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NHRAlPowerAde Drag Racing Series Round 5: Route SS Raceway (Left) Angelle Savoie completed a dominating performance at Route 66 Raceway with a 7.13-to-7 .20 win over Team 23's Antron Brown In the final round. With the win, Savoie extended her lead in the PowerAde Pro Stock Bike points standings. lAbove) Savoie celebrated her second win of the season and her 24th as a professional. She has now won races at all but two tracks on the NHRA Pro Stock Bike tour. STORY AND PHOTOS BY KEVIN McKENNA JOUET, IL, MAY 30-JUNE 2 ngelle Savoie has won 24 races A , and two championships in her stellar seven-year Pro Stock Bike career, but rarely has she been more dominant than she was at the Chicagoland Dodge Dealers Nationals at Route 66 Raceway. Early in qualifying, Savoie set the pace with a 7.14 run on 'her CVEC Suzuki and, from that point on, she was never challenged as she won her second 52 JUNE 19, 2002' cue • • race of the season and extended her lead in the PowerAde points standings. Savoie put an exclamation point on the weekend in the final round against Antron Brown with a 7.13, the quickest run of the event. Brown, the winner of the Englishtown, New Jersey round two weeks earlier, could only muster a 7.20 from his Team 23 Suzuki. To make matters worse, Savoie was first off the starting line with a nearly perfect 0.405 reaction time. "I knew Antron was going to be tough in the final, so 1 tried really n _ VII" S hard to cut a great light and I did," Savoie said. "That 0.405 was the best that was going to come out of me and I was happy to have it. From there, I shifted on time, everything was so smooth, and the bike pulled all the way down the track. It might not look like it sometimes, but it is not easy to win these races." Savoie was not only the first racer to post a 7.1-second elapsed time in Joliet, she was the only one, as no one else ran quicker than Brown's 7.20 in either qualifying or eliminations. On race day, Savoie ran noth- ing but 7.1 s as she downed Fred Camarena, John Smith, and Vance & Hines rider Matt Hines with runs of 7.15, 7.18, and 7.15, respectively. Hines made his best run of the weekend against Savoie in the semifinals, but even his 7.21 was no match for her Star Racing-powered entry. "This bike is so awesome," Savoie said. "The way I see it, my crew has already won the race when we get to the track. The rest is up to me. I have to make it happen. Having a fast bike has given me a lot of confidence, but it can also be a little scary because I know when I don't win, I have no one to blame but myself. If the bike breaks, that's one thing, but I can't handle it when I red-light or shortshift the bike because I know I let my team down. Thankfully, I didn't have to deal with that this weekend."