BLAZING START FOR
KRAWIEC AT NHRA OPENER
S
creamin' Eagle Harley-David-
son's Eddie Krawiec has an
incredible knack for winning the
first race of each new season
and he did it again with a victory
at the Amalie NHRA Gatorna-
tionals at Gainesville Raceway,
March 18-19. Krawiec rode to a
final round win over his Vance &
Hines teammate Andrew Hines.
Krawiec powered to a 6.763 for
the win to cover Hines' competi-
tive 6.802 elapsed time.
"Getting a win this early re-
ally helps set the pace for the
year," Krawiec said. "If you can
win two or three races, that just
about guarantees a spot in the
Countdown. This is an extra-
competitive class and we've
got a lot of good bikes out here
this year so a fast start is more
important than ever. It just feels
good to get one out of the way
so quickly."
The Gainesville opener
featured premium weather and
track conditions which allowed
for record-setting performances.
Krawiec qualified number two
IN
THE
WIND
P28
with a 6.791, behind White Alliga-
tor Suzuki's Jerry Savoie, who
rode to a 6.753 for the top spot.
All 16 qualifiers ran quicker than
a 6.922, making it one of the
most competitive fields in the
history of the class.
"We spent the winter work-
ing to refine our program and it
showed this weekend," Krawiec
said. "We spent a lot of time
in the dyno room working on
engines and trying to learn a
whole new way to tune our
bikes. We also knew coming in
here that this track was going
to be really quick and we knew
our challenge was going to be to
harness that extra horsepower.
We went testing a week ago and
we swapped my tune-up with
the one that my teammate was
using. We picked up 3.5 miles-
per-hour and that told us that
we were on to something. By
the time we got here we had a
couple of fast motorcycles."
Although Krawiec had one of
the quickest bikes in the field,
getting it to the finish line proved
to be a challenge on at least
a couple of runs including his
round one win over Mike Berry.
Krawiec rode the centerline for
much of the track before finally
getting the bike settled.
"I was pointed a little crooked
and when I popped the clutch,
the bike headed for the center
line and I couldn't get it to come
Eddie Krawiec got the 2017 NHRA
season off to a winning start like
he usually does.
