2006 Easter Thunderball

The 2006 Main Event, FIA Drag Racing Series Round 1,

Report for Monday 29th May 2006

from Santa Pod Raceway

I checked out of the Hotel early Monday morning and I was at the track just after 7:30am. When I returned to precisely the same spot in the field car park where I had parked for the last two days, I was pleased to see it was really drying out well. I had feared that I would have to make use of Santa Pod's tractor at some point over the weekend, as I had to do ,at the Easter Thunderball. Just as I hurried through the recently paved catering areas, a batch of freshly cooked bacon wafted across and hit my nostrils like a jack hammer. Drawn as if by a magnet, I was soon at the baguette stand proffering payment and, within moments, a delicious bacon & egg baguette was ready, just to my liking. I chomped into it, greedily, and was soon feeling ready for anything.

As I was heading out towards the pits, I bumped into Simon Groves of eurodragster who alarmed me with news of eurodragster news editor and webmaster, Tog (a.k.a. Andy Rogers) taking ill, early that morning. He was still in the medical centre at the time and was later taken to Bedford hospital for observation. Thankfully, he is now at home and is resting. He and all the eurodragster team work so hard to provide event coverage, often working into the wee small hours to do so and it can all get to be a little too much. I know that only too well, from painful experience. I wish Tog a speedy recovery and privately hope that Mrs Tog will exert a little pressure for our hero to slow down; well, a little bit, anyway.

I stepped up into the pits again to have a quick smooch around and to have a quick sniff of nitro with a couple of warm-ups, but I had to limit myself a little, as I wanted to get back to the start line for the presentation of the Number 1 qualifiers by Birthday Boy and Master Commentator, John Price. Now in possession of his bus pass (!), John expertly interviewed all the number 1 qualifiers with a notable absentee being Tommy Möller, the TF number 1 qualifier.

Eliminations got started fairly promptly with the first round (of four - its a sixteen car field) in Pro Mod. Mats Eriksson, Markko Lantto, Jan Arve Nygård, Marc Meihuizen, Niclas Andersson, Michael Gullqvist, Norbert Kuno and Urban Johansson were happy to advance to the second round. Notable scalps in the first round were Gordon Appleton, Roger Johansson & 'Fast Freddie' Fredrik Fagerström.

Up next, it was Smax Smith in the MacDonald brothers Bulldog Bash/Double Two Top Fueler who was up against number 1 qualifier Tommy Möller. After his qualifying performance of 4.81 seconds, it really was a bit of a tall order to expect to out perform Tommy, but to be there in the event of a mistake or a mishap. Like they say, its never over until the Fat Lady sings or in this case until you cross the finishing line 1,320 feet away from the start line. In a repetition of the fuel pump problems he had at Easter, Tommy could not keep his engine running and at the behest of the race director, an eager first alternate, Urs Erbacher was given the go ahead to start and make a short burnout as Smax was nearly backed up already. The tension arose as Urs obliged with a completely smokeless short burnout and by the time Urs staged, Smax had only been waiting a few seconds. At the hit of the throttle Smax was away first and Urs thundered down track in hot pursuit; Urs then caught fire - but kept on the throttle, whilst Smax tossed his blower belt to the heavens at 1000 feet and still got to the line first! The crowd went wild and Urs, very much on fire, had the fire crew chase him down in the shut off area. What a popular round win it was for our ex-Prestonite and ex FIA European Top Fuel Champion; won on pure merit and determination. In the other fuel eliminations, Andy Carter was all over the place in a victorious run over a tyre-smoking team mate Thomas Nataas. Andy did a great driving job to haul it back from the centre-line and took the win with a creditable 4.89 second pass. The crowd loved it as the B&Q Powertools Car made it to the line first. Håkan Nilsson over-powered the track before the Christmas tree in his run against Micke Kågered and despite getting back on it several times, Micke was away.... into trouble and blew up big time in the lights with a huge fire. There have been so many sacrifices to the aluminium gods this weekend that I'm sure I heard a satisfied and heavenly burp around now.... Håkan Fällström was up next and ran a beautifully clean run to a 5.01 second pass, whilst current FIA Top Fuel Champ Lex Joon was unfortunately up in smoke at half track. Even with a pedal (if it had stuck), Lex would have been hard pushed to catch Håkan by the stripe.

The second round of Pro-Mod was upon us in a blink of an eye and this time Norbert Kuno, Niclas Andersson, a dangerous-looking Urban Johansson and Michael Gullqvist all made it through. Johansson's run of 6.309 would surely be sufficient backup for a previously much quicker 6.2 second pass and a new European record.

In Top Fuel bike in round two, Roel cruised by Luigi Ferretti to take the win with another 6.2 second pass and France's Eric Teboul thundered down the track to a personal best of 6.269 at over 202 mph. In Pro Stock semi-finals, a thrilling final was set up with Jimmy Ålund taking the win over the towering 6'7" Tommy Leindahl and Eero Knihtila running a bye and still posting a 7.1 second pass. In the second round of Top Fuel, problems manifested themselves from the first round. Micke Kågered simply did not show after there was too much fire damage in the first round. Andy Carter had clearly had serious motor problems in the first round and without another bullet to run against Smax, they were hoping he would not be able to start, so they could burble into stage and take the round. That was far from the case and Smax did indeed stroll up to the line. In view of the fact that he was unopposed, Smax dribbled down the track to preserve those precious parts for the final round. Håkan Fällström was also unopposed by Micke Kågered's no-show and he too, wisely, dribbled down the track to preserve parts for the final round.

In nearly next to no time, apparently, it was time for final round appearances. First up was Michael Gullqvist up against Urban Johansson in Pro Mod and these two were quite serious about not taking prisoners! Micke ran a personal best of 6.33, but that was not going to be enough to keep Urban at bay with a tremendous new European ET record of 6.255 at 225.96 mph. Up next was the final round of Top Fuel. Each team had done their best with what they'd got and now it was a canny game of tactics, strategy and mind games. Well, I'd hoped it would be that, but it turned out to be a most gentlemanly and gracious affair! At the green, they were away, virtually together, and remained pretty much glued to each other all the way down track to a winning time of 5.02 seconds for Håkan, whereas Smax was a measly smidgeon behind at 5.08 seconds. Smax had the bigger mph with 288mph and congratulations must be proffered all round as both teams did brilliantly in a weekend that has been costly in terms of parts sacrificed by all the teams and particularly so with the low budget MacDonald brothers Bulldog Bash/Double Two Top Fuel dragster who at last have had a little luck on their side as opposed to the trouble strewn appearances of last year.

I can't wait until the next round in September at the European Finals at Santa Pod; though I hope to sneak to the Veidec Nitro festival at Mantorp Park, before then, if I can convince Mrs. Topnitro of the wisdom of that suggestion.... Well, I've already got a plane ticket - I suppose that's a good start!

Take a look at the Monday Picture Gallery and see what you think. Many thanks for visiting www.topnitro.co.uk

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