Super Series 3
Sunday (race day)

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18:45

We have now posted pictures of today's action, they are available from the raceday update index page.

That's the end of our coverage of Super Series 3, brought to you in association with e-manumit.com and High Performance Heaven, to whom grateful thanks. Thanks to all of you for tuning in over the weekend.

Your reporters were Tog and Sharkman of Eurodragster.com, all pictures by Sharkman. Thanks for their help this weekend to: Wayne, Simon and Ozzy of the tech crew; the APIRA officials; Bruno and the FAST team; APIRA Press Officer Jerry Cookson and Simon Groves in the SCR Press Office; to Terry and Tina Gibbs; and to track announcer John Price for putting up with us. Eurodragster's next raceday coverage of the Super Series will be from Super Series 4 on 26th-28th August.

17:20

Here are the results in all classes:

Super Comp: Alex Nicol 8.921/151.52 def. Tim Adam 8.859/149.01 breakout
Super Gas: Frank Mason 9.916/134.74 def. Tim Adam 9.932/145.63
Super Street: Lee Huxley 11.235/111.94 def. Al Didwell 11.167/122.62
Super Pro ET: Andy Hone 8.603/159.01 def. Dave Moore 8.402/161.29
Pro ET: Steve Wells 11.165/114.80 def. Dave Baldwin 11.607/116.88
Sportsman ET: Neil L'Alouette 14.106/72.58 def. Paul Voyce 23.973/29.03
Junior Dragster: Joe Bond 14.066/45.18 def. Johnny Walker 15.630/38.99
Custom Car Street Eliminator: Jeff Meads 10.139/143.31 def. Steve Nash 10.252/109.22 red light
Wild Bunch: Steve Good 11.816/118.11 def. Martin Holgate 10.914/123.97
Super Street Rover: Steve Good 11.241/125.00 def. Martin Moore broke
Outlaw Anglia: Rob Stone: 9.717/138.04 def. Bob Hancox 10.473/127.12
European Top Gas: Job Heezen 8.354/156.25 def. Herman Jolink 9.810/120.64
Top Fuel Bike: Steve Woollatt 6.752/205.48 def. Ian King 6.940/189.87
Pro Stock Bike: Dave Beck 7.556/177.87 def. Len Paget 8.178/163.04
Funny Bike: Chris Hall staged for points, was unopposed
Super Street Bike: Graham Dance 13.658/83.80 def. Tony Clark 24.847/24.10
Comp Bike: Tim Whetton 9.541/123.63 def. Eddie Galvin 9.435/120.64 red light
9.90 Bike: Geof Connor 9.946/113.35 def. Jamie Sneddon 9.921/138.04
10.90 Bike: Paul Hambidge 10.934/115.68 def. Darren Winnard 10.876/132.74 breakout
Super Twin Fuel: John Williamson 8.656/153.58 def. Ian Carruthers 9.926/132.35
Super Twin Modified: Mark van de Boer 10.454/127.48 def. Wayne Larson 10.756/122.95
Super Twin Gas: Ric Davies 9.959/128.57 def. Jerry Collier 9.814/130.43
Super Twin Street: Les Harris 10.740/124.31 def. Steve Piper 10.858/122.38

After the finals, Jon Hogarth put in another pass in his new 'Vette Super Comp, recording 8.396/163.04.

Roger Goring closed the day with a fantastic pass of 6.474/250.00 with the Firestorm Jet FC. Given that Roger's runs this weekend have been checkout passes you have to wonder what's in store when he turns up the wick.

Today's pictures are now being worked on, stay tuned.

15:00

We've had the first round of European Top Gas and it went as follows:

Herman Jolink 9.600/134.73 def. Gunter Retsch 10.220/145.63
Job Heezen 8.321/154.11 bye

So the first half of a new record in competition for Job, nice work!

Steve Woollatt and Ian King have had their final of Top Fuel Bike. A great race, side-by-side sixes, Steve Woollatt getting there first at 6.752/205.48 to Ian's 6.940/189.87. Unofficially (so far) this makes Steve Woollatt the 2000 ACU Top Fuel Bike Champion since today is the last round for this class this season.

Roger Goring put in the first of today's two passes in his Jet FC, off it at 1000 feet and a great 6.417/229.59. Roger told me before the run that he was aiming for about 220 mph so he must be well pleased with that pass.

Graham Dance and Tony Clark are continuing to slug it out in Super Street Bike, Graham recording 8.231/174.42 in his next round, Tony answering with an 8.254/173.75 in his race.

A similar ET duel is taking place in Pro Stock Bike with Chris Hope at 7.551 and Dave Beck at 7.581 the form of the class.

Stay tuned.

13:00

Eliminations are proceeding at the usual furious Sunday pace, and Super Street Bike is establishing itself as the class of the day. Graham Dance ran 8.271 in round one, only for Tony Clark to go one better at 8.252. In the second round, Tony backed off to a time in the 8.5s whilst Dancey turned it up to 8.224. "We weren't going to make any changes to the bike until Tony went quicker", Graham told me in the fire-up road. If the ladders work as they should then Dancey and Tony Clark won't meet until the final. Other notables in SSB have been Pete Bellinie who has run into the 8.5s, and Germany's Klaus Sarembe who is also running in the eights.

Also on two wheels, Dave Holland had a wobbly moment on the new (to him) Pro Mod Bike, exercising what we at Eurodragster call "dynamic lane choice", i.e. starting the run in one lane and finishing it in the other. Luckily in this case his first round opponent had broken and so Dave was on a single.

Congratulations to Custom Car Street Eliminator racer Ian Hook on breaking his PB in a big way, running 9.711 in the first round of Pro ET, in which he is also entered. Ian repeated the feat in the first round of CCSE with a run in the 9.8s.

The Junior Dragsters are being followed around this weekend by a TV crew from the BBC. They are to be featured in a CBBC programme called "The Exchange", which is a morning show. They're following Katie Gibbs, Holley Glassup, Joe Bond and Johnny Walker. We don't have any transmission details yet but as soon as we know then we'll post them on Eurodragster News. APIRA Press Officer Jerry Cookson tells that that there could be as much as thirty minutes of coverage in the programme.

Stay tuned for more news from eliminations.

10:30

Good morning and welcome again from Shakespeare County Raceway on another warm and sunny morning. We've said on these pages before that if it has to rain at a race then overnight is preferable, it happened again last night but the morning dawned sunny and warm and the track was all but dry before Bruno and the FAST team started work on it. We are half an hour from kick-off and the track looks just great.

On our last race report yesterday we mentioned Job Heezen's great run of 8.164 in practice, Job was seeking an aluminium welder in the pits last night - here's hoping he found one.

Judging by the revised European Top Gas qualifying standings which I've just been given, Job has made whatever repairs he needed to. Nol van Zwieten has now officially been withdrawn from the standings (there was a confusion about all-run fields) so the ETG qualifying now stands as follows:

1. Marc Klessens 8.887/144.23, 2. Herman Jolink 9.869/126.05, 3. Gunter Retsch 9.922/146.10, 4. Job Heezen 16.802/50.45. So it's Klessens v Heezen and Jolink v Retsch in the first round this morning.

We haven't done a pit walk this morning because we have had a photo session with Roger Goring and the Firestorm Jet FC. Roger is very pleased with yesterday's progress, and he loves the track. "It's very smooth, you just have to be a bit careful in the shutdown area", he said. "But it's a nice long track and I feel comfortable with it. We will be looking to go a bit faster today but we have a plan of action, we won't be junking that and going after Martin Hill's record just yet". Roger confided that he was tempted to stay on the throttle all the way on his second pass yesterday because the car drives so well on this track, but he said that self-discipline took over and he shut it off at the planned point.

After the photo session, the crew pushed Firestorm into stage and then I was strapped in by Ian, Rogers's crew chief, and the body was put down so I could get an idea of what Roger sees. As you probably know, Firestorm's jet is rear-mounted and the cockpit is right up front. So I had an uninterrupted view straight down the track.

I'm not claustrophobic so I had no problems there, but what struck me immediately was how little there is in front of you in this car. I've sat in dragsters and the length of the car seems to make you feel more comfortable, here there was just a bonnet, and even though I'm vertically-challenged I felt very low down. Having said that I think I felt more comfortable than I would with the jet engine alongside me. It just goes to show how courageous all jet pilots are.

The dashboard was simple and functional with a few gauges, three buttons on the steering wheel to control the flame show and the afterburner, emergency chute and cut-off handles, and two pedals which I couldn't reach! Ian had me strapped in as tightly as Roger would be and I could hardly move - this is of course what you want. Sharkman took a picture with the digital camera, we will publish that at the end of the day in the usual manner.

The standard of engineering and crafstmanship in the car is very high indeed, every detail has been attended to - if you get the chance to take a look at Firestorm in the pits then be sure and give it the once-over. It is a very impressive piece of kit. And if you get a chance to see it run, then get there early to reserve your seat.

Racing starts soon, stay tuned for news.