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IN THE WIND P30 HINES GETS THIRD WIN AT NHRA FOUR WIDE RACE T he annual NHRA Four Wide Nationals is a unique event where racers in every pro class, including Pro Stock Motorcycle, simultaneously compete against three other racers at zMax Dragstrip, the sport's only four- lane dragstrip. In each heat, the first and second place finishers advance while the other two are eliminated. The format puts a premium on rider concentration and so far, no one has been able to master it like Screamin' Eagle Harley-Davidson's An- drew Hines. For the third-straight year, Hines won the Four Wide title, beat- ing a talented final-round group that included teammate Eddie Krawiec, Victory Gunner's Matt Smith and Pip- pin Trucking Buell's Chip Ellis. Hines got off the starting line first and won with a 6.844, edging Krawiec's 6.849 by a final margin of just five-thousandths of a second. "This race can be very confusing because you have twice as many bikes and four lanes going at once but I am very comfortable here," Hines said. "From the time we rolled up for Q1 on Friday I felt good. I'm familiar with the whole staging proce- dure and I don't feel pressured. I wish we could run every race here. It's great to come here and get another win, especially so early in the season. "To be honest, I thought Eddie was probably go- ing to win," Hines said. "He was so fast in qualify- ing and he was fast again earlier in the day. We've been struggling to keep up with him but at the same time, we've also done a lot of experimenting with my bike. We've tried a lot of new things and some of them are just starting to pay off." Krawiec, the winner of the season- opening NHRA event in Gainesville set the pace in qualifying with a 6.818 and won his first two heats before finishing second in the final. Ironically, Hines didn't win either of his first two heats. He finished second to White Alligator Suzuki's Jerry Savoie in the first match and then trailed Krawiec in the second heat after Krawiec set the low elapsed time of the race with a 6.810. With his 43rd career win, Hines needs just two more victories to tie the late Dave Schultz as NHRA's most successful Pro Stock Motorcycle racer. Schultz claimed 45 wins before his career was cut short by cancer in 2001. "I have a lot of memories from watching Dave race when I was a kid," Hines said. "There is a lot of history that goes into chasing that 45th win. Dave was still in his prime when we lost him and he definitely would have won a lot more races. I think it's an honor just to be as close to him as I am now." Kevin McKenna PHOTOGRAPHY BY KEVIN MCKENNA For the third year in a row, Andrew Hines was victorious at the Four Wide Nationals at the zMax Dragstrip.