8/8/06
After a struggle to
qualify on the bump
with a 5.190 (the 13 car
entry causing some
nervous glances over
his shoulder during
the final session), car
owners Per and
Karsten Andersen
tuned the Veidec/
Landmeco missile to
a string of four
second passes
(including a low ET of the event in a 4.86 to 4.91 defeat of low qualifier Micke Kagered in the first round) to clinch Nilsson’s first victory at his sponsors race and move into the championship points lead.
rookie Top
Fuel season,
Urs Erbacher
made his
way through
to the final
round after
qualifying in
third spot
(5.030). The
Swiss team
appeared to have developed a degree of economy in their tune up during qualifying, thanks to assistance from the well travelled Glenn Mikres, but eliminations saw three engine changes and a big lick of flame at 200 feet as one of the heads lifted in the final round ended Erbacher’s holeshot lead and any chance of securing his first event victory in Top Fuel.
finalist, Tommi Haapanen in his
second race back after a six
year sabbatical from the
cockpit qualified with a 5.17 in
7th and used a consistent 5.11
to defeat a tire smoking 5.13
from Tommy Moller in the
closest race of eliminations, but then pulled a -0.189 red light to hand an easy victory to Erbacher whose mount was chucking parts high in the sky over the finish line.
Most of western Europe has basked (and melted) in a record breaking heatwave over the past month, and hot and humid conditions were very much on the weather chart for most of of the Veidec Festival, traditionally Europe’s largest drag race, held at Mantorp Park at the end of July. The entry list was slightly depleted in the sportsman ranks in comparison with previous years, but the bumper FIA/UEM fields more than made up for this although many struggled to dial in a tune up to the harsh track surface (track temperatures topping out over the 50 deg C mark, 122 deg Fahrenheit in old money) and the infamous bumps and dips that make Mantorp one of the most challenging racetracks on the European Tour. Headlining the event was the largest Top Fuel field ever seen in Europe, with 13 cars making qualifying passes, and a bumper 25 car entry in Pro Modified. Slightly frustratingly, the hot conditions prevented stellar numbers in many of the categories, and the timing equipment proved frustratingly erratic during qualifying and missed a couple of impressive passes in Top Fuel. However, the Swedish fans that packed out the facility over the weekend would have been more than happy with the outcome of eliminations, with their countrymen occupying 10 of the 16 final round spots, and victorious in 6 of the 8 categories.