Gustafsson, Christiansen and Lencses but Maurice makes a move on Day Two
FIM-E Dragbike Championship, Round Two, SpeedEvents Internationals, Tierp Arena, Sweden
Qualifying quickened up for many on the second day for the pro classes at the Speedevents Internationals at Tierp Arena. Three sessions for the bikes shuffled the packs in the four classes, but a leading trio from yesterday held onto their top spots.
Rikard Gustafsson carries over his 6.0244 from yesterday to lead FIM-E Top Fuel Bike, putting in a gentle checkout pass to in the first session today after a motor swap. Sverre Dahl has already left the premises, withdrawing due to oiling issues, Rene van den Berg (3rd) and Eric Richard (4th but improving to a 6.7211) hold station, Mike Olie (6.8596) and Kari Rautanen (6.8723) and Thomas Pettersson (7.4568) complete the field.
Marcus Christiansen improved to a 6.2189 to stay ahead in FIM-E Super Twin but as we predicted yesterday the chasing field have stepped up a bit. Per Bengtsson (6.6027), Chris van Nimmen (PBing with a 6.8412), Greger Johansson (6.8801), Roman Sixta (6.9324) and Svein Olav Rolfstad (6.9490) cracked the sixes, with Erling Opheim (7.0647) and John Rolfstad (7.2972) rounding out the eight bike field, with four alternates for tomorrow’s eliminations.
Dániel Donát Lencsés didn’t improve but yesterday’s 6.7314 holds on to top spot in FIM-E Super Street Bike. Behind him, Alan Morrison Jnr carded a 6.7606 and Mathias Bohlin improved to a 6.7955, while Mogens Lund blitzed his PB with a 6.8262 to round out the multinational top four. Fourteen bikes will progress to eliminations first thing tomorrow on a sixteen bike ladder.
Moves in FIM-E Pro Stock Bike shuffled things around a fair bit as reigning champion Bertrand Maurice cracked the 7.0s for his first time with a 7.0921 and Dimitrios Petridis dropped his PB by two tenths with a 7.152 for second spot. Yesterday’s low qualifier Joerg Lymant improved to a 7.1526 but dropped two places (a 6.9 on the scoreboards caused a flurry of excitement until the 0.8s 60 foot clocking was taken into account). Seven qualified riders will give a solid three rounds of eliminations tomorrow, Maurice benefitting from a first round bye and a chance to check out if the fix for a compression loss has done the job.
Tomorrow (Sunday) will see all four classes head into eliminations day. A free livestream with appear on the Speedevents Youtube channel when the action starts (subscribe for a notification) https://www.youtube.com/@Speedevents_se
Words and photos Ivan Sansom & Rose Hughes
