ANDRA Hall of Fame member Dennis Syrmis, the man who led Australian drag racing from the early years of ANDRA and was instrumental in the establishment of Willowbank Raceway, was farewelled in a moving ceremony last week at Willowbank Raceway.

Dennis had suffered from the effects of Alzheimer’s for more than a decade and passed away, aged 71, on December 1. He was ANDRA national director from 1974 until 1983 and during that time instituted a wide range of policies that lifted drag racing from what was little more than a club-based hobby into a championship sport.

Dennis continued to help guide the sport once he resigned as ANDRA’s head and took up the position of manager of Willowbank Raceway in 1983.

Willowbank board member Lex Swayn, who worked with Dennis from the early years of Willowbank, said Dennis had an enormously positive impact on the sport of championship drag racing as a racer of his “Time Machine’’ cars, as an administrator with ANDRA and as Willowbank track manager.

“It is generally acknowledged that no individual has contributed as much to the advancement of Australian drag racing as Dennis and the reason he stands out from all others is that his endeavours stretch across the three main areas of the sport – racing, national governing organisation and track manager/promoter.

“Overwhelmingly, the impact of his contributions have been enormously positive and in all these genuine efforts over a 35-year period of service to the sport, I am unaware of anything Dennis did that benefited him personally, either financially or in the area of racing competition.

“He was the right man at the right time for the sport of drag racing and for Willowbank Raceway.”

Around 370 people, including the Syrmis and Emslie families and many friends from interstate, gathered at the raceway to celebrate Dennis’s life.

At the conclusion of the service, Dennis’s casket, inscribed with his race number 186, was placed in the hearse and driven through an honour guard of Willowbank officials, staff and board members to the start line where Sue Syrmis activated the starting lights to send her husband on his last pass down the Willowbank quarter mile. The hearse made the trip down the racing surface accompanied by the sounds of Pat Benatar’s “All Fired Up”, a song Dennis always believed was made for drag racing.

In 2010, the Willowbank quarter mile was named Dennis Syrmis Way in honour of the man who was the driving force behind construction of the raceway in the early 1980s.

In a moving but uplifting ceremony conducted by the Reverend Jeanette Gillam, Sue Syrmis urged those present to work together to keep Dennis’s dream alive. Representatives of Willowbank and the Syrmis and Emslie families praised Dennis’s achievements, but speaker after speaker also brought howls of laughter from those in attendance as they related stories from his youth and classic examples of his fiery temper.

Ms Gillam told the gathering that in examining the many stories of Dennis’s life, one of his quotes stuck out. “One phrase tells us about the principles by which Dennis lived life and conducted business, and that was ‘Forget it, change it, do whatever, just move on’. I guess that is what he’d be saying to us now if he could hear us. I know you won’t forget Dennis, you certainly couldn’t have changed him, and you have done whatever you could for him, especially in recent times, so now all we have to do is move on.’’

Dennis was honoured by ANDRA with the Award of Merit in 1993, a Lifetime Achievement award in 2000 and was inducted into the Hall of Fame this year.

ANDRA’s Fastlane magazine will carry an extended feature on Dennis’ life in the first quarter 2014 edition.

Below is a video of the service, supplied by Willowbank Raceway. Words with thanks to Lex Swayn. Image with thanks to Dave Reid.