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16:30

TMFC finalist Leif Andreasson said "The troops are on their way! We are running ok, the setup is quite soft as I want to avoid losing traction and the car jumping around. I short shifted to third on the last run and that worked and the car kept stable. I will have to step up for the final though and we will put in more power against Jörgen."

Jörgen Johnsson's crew man Martin Olsson said "We are just taking this event as practice as Jörgen has not sat in the car for a year. We have struggled for five years to get the combination together and have only bought a new block this year. Our tuner Peter Karlsson is learning fast. We are a young team - it's only Jörgen who's Over The Hill!

Michael Malmgren said "This is going to be a very tight race and my ET for the last round should have been better as I rolled the lights and spoilt the time. So Jimmy has the lane choice, but I think the lanes are even".

Micke Gullqvist (Pro Mod) said, "We have had lots of problems and have had to work very hard to change some parts and get ready. We had the right lane in the first round and the left in the next two rounds. I am really happy with my new European speed record of 228.18mph (367.22kph). Now we need to find a little more ET against Urban."

Urban Johansson said "On our 6.29 we broke our rear axle and replaced it. We are happy with the event either way and have increased our points lead this weekend."

Håkan Nilsson said "We have run two four second passes in eliminations so far and intend to run our third against Urs in the final. The lanes are close although we have preferred the right one. We have discussed whether to change lanes if the situation arises but have never done so in competition. The car has been great, we have a good smooth tuneup and will look at the final conservatively.

Urs Erbacher's pit was very busy after the car had mechanical problems in the semi-final. Team member Andrea Wucher said, "We wanted to change the cylinder sleeves but the new ones didn't fit so we have had to change the block. Our problem in the semi-final was a loose fuel line which leaked at the top but fortunately caused no major damage. The final should be great as it is both Urs and Håkan's first final".

Kenneth Lorentzon, crew chief for Håkan Fallström and Tommy Möller said "We ran well at this meeting although the weather was against us which all cars have to deal with. We only had a couple of small incidents in the weekend, on his first run Tommy had his left hand side valve cover crack and oil went on the slink causing the car to go up in smoke. With Håkan, the bottom pulley came off but fortunately the damage caused was not severe. Otherwise we ran a string of 5.0s in qualifying which is great for the sport. It was a shame our cars went out early but it will be interesting in the points battle and a great opportunity for Håkan Nilsson. I am pleased to see the number of cars in Top Fuel competition; I expect we will have nine in Norway and 11 or 12 at the European Finals. The other area that has improved a lot is the FIA/UEM series TV coverage which has a very professional feel to it".

13:30

Shaun Branch was overall pleased with the weekend in spite of a first round exit from Top Fuel Bike. "We started off with ignition problems which we have solved and run a PB speed of 180.85mph. The race against Peter Ström was close at the end and we ran our best pass of the weekend on that run. I would like to thank Mark and Alex Hope for all their help this weekend as well as my Dad. Our next race will be at Hockenheim where I am looking forward to racing against Roel Koedam".

Paul Watson of Eurodragster home and news page sponsors Dynospeed Developments said "I staged too shallow to avoid red-lighting and rolled through the lights. This is the second time I have done that this year. It is a disappointing end to the meeting as we could have gone through" Paul thanks crewman Jason Macan for his help.

Martin Bishop said "It was an easy win because Anders Larsson was a no show with breakage. We are still running the new motor in and our 7.65 is some way off our best with it of 7.44. However, looking at the data, I can see we were spinning the tyre down the track and that lost us speed as well. It's going to be a close race against Orjan Gustavsson". Martin's data also shows that he pulls 0.7 sideways G on the bike, an indication of how difficult handling these bikes must be.

Orjan Gustavsson said "We have had a difficult weekend and made lots of changes, including getting rid of our retard box and changing the ignition system. Our best time is a 7.58 and our 7.68 in the first round is our first proper run this race and gives us a baseline to work on".

Anders Abrahamsson's crewman Roger Lyrén said after running 7.498 that "The clutch went away and slipped all the way down. That surprised us as we used the same settings as our fourth qualifier. We had previously had problems with tyres and had to gamble with an old tyre for the fourth qualifier when we ran a 7.39. We can tighten up the clutch and our Vance & Hines engine supplied by our business MotoSpeed is performing well".

Lastly on Pro Stock Bike, well done to Luigi Chinarello on running a new personal best of 7.750/275.55kph.

Ulf Nylen is through to the second round of Super Twins with the beautiful new Yellow Rose of Texas, but is battling the odds on two fronts. Ulf has a bandaged leg thanks to burns from the exhaust system. Also as crewman Ian Turburville explained, the gearbox had broken again and there is no second gear available for the race against Lo Stauble. "Ulf will launch and shut off at half track. If Lo breaks he will go through".

Ronny Aasen of Norway said "Our 6.88 in the first round is closer to our potential. We were disappointed with our last qualifying run and the gearbox broke, but we have made small adjustments to the setup and it has worked. It still launches lazily but the top end feels good now. We will push up the nitro percentage as the air is returning to the same conditions as previously in the event".

Peter Ström said after defeating Shaun Branch with a 7.13, "The bike is in one piece but I am not satisfied with the performance and the launch is terrible. We almost crossed the centre line too and had to lift. I hope we can use our performance advantage against Kai Selkamaa".

Rickard Gustavsson said after a 7.06 win "We had too little tyre pressure - the tyre collapsed and the bike went down on the frame and I had to lift. It was an intersting ride. We will try to run a 6.6 against Eric Teboul".

Eric Teboul said the 6.50 defeat of Luigi Ferretti was no t without its dramas. "I was concerned in the short shut down area that the bike wouldn't stop. We ran a high speed of 330kph and I cannot use the brakes immediately and have to be gentle with braking. I stopped 5 metres from the gravel trap. This is the same motor that I ran a 6.2 at Santa Pod with., it's my second year with this setup, but I modified the Vortex head over the winter to avoid the problems with burning valve seats that we were getting".

11:30

We talked to Top Fuel and Pro Mod drivers after the first round.

Håkan Nilsson said after his win over Micke Kågered, "I wish I had a radio because I didn't know I had won until Micke came up to congratulate me. I had some tyre shake in the second half of the track and smoked the tyres at the finish line, so we could have been even quicker. For the sake of the points race, we really want to beat Thomas in the semi-final and it would be nice to have a chicken farmers' race against Tommi Haapanen in the final."

Tommi Haapanen said his fire at the top end was caused by an escaping spark plug and damage wasn't serious. He said "The track looks as if it can take more power at the moment but it will get warmer later so we are still going to be careful for our next race against Urs".

Thomas Nataas said after defeating points leader Håkan Fallström "That was an important race for us. The track temperature and air are so different that we could put more power in it today. We will reduce the timing for the clutch to come in as we were starting to get wheelspin as it came in when the circuit met the dragstrip and hope the track doesn't get too warm".

Urs Erbacher said "We blew out a head gasket on that run and will change an engine. We don't know the extent of the damage. The track is better and we will try to put more power down without spinning the tyres. We will race Tommi in the semi-final. We noticed tuning adviser Glenn Mikres react as Urs went into stage and he said "Urs lit both lights immediately and I was concerned in case he had to sit in stage for too long with the high side on. A blower belt broke off after 4.3s and we were running on six cylinders when we went through the lights, because we had broke a valve and pushrod and dropped on other cylinder. But we got the win light and that's the main thing."

Fast Freddy Fagerström's team had a sleepless night after breaking a crankshaft yesterday. "We have ended up borrowing a crank from Ulf Leanders and we are grateful to him. We are happy winning the first round with a 6.50 but we shook the tyres early in first gear and can do better against Micke Gullqvist in the next round".

Mikael and Magnus Lindahl were delighted with running low ET of first round of Pro Modified after changing to the right lane. "We looked at Urban and saw the right lane was the better one. It was early in the morning and conditions will hopefully stay the same. Our time of 6.330 is 0.05 off our personal best and think we can improve on that time against Roger Johansson in the next round. What has helped bring the car round this weekend is changing the rear end gear ratio between Friday and Saturday.

Jan-Arne Nygård said after defeating Mats Eriksson, "We are struggling with our clutch and working hard to get the right combination and closing on the tuneup too. We are against Urban next round which will be tough, but we have lane choice and I think the right hand lane will be the better one for the day". In the first round there were seven wins in the right lane, which some say is the bumpier of the two, the eighth winner being Gordon Appleton.

Gordon said after an out-of-shape shutoff run against a broken Ulf Rapp, "I don't like getting through like that and shut down after I got out of shape. I got close to the centre line but would have won anyway. I have got Andy in the next round, it hardly seems fair that we are meeting that early.

Andy Robinson said "We lost the blower belt in defeating Marko Lantto but had no associated damage with it and the car seems OK. I am happy with the right lane".

Roger Johansson said after a 6.53 win, "We need to tighten the clutch for our race against Micke Lindahl, as it was slipping. We will lose lane choice but find the right lane rather bumpy and are happy to go in the left".

09:30

Good morning and welcome to Pit Notes for Sunday, eliminations day at the 2006 Veidec Nitro Festival. We had a short but torrential downpour after racing finished yesterday and this morning weather conditions are different to the previous three days - low cloud cover and much cooler, about 22 degrees Celsius. The improved air should favour the racers so we'll see how they do.

Last night we walked around the pits and got some notes from Top Methanol Dragster racers. Gittli Koller, data analyst for Peter Schofer said "We are happy so far with our runs which have been in the 5.5s. We will be racing Christer Johansson in the first round but want to get through to the final and if we do that we will retain our championship lead".

Defending TMD champion Dave Wilson with the Eurodragster Event Coverage sponsors American Car Imports dragster said, "We have done the best we can to have qualified no.1 and have low ET as this means more points for us. We found a problem with the weather station not reading the base altitude correctly which gave us false data. We started on last year's settings and have got readings from other teams to work with. On our last run we lost the belt - I always put a fresh belt on for the start of eliminations so it wouldn't have mattered. However it did do some damage to the surrounding mountings which we've had to replace.

Rob Turner said "The car felt as good to the first shift as it ever has but then tapered off a little in high gear. We've been consistent though with all runs between 5.56 to 5.65.

Krister Johansson's A/FD is still suffering from the reduction in nitro percentage from 100% to 98%. Crewman Tim Read said "We can't find any other reason for our lack of performance. The car is susceptible to altitude changes as we don't run a blower and can't up the boost to compensate. We just end up with running too rich and losing cylinders down the track. In the US, Mitch Myers who had run 5.11 on nitro had a lot of problems with the percentage change, lost several tenths and did 60 test passes before selling up and leaving the sport. Next year the percentage will be reduced to 97% which will make matters worse". Krister said "I am thinking of visiting the US at the end of the season to talk to some of the currently running A/FD teams to see how they are overcoming the problem."

Werner Habermann was delighted with son Timo's first-ever five in their TMD. "I am so pleased for Timo - he is a very good driver. We want to run a 5.8 next time out. We know we are losing time to clutch slippage and are still running our API Big Brute, which is Powerglide-derived". Werner sends his best wishes to team member Drago who is at home recovering from an operation. "He does a lot for our team and we are missing him", said Werner.

Jimmy Alund had four monks standing behind the car on his final qualifying pass, bowing to it on the launch. We also spotted that the "monks" were wearing Oakley shoes and went to Jimmy's pit to investigate. He said "My friend Johan Milton who sponsors the car has a restaurant and hotel locally the Vadstena Klosterhotell in Murkrestaureng where you can get great food". Jimmy's hood scoop has the reaturant's logo on it too. Jimmy said "I am one ten thousandth away from pole position! I have been swapping the top spot with Michael in each session. I am happy the engine is in one piece and have had a great time. Tomorrow I will be hosting 150 people from my sponsor Klintberg & Way American Parts Centre".