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DRAG RACE NHRA PRO STOCK SERIES ROUNDS 1-2/SEPTEMBER 13-14, 2014 TEXAS MOTORPLEX/DALLAS, TEXAS P76 "If Steve makes it up there in time, I lose," Hines said. "When I left the starting line, my bike was shaking the tire and I pushed the button for sec- ond gear and it went straight to fifth. I've never had that experi- ence before. I knew something was really wrong, but I did the stupid thing and stayed with it. I feel bad for Steve, but we waited about an extra nine or 10 minutes for him to show up and eventually Mark [Lyle, NHRA chief starter] gave us the signal to fire up. When Mark does that, you've got to go. I'm sure Steve isn't the happiest guy in the world right now, but what are we going to do? It was a bad deal all the way around. I took my time as much as I could and I'm sure it makes Steve feel worse to see what happened to my bike, but I guess that's fate." His final round troubles not- withstanding, Hines was rock- solid on race day in Dallas. After qualifying in the number-three spot, he survived a close battle against Lucas Oil Buell's Hec- tor Arana Sr. in the first round. Hines had the second-quickest bike in the second round with a 6.90, but didn't need it after White Alligator Suzuki's Jerry Savoie red-lighted. Hines then punched his ticket to the final with a 6.92 to 6.98 win over Petrolhead Buell's Scotty Pol- lacheck in the semi final round. "Last night, I wasn't so sure we'd be here," Hines said. "We struggled with this new bike; we were good at first but then we lost the handle on it. Now I think we've got it straightened out." In spite of his mechanical woes, Johnson had every rea- son to feel good about his per- formance in Dallas. On Satur- day, he raced to the final round of the Charlotte race and re- peated the feat on Sunday. "We've never hurt so many parts in one race," Johnson said. "We were matching parts up with other engines and liter- ally had three teams helping us do it. We had two options. We could have put a motor in and that would have had us up there in time or we could have put in the kick-ass-win-the-race motor. We choose the kick-ass engine and just missed the call. "I'm not mad, though," John- son said. "I went up to Eddie [Krawiec] to find out what hap- pened from the horse's mouth. Eddie said they waited as long as they could until they were asked to fire up and go. I ap- preciated that. You can't ask for more from a competitor. Those guys have lots of resources and tons of talent. To show sports- manship on top of it, that makes them a class act." CN FINAL 1. Andrew Hines (Harley-Davidson) 7.571/186.54 mph 2. Steve Johnson (Suzuki) No Show Briefly... hopes took a major hit when he lost in the first round in of the Dal- las event. Arana Jr. was well ahead of opponent Shawn Gann but sat up before the finish line. Arana Jr. is now in fourth place in the standings, 125 behind leader Hines. "I don't know what might have happened," said Arana Jr. "We went over everything on the bike and it looked beautiful. I was in front of him and had the win all of a sudden it threw me into the wind- shield. I don't know what happened." White Alligator Suzuki's Jerry Savoie had a bike that was quick enough to win the race but a red-light start (by just three-thousandths of a second) ended his day in round two against Hines. Michael Ray, who left the Star team two races ago and is now riding a Su- zuki owned by Joe DeSantis, might be back on a Buell V-twin in the near future. Ray owns the Buell chas- sis he'd been riding all season and recently sent that bike in for a fresh look. If and when the bike resurfac- es, it will most likely have an engine leased from Matt Smith's team. Following the completion of the first two rounds of the six-round Countdown to the Championship playoffs, Hines is the leader over Krawiec by 45-points. Steve John- son, who started the Countdown in the number 10 spot, has moved to third after his two runner-up finishes. The remainder of the field includes Hector Arana Jr., Matt Smith, Scotty Pollacheck, John Hall, Hector Arana Sr. Angie Smith, and Michael Ray.

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