Cycle News

Cycle News 2014 Issue 25 June 24

Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles

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NHRA MELLO YELLO PRO STOCK SERIES okay with that." Before she reached the final round, Angie had the enviable task of beating both the Screa- min' Eagle Harley-Davidsons of teammates Eddie Krawiec and Andrew Hines, who had com- bined to win the last three races and done so in a dominant fash- ion. Smith's 6.896 elapsed time beat Krawiec's 6.862 in the sec- ond round and she returned for the semi finals to stop Hines, 6.908 to 6.921. "It's very special to beat both Harleys," Smith said. "Eddie [Krawiec] has beaten me so many times that I stopped count- ing. I owed him this one. I knew I had to do my job on the start- ing line and I somehow managed to get it done. I'd beaten Andrew before, but that was a long time ago and he's had my number ever since. It's just huge to get past both of those bikes because they've been so dominant." VOL. 51 ISSUE 25 JUNE 24, 2014 P93 Briefly... He didn't win in Epping, but Lucas Oil Buell's Hector Arana Jr. has to feel better about his chances after a solid performance that in- cluded a 6.808 win over John Hall in round two - the quickest pass of eliminations. Arana's chance to break up the husband-wife final be- tween Matt and Angie Smith went away when his bike wouldn't shift against Matt. "We made a change after the first round that was going to be a good change once we got the hang of it and because of that, I was able to go low of the round with a 6.80," said Arana Jr. "The bike wouldn't shift. It's one of those one- in-a-million things that can happen to a rider. The gears didn't line up and shift, killing the run completely. Otherwise, we'd have made it to the final, but I'm not going to let what happened get us down." For the second-straight race, Bad Boy Buggies Suzuki's Jimmy Un- derdahl was a no show for the first round after encountering significant engine damage during qualifying. This time, eventual race winner An- gie Smith was the beneficiary of the single run. Screamin' Eagle Harley-Davidson's Eddie Krawiec claimed the top spot in qualifying with a 6.794. It was his third number-one of the sea- son and 17th of his career. "When we came off the truck, both bikes were running well," Krawiec said. "We were struggling a bit, though, in going down the track and making good runs. We had to make a cou- ple changes to make some more power." Naturally, Krawiec was not happy to lose to Angie Smith, whom he had beaten every other time they've raced. "We sort of missed the set- up," Krawiec said. "We went out there and [bogged] the motor and it slowed down a little bit. Angie got around me. That's' racing as they say." Angie Smith was the fourth woman to win an NHRA Pro Stock Motor- cycle race. The others are Angelle Savoie, Karen Stoffer, and Peggy Llewellyn. "Those ladies all paved the way for people like me to come out here and be able to do this," said Angie. Expect Matt Smith Racing Buell's Scotty Pollacheck to make a sponsorship announcement be- fore next weekend's event in Joliet. Pollacheck, who ran the first five events of the season out of his own pocket, is rumored to have inked a deal with a new apparel company. Following the dominant perfor- mance of the Screamin' Eagle Harley team at the most recent round in Englishtown, it was ru- mored that the rest of the Pro Stock Motorcycle teams would sit out the opening round of qualifying in Ep- ping as a way to protest the per- ceived lack of parity, but that boy- cott did not materialize. In a show of unity designed to in- crease the visibility of NHRA's two- wheel racers, the Pro Stock Motor- cycle teams have begun to use the hashtag #nhraPSM in all official team and personal Twitter feeds. continued on next page

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