Thu, 12 Jun 2003, 07:03 AM Andrew Cowin Delays Return to Top Fuel Cockpit until 2004

Courtesy of Gerald McDornan Photo copyright 2003 NHRA

Andrew Cowin

Champion Australian Top Fuel drag racer Andrew Cowin has delayed his return to racing until the beginning of the 2004 American season.

Cowin has elected to skip the remainder of the 2003 NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series in the United States in preference to ensuring he fully recovers from head and shoulder injuries sustained in a fall in late March, despite having already received a medical clearance to return to racing.

“This has been a hard decision, but having considered all options and potential outcomes I believe it is the right decision,” Cowin said.

The 23-year-old said a major factor was seeing how his twin brother, John, was still feeling the effects of ‘tire shake’ four days after driving the Cowin family’s 7,000-horsepower Top Fuel dragster in Queensland last weekend.

“I wake up each day thinking how lucky I am to be alive and I don’t want to get too greedy too early … these cars just don’t warn you before they bite and when they do bite, they’re totally unforgiving,” Cowin said.

“While I want to race now, and I have the medical clearance to race, I know I have a long career ahead of me and it is pointless risking that. I would rather wait a few more months and be fully comfortable with myself,” he said.

Cowin, from Chiswick in Sydney, said he had informed Mark and Andy Carrier, owners of the Tennessee-based Carrier Boyz Racing

“It was hard telling the Carriers that I wouldn’t be continuing this year – they’ve been so good to me and cared more about my health than what I did. But I didn’t want to hold up their racing program any more and I had to make a decision. Thankfully, they understand,” Cowin said.

Driving for the New York Yankees-backed, Darrell Gwynn Racing team on the NHRA POWERade Series tour in 2002, Cowin finished a career-high eighth in the Top Fuel championship, as well as recording the then fourth quickest standing quarter-mile elapsed time in history at just 4.490-seconds.

During a fleeting trip home to Australia in June last year, Cowin also became the first driver outside the US to break the 500-kilometer per hour barrier, recording a speed of over 506km/h in the Cowin Family Racing Rocket Industries Top Fuel dragster at the Castrol Winternationals at Willowbank Raceway.