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They thought they saw a monster 232-mph lap from Doug Vancil (lead photo) on Friday, only to have it disallowed because of an electronic glitch. Then the fans were rewarded when four racers ran laps between 219 and 223 with the speed mark eventually going to Mike Romine after a second round duel by just four-hundredths of a second. Romine set the top speed mark at 223.69 to edge Mark Cox's 223.65. Cox got a little revenge as he ran a quicker 6.514 to edge Romine's 6.579.

Just to really give the fans of the fast hogs a real qualifying treat. At somewhere around 10 pm Saturday night the last two pair to fire were Doug Vancil, who needed to run quicker than 6.447 to wrench the pole away from Ray Price, and Mark Conner who needed to run better than a 6.701 to get back into the field after being bumped. Vancil's Vance & Hines-backed Harley ran low elapsed time of the meet with a 6.37 and Conner (below) bumped back into the field with a 6.66 pass. The crowd went wild!

Eliminations on Sunday were just as good as the qualifying the previous two days had been. The bikes didn't make their first lap until three o'clock in the afternoon so the crews and drivers had all day to tweak the tune-ups and the drivers. Price had low elapsed time of the round with a solid 6.423 to set up a semi-final match with Mark Cox who had run a 6.434 to beat Steve Stordeur. Takeshi Shigematsu got past a troubled Johnny Mancuso with a 6.62, which got him the dubious honor of Doug Vancil in the semis.

In the semis Price put a big holeshot on Cox (photo) with a .014 light to Cox's .063! Price's 6.462 wasn't enough to hold off Cox's career best 6.404 and Cox got to the stripe just .011 of a second before Price.

In the other match Vancil took Shigematsu (photo) out large with a 6.456 to a 6.657. Vancil struggled to control his hog all the way down track, hanging his body way off the bike's centerline to keep it between the lines, but managed to win.

The final round was anti-climatic as what started out to be a great race quickly went south when Cox's Bojangles Chicken-sponsored bike wasted a great .003 reaction time when it nosed over at about 100 feet and Vancil motored to the win with a leisurely 6.706/209 lap.

If the crowd's reaction to the Nitro Harley's -- they stood up and cheered en mass every time the bikes ran during eliminations -- is any indication, you can look for a larger schedule next year for these competitors. (At least that's what the staff at DRO has on the request line.) They will appear at least two more times on the NHRA circuit this year with the Pro Mods. Don't miss those events.

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