankshaft. Air is drawn through a K&N filter by the F3-121 Procharger, and into the engine via a single-blow-through carburetor.

Upon hearing the motor start for the first time a former team member referred to its sound as "thumpy goodness." Some of that is due to Kevin, who fabricates the headers himself out of Borla pipes. As the President of Performance by Fisher, a custom exhaust and repair facility in their hometown of Lima, he certainly brings the skills to the job. Once the welding is done the headers receive an Armor Coat ceramic coating.

Power is driven back not through a direct drive using a series of clutches like a Top Fuel dragster, but rather a heavily-modified Abruzzi two-speed Powerglide with an aluminum torque converter. The chassis is an American Race Cars 272-inch wheelbase dragster out of Millbury, OH (see a trend here?).

Small video cameras are giving non-participants the opportunity to see what it's like to compete

The ultimate selfie. Actually a frame grab off a video of one of Kathy's runs. Trade seats anyone?

As mentioned by Kathy earlier, she started using K&N air filters long before she ever thought of doing more than just racing her Camaro on weekends. The Performance by Fisher team tell us they wouldn’t drive anywhere without a K&N filter protecting the engine. The Top Dragster has a custom filter designed specifically for the application. All the oil in the 547 CID Big Block passes through a K&N billet oil filter. The race car hauler is, of course, fitted with K&N filters as their own personal vehicles including Kathy’s Harley-Davidson Trike.

As performance by Fisher is also a independent repair garage that focuses on performance work, Kevin and his crew install K&N filters on customer cars. As Kathy says, "use ‘em, love ‘em, sell ‘em."

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