Sunday Eliminations at The FIA European Finals at Santa Pod

The European Finals - Final Eliminations Day

Sunday 10th September 2006

When I got to the track it was well before 8am and in amongst the heavy mist, I headed to the same place as the day before, for a bacon baguette. Perhaps it was the fact that it was an impatient lad doing the cooking, but I had the feeling I might regret it and indeed I did. How can something be both burned and under cooked at the same time? I had no time to do anything about it and instead headed off up into the pits to catch some nitro. I also bumped into Andy Frost and proffered my congratulations for his recent and repeated entry into the 7 second zone. In fact, I ended up having chats with chums and fellow nitro freaks to the extent that I realised that the Pro eliminations were about to start! With the zip of a Spring Gazelle (okay, a heavy shuffle with sore feet!) I rushed back to the action in the nick of time, though I was annoyed that I had missed the pre-race ceremonies with the number 1 qualifiers. The mist had all now burned off, so the action could now get underway.

The first round of Pro-Mod got us started and Roger Johansson, Seppo Saapola, Bruno Bader, Danny Cockerill, Marko Lantto, Mats Eriksson (with a huge wheelie and shake), Andy Robinson and Urban Johansson all made it through to the second round. In the first round of Top Fuel, Tommi Haapanen was in as first alternate for Smax Smith who had too much damage to fix from the pro qualifying yesterday. He was up against Tommy Möller in the Pennzoil fueler and at the lights, Tommy got away first and Tommi hiked his front wheels a little. He soon started to smoke his tyres and before long he was well ablaze. Tommy Möller then pitched his belt before half track and it was a case of who had the most momentum to make it to the line. Tommi Haapanen got there first trailing an ocean of 'stuff' all the way down the track. On reflection, this was perhaps no bad thing. The numbers of people attending the meeting over the past three days were absolutely stunning - more than I could ever recall. Today, however, the organisers had to close the road to people leaving the track as there were miles and miles of traffic still trying to get in. The oil-down interruption meant that many many more people were in attendance when the racing got underway again. There must have been 50,000+ people at Santa Pod at the height of eliminations. Just before the next pair were ready to run (Håkan Nilsson and Thomas Nataas to decide the championship) Karsten Andersen decided to switch lanes for the Veidec car (always the option for the higher qualifier, or runner at the previous round) to the spectator lane. I wanted to get pictures of Håkan, so I changed lanes myself to the less photogenic (due to the position of the sun in the morning) spectator lane to catch the action. Håkan got away first, really tattooing Thomas with a 0.047 reaction compared to Thomas's 0.177, and laid down a nice clean pass to a 4.864 at 296mph and the crowd loved it! Thomas hit shake and rattle just past the tree and despite a quick pedal they smoked when he got back on it. That run decided the FIA Top Fuel Championship and Håkan Nilsson is another rookie-year Champion. Well done, guys! On the next run, Urs Erbacher was up against Stig Neergard and, barring unforeseen problems, we were pretty much expecting Urs to take this round. He didn't fail to disappoint and ran a superb 4.912 at just 244.71mph which betrays the fact that Urs spat his blower belt off at 700 feet! Lex Joon and Micke Kågered were up next and it turnout out to be a pedal and shake-fest. Lex hazed his tyres at half track and got really out of shape before hauling it back at the stripe. Micke simply got bored of his brains being shaken out his ears and lifted just past half track. There was only 0.88 in it at the finish. In Pro Stock Car Round 1, Tommy Leindahl, Eero Knihtilä, Jimmy Ålund and Michael Malmgrem lifted the honours. In Top Methanol Funny Car, Ulf Leanders, Dan Larson and Leif Andréasson taking the round wins. In Supertwin we had an unexpected surprise when Lorenz Stäuble's engine conked out during the burnout, which left the door open for first alternate Job Heezen to come in against Per Bengtsson. Per took the win, as did Ronny Aasen, Charley Karling and Gunther Söhn. In Top Fuel bike, the first round honours went to Roel Koedam, Ian King, Dave Bailey and Sverr Dahl. Pro Stock bike round 1 saw Martin Newberry, Orjan Gustafsson, Anders Jakobsson and Anders Abrahamsson take the round wins. In Top Methanol Dragster, Dave Grumpy Wilson had a bye and did not make it a tardy one, either - a 5.453 at 258.59 proves he had got over his motor troubles from the last qualifying session. Krister Johansson surprised Rob Turner in the next pairing with the sort of performance he was regularly dishing out last year with his nitro-fueled un supercharged dragster. Krister has been struggling with the reduced 98% nitro percentage, but he made the most of a 5.801 second pass to drop Rob Turner on a shake-ridden run. Peter Schöfer knew he wouldn't have to try too hard with Rikard Persson in the other lane, but he didn't turn it down that much and ran 5.637 against Rikard's personal-best 6.924 second pass.

In the second round of Pro-mod, Andy Robinson had another of the gremlins which have beset him during the year and his car would not start. Seppo Saapola took the bye and banked the round points. Urban Johansson downed Roger Johansson (no relation) with a cruising 6.236. Danny Cockerill got the round win next over Marko Lantto and Mats Eriksson defeated Bruno Bader with an impressive 6.297. In the semi-final round of Top Fuel, Tommi Haapanen did not show in time for this round (I'm not surprised - he used up more aluminium over the weekend than the bacofoil factory!) so Urs Erbacher got the advantage of a bye run. Not wishing to disappoint the crowd with a parts-saving pass, Urs planted it and ran 4.795 at 304.29 indicating that he might have lifted a smidgeon before the stripe. The crowd loved it and they went crazy. Håkan Nilsson and Lex Joon were up next and this was going to be anybody's guess as they both smoked the tyres at half track and they tried to recover and then Håkan had a big dose of flash-bang before the lights, but it was Håkan who got there first with a 5.015 at 267.99. Lex was just behind at 5.28 having taken the long way round and his black stripes got quite close to the centre line as well. In the Pro Stock semi final Michael Malmgrem continued his storming weekend with taking out Tommy Leindahl 6.92/7.04 and in the second pair, Jimmy Ålund took out Eero Knihtilä (he took himself out with a red light, really) with a 6.95 versus a 6.88. Next up was the Fuel Funny Cars and John Spuffard was up against Gordon Smith. Spuff was away at the lights but lost traction later. Gordon soon ran John down with a storming 5.935 second pass. On a solo, Leif Helander ran a simply superb 5.350 at 243mph to post a lifetime best in the car once owned by ex-pat Prestonian, Smax Smith. In the semi-final of Top Methanol Funny Car, Leif Andréasson handed the FIA championship on a plate to Ulf Leanders with a red light. Leif must not have seen the tree as he kept on it despite his funny car labouring and groaning it's way down the track, leaving an embarrassing trail of oil for the track crew to clear up. I guess Leif didn't have much to say after that, but I thought it best not to go and ask him....! Dan Larsen had a freebie bye in the other round and ran a clean and green 5.87 at over 245mph. Next up was the semi-final of Supertwin and Ronnie Aasen had the chance of locking down the title if he could get past Per Bengtsson. At the lights, Ronny obliged us carried his front wheel to past half track (where he touched down with a visible 'puff' of rubber smoke) and he got to the stripe with 6.852 at 209mph. Congratulations to Ronnie. In the Pro Stock bike semi-final Orjan Gustafsson and Anders Abrahamsson advanced to ink up their next meeting in the final round. In Top Fuel bike, I didn't know who to support the most when it was Britain's Ian King versus the inimitable Roel Koedam. My indecision on personal lane choice was resolved as I stopped level with Ian just as he was burning out. It was the afternoon and the light's better in this lane. That's my excuse and I'm sticking with it! The two big friends were glued to each other, pretty much all the way down track and at it's thrilling conclusion, Roel got there first with a 6.342 at 210mph and Ian was just behind with a 6.51 at 197mph. Dave Bailey got a bye in the other round when Sverr Dahl broke. In the Pro-mod semi-finals, Urban Johansson was shut off by starter Ian Marshal, as he had an oil leak. It seems unkind for the driver to do this, but as they say, a dribble on the start line more often than not turns into a torrent on the run. Safety must always be the first consideration. Danny Cockerill took it easy with a 7.5 second pass and in the second semi-final, Mats Eriksson gifted a final round appearance to Seppo Saapola by pulling a red light. Seppo would have struggled to handle Mats' 6.340 second pass, as well. In the Top Methanol Dragster Semi Final, Dave Wilson downed Krister Johansson with a 5.515 to a labouring 6.680 for Krister. Peter Schöfer had a bye in the other round and took it relatively easy, feeling that lane choice in the final was not essential. Peter has to win the final set low ET of the event to win the championship.

Into the finals we went, starting with SuperTwin. Ronnie Aasen was up against Anders 'Charley' Karling and Charley threw it away with a red light at the start. Ronnie got about 10 feet and snapped his drive belt. Even though he never made it to the other end of the strip, he still gets the win. In the Pro Stock Bike final, Anders Abrahamsson was up against his team mate Orjan Gustafsson and basically Anders was away first at the green and that was that. A 7.470 second pass did the business today. Up next was the Top Fuel bike final with Roel Koedam ending his top fuel bike career. Roel waved his hand to the crowd during the burnout (!) and the crowd really showed it's appreciation with a huge round of applause. I was in the wrong lane, unfortunately, but decided to go down track so as to have half a chance of shooting across track to catch Roel. Dave Bailey red-lighted away anyway and Roel thundered to a 6.324 at 195.38. He just lifted before the line as the motor made a funny noise. Next up was the Pro Stock Car final and it was Jimmy Ålund versus Michael Malmgrem. All weekend Michael has been on some kind of high speed reversing routine and again, he didn't disappoint. Jimmy got away first at the lights and got to the stripe in 6.921 holeshotting Michael who ran a quicker 6.90. It was all down to reaction times - they were both very quick, but Jimmy was quicker. In the Top Methanol Funny Car final, Dan Larson ran a creditable 5.87 second pass over a shaking and rattling Ulf Leanders who got there in 6.900 seconds. In the Pro Mod final, Danny Cockerill was up against Seppo Saapola, Seppo in the pit side lane and Danny in the spectator-side lane. They seemed pretty much glued together all the way down and Danny got there first with a 6.507 at 215.35mph. After a delay for a medical emergency, racing continued with Top Methanol dragster and another Peter Schöfer/Dave Wilson final. Dave was not going to gift anything to Peter, but tyre-shake and a bit of smoke slowed Dave to a 5.702 and Peter won with a 5.559 at 256.03. As Peter didn't get the low ET of the meeting, that means that Dave wins another Top Methanol Dragster championship. Up next as the excitement grew, was the Top Fuel final with Urs Erbacher facing Håkan Nilsson and I think it's safe to say that Urs had been looking 'dangerous' all weekend and was looking to take no prisoners! After super burnouts from both cars, they crept into stage and pulled the fuel to the high side and Paaw!! Off they shot and Urs got there first with a 4.790 at 312.22 mph. Håkan's race was over at 900 feet as his blower belt sailed to the moon - but hey! Håkan had the championship in his pocket, so he shouldn't be too disappointed. The sportsman racing continued after the Top Fuel final and of note amongst the runners was Jon Morton who won the Super Gas title and also in Comp Eliminator, Spencer Tramm was victorious over a late starting Andy Frost who - again - ran right down in that 7 second zone. The Street Eliminator category will be extremely interesting next season.... Just as the jet cars and the Fuel Funny cars were due to run at the very end of the day, the track was closed following the earlier medical emergency.

All in all, this has been simply the best meeting that I have ever attended outside the United States. The weather, the crowds and the whole ambiance of the meeting was absolutely superb and the SPRC, Santa Pod, the staff and the organisation should all take a huge bow. It is difficult to see how such a fantastic meeting can be improved upon, but I am sure that by natural evolution, it will. Thank you for taking the time to read this report. Please come back to www.topnitro.co.uk, soon.

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