Squig, 38, is an engineering production manager at Marten Spars and is a qualified fitter and turner. He and his partner Tanya live in rural South Auckland on a lifestyle block with their three sons Devin, Zachary, and Hunter, a far extreme from the hectic, noisy drag strip.

Hot Rodding and dragracing started back in the early eighties for Squig when he was an impressionable 15 year old. He latched on to a few local rodders who are still quite well known in the rodding scene today. People like Noel Sheehan, Dave Grahame, Gary Child, Bob Armstrong, Rick Purcell (Twitch) to name a few.

It was from these rodders that he got his name which obviously stuck. At 16 Squig became a member of the Pukekohe Hot Rod Club and a worker at Champion Dragway ( pit runner) until he was about 18 where he then drifted away from rodding and racing till his early 20’s. At 18, still interested in American and Aussie cars he bought an XP Falcon (4 door) with a heavy breathing 170 pursuit engine. The Falcon kept the 6 for a few more years until enough money could be saved to build up a 302 and C4 which went in about 1990. At this stage Squig and Tanya belonged to the Early Falcon and Farlane Club (of which Alistair and P.C of Petrolhead were key members), the club held many runs, one of which was at Champion Dragway. Well Squig gave it ago and with the standard 302 it ran 15.7 at 94mph with a standard diff. He was HOOKED!!!!! Again. 6 months later the engine was out and in went a cam, new pistons, a little port matching, shift kitted C4 and a 9inch diff with a 4 spider 3.5 head. Instant 14.6 at 97mph. Squig raced it like that for about a year or two at street meets and comp. meets in D.Y.O. Then Squig got the urge to go faster AS YOU DO!!! Firstly he thought about back halving the car and putting on a Hipo small block but then got a little carried away and gutted the car. The Falcon was entirely built in Squig’s garage and 95% of the build was taken on by Squig. This included the space frame chassis, front and rear suspension, diff, interior work, panel work, including the 2 door conversion and all fibreglass parts, through to the engine build up. There were a few years of research before this, while saving for the project. During it there were many people who gave invaluable advice such as Terry Bowden of Terry’s Chassis Shoppe, Grant Brifault, Steve Wells, Brian Webber and countless others.

Four years later 1996, the car debut in primer green at Champion Dragway as a supergasser with a B/B ford of course. The engine was a stock 2 bolt block with a Lunati stroker kit taking it out to 512ci. It had aluminium cobra jet heads and a single 4 barrel.

The car managed to run 9.7s at 140mph, which was perfect for the 9.90 class. In its first full season with a new Steve Levene paint job Team Squig managed to get a 5th placing at the Nationals and to come runner up in the Champion Dragway Supergas point score. The next season with the aid of a transbrake, a runner up at the Nationals, first place in Supergas and runner for overall points in all classes was achieved. However, Squig wasn’t entirely satisfied. He wanted to go faster, get in to the 8’s and most of all he wanted to race properly, not on a fixed index. Squig had always looked at competition eliminator as one of the toughest classes to succeed in as there were some very good teams and drivers, and a myriad of different cars and engine combinations, a real innovative class. Of course to do this the 2 bolt block wouldn’t cut the mustard and was about 300hp shy of the mark. So enter Segedin Truck and Auto Parts (STA Parts).

Squig had met Kerry, Segedin’s engine builder for Mark’s (manager of ‘STA Parts’) ski boat, at Paines Engine Reconditioners, when Squig was building the 512ci. Kerry showed an interest in Squig’s project as Mark’s motors were all B/B Fords also. So when Squig was looking to upgrade Kerry suggested he come and talk to Mark and look at buying one of his old boat engines. Squig purchased one of Mark’s engines and Mark was kind enough to lend his Kinsler fuel injection and supply parts etc. at a good rate. From there the partnership blossomed.

Squig took a season off, so as to adapt the car for it’s new lease of life, while this was happening the Falcon was channelled a further 2inches and given a 3 inch roof chop, a new funny car style roll cage, complete new interior tin work, a rewiring and of course another stunning Steve Levene paint scheme. First meeting out half way through the season 2000-2001 after a couple of aborted passes and some chassis tuning to harness the new found power the falcon stormed to a 8.8s at 154mph, good enough to break the longstanding record of Rhys Harrison (9.05s at 150) by two tenths and 4mph. By the end of the season Team Squig had managed to lower the record to 8.5s at 157mph. and win two meetings while they were at it. Awesome!!

The next season the team had big plans to up the compression, run on alcohol and new diff gears, slicks etc. But things don’t always go to plan. The engine didn’t even survive the dyno. Enter Mark Segedin again!!! Mark offered Squig a second block and pistons at a good price and Team Squig were back in business again, albeit a few meetings late. The engine was thrown together as quickly a possible with whatever could be scrounged from the old engine and what ‘STA Parts’ and Squig had available. With a low compression engine on alcohol it was expected to run in the high 8s, but at least the Team could make a showing. It actually ran 8.6s at 159mph – a tenth slower but 2mph faster – go figure!!! This was partly due to running alcohol, new wing and a new diff ratio as previously mentioned.

So now to the 2003-2004 season. Well, with a good block, new high compression pistons and on alcohol again and a few more little refinements like an Edelbrock Data logger from ‘STA Parts’ we managed 8.4s at ~161mph. But it wasn’t all bad news as we lasted the whole season, did quite a few shows and appearances including Burnout demo’s at the V8 Super cars at Pukekohe and later again at The Best swap meet & show, both of which were very well received and publicised and a lot of FUN!! We could have massaged another tenth or so out of it, but I felt it was time to move onward and upward, not only for the endless pursuit of speed but also to keep ‘STA Parts’ in the spot light and the best place for that is Top Doorslammer!