2008 Review

Santa Pod FIA European Finals

We came to Santa Pod with hope still for a run for the title, the scenario was that we needed to win and set low ET of the event, but also have Åhlund loosing first round and see Nixon going out in Semi-finals.

So it was not realistic as Mr Åhlund seldom makes mistakes, and this race was not different. conditions could have been better, it rained all day Friday and Saturday which ruined our game plan totally. We had decided to run our new carburettors as we know we are down on high-end power with the ones on the engine, but we needed to test the new ones to get them dialled in otherwise they could hurt instead of help. It all came down to one qualifying run on late Sunday and 1 hour after that first round of eliminations on a very tricky cold track. We had to go for a safe set up to secure to be in the 8-car ladder, after a long discussion together with Crew Chief Anders Wall and rest off crew we decided to be on the soft side to make a safe run. It turned out to be a good call and we where second fastest with 6.86 with Åhlund on nr 1 spot with 6.84. We took an easy first round win over Jan Palmquist with a 6,84 against Palmquist 6.98. Åhlund did his homework and the chance for us was gone, he ran 6.83 and other the other side off the ladder we had Nixon Sundblom that only run 6.90 same as in qualifying so we felt we had him covered as we had too race him in the Semi-finals. First semi-final was Åhlund against Magnus Hanson, but Hanson took a chance and red lighted with personal best 6.88 against Åhlunds 6.82. Then it was us and I felt pretty good about the situation, we had a fast car and we had tightened the clutch to get the car up on the tire faster as our 60ft time was off compare to Åhlund and Sundblom, we had about same reaction time, but Nixon did his best run of course off the weekend and run 6.80 against mine 6.84 again. This was hard for us as a win against Sundblom and then a win in the final we would ended up as runner up in the Championship, but the Finals never took place due to new heavy rain, so it didn’t matter.

We didn’t loose the Championship at this race we lost it already at Alastaro Finland where the promoter made a big mistake and let Pro Stock cars run right after Top Fuel cars without cleaning the track, and everybody knows how much clutch dust there is from a Top Fuel car, so track was very slippery and all cars in left lane had to lift as they lost traction totally, and we had the left lane and we were the first car out so we never had a chance to change lane which we could as we had low ET. This really cost us the point’s needed to stay near the top. So we have to start with same number on car as in 2008 and we will for sure fight even harder in 2009 to end up at a higher spot the in 2008. And this hard work has already started with some more testing at Meca Raceway with our new Braswell carburettors and right away we ran a personal best on the 1/8mile and numbers were very promising and it did give us good hope and steam for all at Malmgren racing Team.

So you can for sure put us on the contender list for the 2009 Championship Title!

We started off as usual at Santa Pod in UK with first FIA round off 2008 with high hopes. This after promising testing off our new Bob Ingles built engine we tested in Rickie Smiths Bickel car in the US with very good results.

We only made 2 runs then the heavy rain came and the event was cancelled, we struggled with ignition problems off the line and poor 60ft times and this only put us in nr 5 spot (we have never qualified that bad) coming back to the shop in Sweden we put in our test engine and went to our local track, MECA in Malmö and did some testing and found a bad ignition box in the car and now we where back to good 60 ft times and good power.

All Wednesdays from first Wednesday in May to Sept we were also making passenger rides for special invited customers by Lahega, something that has proven to be very successful for Lahega, and off course for the people getting the opportunity to get a ride, they are very thrilled to experience the feeling of going from 0-80 mph in 1 sec flat........

Next stop on the FIA tour is Finland and Alastaro where we had some clutch problems but still run pretty good with a 6.91 in the warm conditions and on a very slippery track, but this was only good enough for nr 4 spot in the very tight field. Still we didn’t perform as well as we should and we tried hard to figure out why, first round of elimination we were the first pair out right after Top Fuel which was a big mistake by the organizer and all cars more or less lost control of traction and was skating around bad and 3 cars almost crashed, we never came that far as we lost traction right away off the start line, losing to Ero Knitilaa who only could run 7.26 while skating around all over the track almost loosing control off his Chevy Cavalier. Again it was Jimmy Ålund that could handle the tricky track best and he also did win the race against Tommy Leindahl that just had bought Kenny Koretskys Chevy Cobalt car from USA, well done !

Now we had a lot off pressure coming to next round at Mantorp Park in Sweden. But whole team was in a good mood as we had found the problem with lack off power and we did feel we could be back on the top again. We couldn’t be more right, first day we overpowered the track ( what a shame as friday was best weather and track still not too bad) on Saturday it did get warmer and track more slippery, but still we managed a strong 6.88 low ET for the day, only Jimmy Ålund was faster with 6.85 but that run was on Friday. Just to give you an idea how tricky it was, for example Richard Sunblom could not get down once same with Adam Flamholc, but Sunblom on last qualifying run manage a decent 6.94 and went in on nr 5 spot. We beat in first round Kenneth Söderström, and in second round we beat Tommy Leindahl with strong runs and then was ready for finals against Nixon Sunblom ( good news for us was that Jimmy Ålund lost in semi-finals) We were the fastest car whole race day and had lane choice in finals ( very important at this track) and we felt we had the race in the box, but due to some oil drops from our car we lost traction right away when I dumped the clutch and I could see Nixon cruising down with only 7.30 ET due to his clutch gave up, we really should have won this one, and we really had to, to be able to still have a fair shot at the title. I take the blame for what happened as I did started the engine too fast in the finals and it did puke over some, enough to put some this layer off oil on the start line. Now we need help from others at Finals at Santa Pod UK to be able to win, more realistic is that we have to try to defend our nr 3 spot, as by reaching finals at Mantorp we now moved from nr 6 spot too nr 3 spot, but with Leindahl and Hansson with just a couple points behind us. Ålund has a little more then 2 rounds off points ahead off us, so a pretty tuff deal, especially now when we got the news from FIA that not all classes was invited to the FIA round in Germany ( Hockenheim Ring) Pro stock was not invited due to lack off German teams running Pro stock ( very strange decision I must say) so suddenly we only had one round less in the FIA Championship.

We will do some more testing before the finals and our new engine seems to work very well and coming to Santa Pod that normally is very good traction I think we will be able to through in all we got under the hood and hopefully that will be good enough too be the fastest car and by that put some pressure on our competitors.

At Mantorp it was opposite we had too take out power and run the car as soft as we could and dare, not so fun but very challenging.

Well wish us all at Lahega Pro stock racing the best off luck, now is the time we really need it.

Stay tuned !

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