He smashed through the eight-second barrier for completing the quarter-mile course at Santa Pod in the European finals over the weekend – hitting a speed of more than 183mph in his extensively-modified Vauxhall VX 4/90.

The car, known as Red Victor 2, used to put out around 1,500hp and was capable of hitting 60mph in 1.1 seconds.

But this still wasn’t fast enough for the father-of-three who runs Penn Autos in Springhill Lane, Wolverhampton.

He even decided not to compete in the Custom Car Street Eliminator class this season, so he could work on boosting the power of the giant 9.3 litre Chevrolet V8 engine in Red Victor 2.

“It’s taken me this long to get it right but all the hard work has paid off,” said Andy, whose car is now the fastest street-legal drag car of its type in the world.

He has now got the turbocharged engine generating an awesome 2,200hp – and reckons there’s another 300hp to come.

Red Victor 2 can hit 140mph in around five seconds and reaches 183 in 7.8 seconds -Êyet is taxed, tested, and insured and can be driven on public roads.

“This, of course, will be faster when I develop the car further,” said Andy, whose next meeting is the National finals at Santa Pod in October.

“We will race in the last round of Street Eliminator to not only try to win the meeting, but to set a new record.

“If track conditions are good and the car stays as reliable as it has this previous weekend we should be able to do it.”

He added he would be returning to competitive action next year now that he had got the car right.

“The pressure will be on because everyone knows what the car is capable of, and I will be expected to win every event.”

Andy thanked Altiss Engineering who did the conversion on the car and Snap-on dealer Raj Singh, who supplied him with tools to work on the car.

By Motoring Editor Pete Carroll

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