The first historic FIA Championship Trophy has arrived at Malta Motorsport Federation office this week. This Historic Trophy will be presented to Monty Bugeja, during the SportMalta Awards night on Saturday. Monty Bugeja, is the first Maltese driver to win a FIA European Drag Racing Championship which came to an end with a historic final race between two Maltese Teams in front of more than 40,000 spectators.

Monty Bugeja of Mr. Whippy Racing Team and Chris Polidano of Kalanc Racing Team, battled the last final run of the FIA Championship, with Bugeja winning the 2012 FIA Top Methanol Dragster title in glorious style in front of at least 500 Maltese fans cheering and waving their Maltese flags. The 50 year old drag racer driving the Mr. Whippy Dragster, was assisted by a crew of 14 persons under the supervision of Team owner Joe Carabott and crew chief Remic Arapa, who strongly contributed for this first FIA Drag Racing title for Malta and the first ever Maltese Team to win a FIA title in any kind of motorsport at all.

International Commentators, stated several times that nobody deserved the 2012 championship better than Monty Bugeja and the Joe Carabott owned Mr Whippy Racing Team. With 5.292 sec (Main Event) they set the best European Time of the season, were number one qualifier five times (out of six races) and were in the final four times. Until the European Finals only a win was missing, but that issue was solved in the last race of the season at Santa Pod. That win was the icing on the cake of their historic season and the reason for the team to go wild at the start line of the Final Race.

Monty Bugeja is involved in the sport of drag racing since 1985 and won several national titles. Bugeja made his first Top Methanol Dragster pass in 1996 and entered a FIA TMD European Championship race for the first time in 2000. In the next few years he won three FIA races at Santa Pod. After a few years racing at Malta again, the team returned to the FIA Championship last year. In 2012 they did the full championship tour, two rounds in UK, two in Sweden, one in Finland and one in Germany and were the fastest and most consistent of all championship contenders

 ‘A dream coming true!’ was Monty comments. ‘The team worked brilliantly throughout the season, and although the weather was not always on our side during the championship, we kept our hopes high that we can make it. This is a great honour for us to be the first Maltese Team to bring this prestigious FIA Championship title to our island. We are looking forward with the FIA Championship Trophy presentation during the SportMalta Awards night on Saturday.