The FIA European Finals
Santa Pod Raceway
September 7-10, 2023
2023 FIA European Finals at Santa Pod Raceway
Winners Become Champions
Words & photos by Ivan Sansom & Rose Hughes / www.dragracingeurope.eu
The 2023 FIM-E Dragbike championship goes into the ledger following a season of ups and downs with a dramatic finale at Santa Pod Raceway when a record-breaking heatwave came to an end with a spectacular storm sweeping through the facility.
Once focus had shifted from holding down awnings and keeping out of the deluge, the SPRC track crew did a tremendous job to get the track back into raceable condition and the FIM-E classes completed before the curfew kicked in. Notably the Euro Finals winners not only ended their year on a high, but will carry the Number One plates next year having doubled up with the title trophies.
2023 FIM-E CHAMPIONS
- Top Fuel Motorcycle – Rickard Gustafsson
- Super Twin Motorcycle – Marcus Christiansen
- Pro Stock Motorcycle – Bertrand Maurice
- Super Street Bike – Alan Morrison Junior
- Junior Dragbike – Leah Morrison
ELIMINATIONS
FIM-E Top Fuel Motorcycle
Rikard Gustafsson and the RG Engineering team used the time over the weekend to go through the issues that had beset the FIM-E Top Fuel championship winning bike in the latter part of the season. A first round bye bought time to thoroughly investigate the fuel system and rebuild the pump, after which the bike came back to life with a pair of 5.9s, the best coming in the final with a 5.921/237.43 to take the event win and underline the Swede’s fourth championship.
Some great numbers were also produced elsewhere on the ladder, with Eric Richard managing a semifinal finish (going out to Gustafsson at that stage) after a side-by-side 6.5 quarter final eliminator with Mark Smith. Richard dropping into second spot in the 2023 points in doing so.
Al Smith managed a 6.182 in an opening freebie when Rene van den Berg was shutoff before making the startline, but oil pressure issues ended his event. There was also the small matter of Gustafsson’s final round opponent and Stuart Crane finished the year off with a run through eliminations, resetting his PB with a 6.206/213.87 (and a 4.004 half track) to defeat Mike Olie before almost repeating with a 6.288 in the trophy match up in far from ideal conditions for the Warpspeed funny.
FIM-E Super Twin Motorcycle
Marcus Christiansen was hunting numbers in FIM-E Super Twin and lowered his PB with a 6.105/222.28 to lower the European best with a naturally aspirated twin in the semi-final bye.
With cooler conditions for the final under the lights the Danish dynamic duo of Marcus and his father Claus tweaked things a bit to take aim at the 6.0s, unfortunately they weren’t to come as the motor went away at about the 1000 foot mark, but a 6.415 was enough to take the win from Chris van Nimmen’s 6.985 (the Belgian ending the year on a high having defeated championship runner-up Martijn de Haas in the first round of eliminations).
With the winter to fix it, Speedy’s Racing will be pretty much odds on for a 6.0 (or possibly better) next year.
FIM-E Pro Stock Motorcycle
The FIM-E Pro Stock Bike event trophy headed back over the Channel to France alongside the championship with Bertrand Maurice continuing his improvements with the Light Speed Suzuki at the year’s conclusion, a 7.235/182 in the opening round victory over Aswin le Noble being his best of the weekend.
On the lower half of the ladder Joerg Lymant produced a pair of mid sevens to defeat Jerome Rougemont in the quarters and a semi-final finish for the Buell and second spot in the championship.
Martin Newbury booked his spot in the final alongside Maurice after a pair of 7.1s (a 7.159 in the opening round being the class best of the weekend) but he left too early to hand the Euro Finals title to Maurice.
FIM-E Super Street Bike
FIM-E Super Street Bike was the only championship to go into eliminations up for grabs, but when Daniel Donat Lencses jumped through stage in his quarter final with Mark Hope, Alan Morrison Jnr was handed the number one plate for next year.
That makes it sound easy, but Morrison Jnr ripped off an impressive series of 6.790/218.03 (to defeat brother Ross’s 6.931/211.09) and 6.764/218.02 to take account of Hope at the semi-finals. His opponent Jake Mechaell set low ET of the quarters and semis with a 6.741/216.98 (knocking off Peter Ostlund) and a 6.695/218.97 (over a redlighting Mogens Lund).
Mechaell spun wildly off the start line in the all important match up while Morrison Jnr took his third event win of the year with a super consistent 6.775/220.27.
FIM-E Junior Drag Bike Cup
With two trophies to take back home, the Morrison family added another two when Leah Morrison (Alan Jnr’s daughter) took a winner-takes-all final round against Holley King in the FIM-E Junior Cup leaving first and getting closer to her 11.80 dial-in to end what has been a topsy-turvy season in the Juniors.
Find more coverage at www.dragracingeurope.eu
FINAL QUALIFYING
After an engine rebuild overnight, Rikard Gustafsson suffered more damage on his one pass today but carried over the 5.9 from yesterday to keep the top spot in FIM-E Top Fuel Bike.
FIM-E Top Fuel Motorcycle
Behind him there was some substantial improvements with Stuart Crane recording a 6.270/214 from the Warpspeed Funny and Al Smith moving up to three with a 6.292 that was clicked off when Smith noticed the oil pressure dropping on the PBR Rocket. Eric Richard improved ET wise with a 6.5038, as did Mark Smith (6.5325) and Mike Olie (6.9062); indicating the rude health that European funnybike racing is in. Rene van den Berg and the Shark Attack fueler nipped in ahead of Olie in sixth spot with a 6.735.
FIM-E Super Twin Motorcycle
Marcus Christiansen is somewhat distant at the head of the FIM-E Super Twin trio and produced a thing of beauty in the first session with a 6.118s/217.92 to deliver the quickest injected twin pass outside of North America. A second shot at Bob Malloy’s world best mark drifted off a bit when the fuel shutoff was accidently deployed (but we’ll see what the Danes can do tomorrow in eliminations). After a lot of damage yesterday Martijn de Haas bounced back with a 6.7402 and Chris van Nimmen sits at third with his 6.8 from yesterday.
FIM-E Pro Stock Motorcycle
The FIM-E Pro Stock Bike field is still led by Bertrand Maurice, the French champion improving to a 7.244 in the first session today and was very happy having rediscovered the consistency in the Light Speed Suzuki that was certainly AWOL at the start of the year.
FIM-E Super Street Bike
FIM-E Super Street Bike once again delivered in spectacular fashion with the top three swapping around when Jake Mechaell dropping a PB 6.6601/216.91 in the final session to jump up from third to first and close to the European ET record. Neither Daniel Donat Lencses (the overnight leader at 6.7252) or Alan Morrison Jnr (6.7576) were able to improve which sets up the potential of a semi-final tomorrow that could decide the championship. The eight bike bump sits at 7.1084 with Peter Ostlund who has the unenviable task of taking on Mechaell in the first round tomorrow morning.
FIM-E Junior Drag Bike Cup
Richard Willcox held on to the number one spot in FIM-E Junior Drag Bike and improved with a +0.0024s over his 9.42 dial-in in the final session. The top six of the eight bike field are in the +0.0X range and, as has been demonstrated previously, any one in the qualified field can take the event win tomorrow.
EVENT PREVIEW
Some FIM-E Dragbike titles have been decided, some championships are up for grabs, and records are in the sights for some.
This weekend sees the culmination of the FIM-E Dragbike series at Santa Pod Raceway and while the championship has been decided in three of the categories, the fourth is very much in the mix and there are a number of teams looking to reset records and PBs across the piece.
FIM-E Top Fuel Bike
Rikard Gustafsson secured his fourth TFB title at last month’s NitrOlympX, but heads into the EuroFinals looking to recover from the drive train damage that blighted that weekend for the RG Engineering team. The Swede seems to be back on track after a successful outing to the Mosten raceday and will be looking to improve on his 5.74/260 PB numbers from the opening event of the year at Santa Pod.
Behind Gustafsson, there will be a close battle to see if either Rene van den Berg or Eric Richard (runner-up and winner in Germany) can gather enough points to get past Neil Midgley who is still sitting in second spot despite his season ending off in Sweden last month. There is also the small matter of personal bests for both to aim at, which is also the focus of attention for the Warpspeed duo of Stuart Crane and Mark Smith.
After recording a 6.2 at the Main Event, Crane is looking to go lower himself, “it might take losing a motor”, and getting Smith into the 6.2 second zone. Mike Olie will be hoping to improve on his NitrOlympX outing where the Kawasaki Funny Bike decided that one run would be sufficient when it trashed the gearbox and oil pump.
There’s also the small matter of Al Smith and the unique PBR Triple that has already run into the fives and builder/owner/tuner Phil Baimbridge will be hoping the Rocket has expelled the annoying little problems to dig deeper into the setup.
FIM-E Super Twin
Unfortunately the Euro Finals is back to three entries in the Super Twin category. Marcus Christiansen has done the title thing again for the fourth year in a row. If conditions permit the Danish father and son team will be looking to run quick, real quick with a target of the 6.0s in mind.
Martijn de Haas will be looking to build on an improved second half to the season “slowly we are getting the performance back in the bike and, importantly, had fun racing in Hockenheim” and the Dutch rider’s 6.5 personal best could be under threat. Also chasing PBs will be Chris van Nimmen, the Belgian looking to round out the year with a 6 second ticket.
FIM-E Super Street
If the FIM-E championship is decided in three of the other categories, the 2023 title chase in Super Street Bike is far from a done deal.
Looking at the current points, those in with a shout include leader Alan Morrison Jnr and last year’s champion Daniel Donat Lencses, Mathias Bohlin also is very much in the mix but the Swede is a curious omission from the latest entry list.
There are another ten entries that could provide major stumbling blocks for the title chasers, including Jake Mechaell on something of a hot streak at the moment, multi-time champion Steve Venables, Mogens Lund, Mark Hope, Ross Morrison, Kristian Jasz and Peter Ostlund all on Hayabusas, while the Austro-German trio of Erich Gruber, Clemens Walleit and Ricardo Grauer represent the Kawasaki contingent.
FIM-E Pro Stock
Five entries in Pro Stock Bike, but the 2023 title has already been settled with Bertrand Maurice doing the deal thanks to an event win and final round finishes at each of the four preceding events (two being rained out).
The battle for the number two plate in 2024 will be between three riders, Joerg Lymant coming off the back of an event win at his home race in Germany last month, Martin Newbury who is still getting to grips with the ex-Karlsson GSXR and a somewhat distant Aswin le Noble who could do with getting into the sevens by the season end. Martin Bishop is always a contender for event honours, while Jerome Rougement makes his Santa Pod debut at the Euro Finals.
FIM-E Junior Drag Bike Cup
The Euro Finals is the wrap up of the three event FIM-E Junior season with the remarkable situation that almost all of the eight riders are in contention to pick up the 2023 Cup.
Current points leader is Richard Willcox, but given the unpredictability of the dial-in class (the number one qualifier having gone out first round at both of the previous events) the form book is something of a lottery. No matter, the Juniors will feature in some of the best racing of the event as the next generation hones their skills.
Qualifying Friday 8th – Saturday 9th September, Eliminations Sunday 10th September
Livestream will appear here https://www.youtube.com/@SantaPodTV/streams
