IN
THE
WIND
P30
HINES GRABS MORE FOUR-WIDE GLORY
S
creamin' Eagle Harley-Da-
vidson's Andrew Hines suc-
cessfully negotiated the often-
confusing Four-Wide Nationals
to claim his 39th career NHRA
national event title. The once-
a-year event is different in that
it features four lanes of side-by-
side-by-side competition in the
four-lane dragstrip at zMax Drag-
way in Charlotte. In each four-
bike heat, the first and second
place finishers advance until the
final where a winner, runner-up,
and two semifinalists are decid-
ed. Hines has now won the event
twice after defeating his team-
mate, Eddie Krawiec, Lucas
Oil Buell's Hector Arana Jr. and
Petrolhead Buell's Scotty Polla-
check in the final round.
"After Gainesville, we went
back to our shop, got to work
and tried a few things," Hines
said. "We followed through with
our game plan and my Harley V-
Rod got us to the final round."
Hines' biggest concern was
Arana Jr., who tied the best
speed in the history of the class
with a 199.26-mph blast in the
semi finals and then returned
to flirt with the 200-mph barrier
in the final with a 199.88-mph
effort. Arana Jr. made the quick-
est run in the final with a 6.804,
but Hines and Krawiec got the
starting line holeshot and both
Harley riders beat him to the
finish line.
"We had only been running
about 193-194 mph so we took
a gamble in the final and closed
the gap between us and Hector
[Arana] Jr," Hines said. "We took
a swing at it; looked at a few
things we used to do four or five
years ago, and when I put the
bike in high gear it was boogy-
ing. We're still about three mph
off of Junior but he doesn't have
us by six or seven anymore. The
200 mph deal is important. It's
the last big barrier in our sport
and we want a shot at it. Hope-
fully, we have similar conditions
in Englishtown in a couple of
months."
Kevin McKenna
Reigning champ Andrew Hines (1) takes his first
win of the year in Charlotte, North Carolina.
