FIA DRAG RACING CHAMPIONSHIP
Rain halts play but Micallef lifts FIA European title
Organiser: Santa Pod Racers Club When: September 7-10 Where: Santa Pod, Bedfordshire Starters: 262.
The FIA European Drag Racing season came to its conclusion at Santa Pod Raceway over the weekend, although the event was severely disrupted and ultimately curtailed by the repeated intervention of the wet stuff.
For all of the FIA professional categories, qualifying was a challenging affair with at best two sessions permitted, which caused some shocks in the formulation of the fields for eliminations.
Rain also plagued the activities on finals day with the sterling work of the track preparation crew managing to get the four FIA classes past the semi-final stage before more rain and only small breaks on the weather radar frustrated their efforts.
After a slew of polesitting runs across Europe this season, one of the major casualties of the abbreviated qualifying was Brit Liam Jones who failed to make the eight-car field in FIA Top Fuel Dragster. With Jones and the Rune Fjeld Motorsports team on the outside looking in, and the first- round loss of Finn Antti Horto in the Eagle Racing/rune Fjeld Motorsports entry (who had qualified low with a 4.0883s/292.06mph), the 2017 points series was deservedly decided in favour of Duncan Micallef.
The third RFM dragster driver who has led the points thanks to a strong series of event wins in Sweden, Finland and Germany.
He celebrated by working his way to a final round berth, defeating second generation Jndia Erbacher at the quarter final stage with a 4.1579s/303.78mph run (top speed of the meeting) and a competition solo at the semifinal stage when opponent Stefan Gunnarsson was a no-show after a catastrophic engine explosion in his first round.
Micallef’s final round opponent was due to be outgoing series champion Anita Makela; the popular Finnish racer producing her best race day performance on what has been a wretched season with round wins over Stig Neergaard and Mikael Kagered, the latter came with a 4.0754s at only 240.72mph for the quickest elapsed time of the weekend.
The combined FIA and MSA Pro Modified category had Swede Jimmy Alund qualify with a 5.9786s/236.09mph run, followed by Andy Robinson with a 6.0769s/236.15mph. Robinson kept British hopes alive with a 5.994s/237.49mph season’s best in the first round of eliminations on the 16-car ladder but a loose airline on the transmission halted his chance of honours at the quarter final stage. The final was due to be contested by Dutch racer David Vegter and the newly crowned and almost perennial FIA champion Micke Gullqvist before the rain came.
Gullqvist’s Swedish compatriot Bengt Ljungdahl gained his first FIA Pro Stock Car title over the weekend, while Germany’s Timo Habermann picked up the honours in FIA Top Methanol ahead of his younger sibling Dennis.