Pro Mod racer Norbert Kuno has a brand new car with a carbon fibre body with longer nose, new Vanishing Point chassis and new Brad Anderson engine. A planned check-out pass on Friday evening didn't transpire but this morning he took it gently down the track for a mid-ten. He later improved to fifth place in final qualifying.

Top Methanol Dragster racer Dennis Habermann along with brother Timo was ready to do a checkout pass yesterday evening but it was decided not to do that, so his first run was this morning to a throttle-feathering 6.98, one of only two sixes so far today.

This is the Nostalgia Funny Car of Roger Kirschner who is head of Uni-Fit which sponsors Werner Habermann racing. Sadly, engine damage meant it was unable to run, however Wendy Baker and Ramon van der Weurf will be making an exhibition pass this evening.

Super Street Bike racer Nichlas Sverin has a new Suzuki Hayabusa this year and the turbo bike has made a best of 7.87, but here qualified fifth with 9.125/260kph. He said "I short shifted, took power out, softened the clutch and moved the rear wheel forward. Going fast on this bike has been hampered by rain at the Main Event, and now I am looking forward to Hungary."

Top Fuel Bike racer René van den Berg's new Shark Attack Racing Team machine is a beautiful piece of engineering and ran an impressive 7.21/351kph on its maiden pass in competition. The bike, built by Jan Smit features a Puma engine, Opcon blower and Puma transmission. The paint is by Ted Sineger. René said "we were pleased with testing with a 1.1 60ft time at 60% throttle. We will be racing at Shakespeare County in August and the European and UK National Finals in September.

Funny Bike racer Mike Olie ran a PB of 7.88/287kph in his qualifier yesterday. He said "I have changed the fuel system as I had made some mistakes in the setup which I solved at the last meeting. For this event, I took a lot of clutch out and made sure it slipped for the first 100m before locking. The first run it slipped for 150m and then the tyre spun for the rest of the track; on the second run it was set up to slip for 100m then locked up and the traction was better. So we have been thinking about settings. We will be at the UK National Finals and Mosten, where I ran a gretat 4.93 last year.

Top Fuel Bike racer Steve Woollatt suffered a magneto fire on the warm-up yesterday. Crewman Phil Baimbridge said "There is less dense air here and we thank Peter Svensson for lending us a replacement. It is one of the few things that are similar between the bikes and teams have spares for." Phil mentioned that the bike is 25 years old, but most parts have changed apart from the original John Clift-built frame and the chain guard. He said "To run on this track we will take fuel out and retard the ignition to avoid chain damage from shake. What we've got, we've got. We will just have to deal with it and make the best of it. It makes it exciting as anyone could win; it's a bit like when we ran at City of London Airport a few years ago."

Competition Eliminator racer Ingo Ekert from Kusterdingen has acquired this immaculate '70 Dodge Challenger built by Mats Eriksson in 2001. The TFX engine with Brad Anderson Stage V heads, AFT clutch and Lenco gearbox. The car has run a best of 7.10/328kph, but here an 10.546 was 3.38 over the AA/PM index of 7.16.

Competition Eliminator racer René Meierhofer qualified no.1 with a 0.53-under 8.882 compared with his G/A index of 9.42. It is interesting to note the smaller and non-power adder engined cars are the only ones able to run under their index, the other being Robin Sattler's dragster. René's '88 Jerry Bickel-built Beretta has a 4.4 litre engine with stock block and heads.

Supertwin Top Gas rider Hermann Jolink said "I was concentrating on feathering the throttle this morning and so my gear changes weren't good and the bike moved around. It's difficult because we aren't used to these conditions." Despite his disappointment with his Ducati bike's performance, he is nevertheless qualified as no.1 with an 8.857/250kph run, 0.6s slower than what the bike is capable of.

Funny Bike racer Thomas Joswig of Frankfurt runs this Kosman-framed turbo methanol Suzuki with 1350cc engine. A 9.977/246kph did not make the field.

Funny Bike racer Eric Richard of Freistroff in France was no.1 qualifier with a 7.822/291kph, only a couple of tenths off his personal best. Eric won the 2010-11 Funny Bike championship in France. Crew member Yannick Richard was looking after the bike.

Super Street Bike racer Graham Dance said "I am using the settings that we would have at Hungary - I think I was the only rider who bogged off the line there last year. But it's unlike any other track here this weekend. The startline is challenging but there is some grip in the second eighth as Dave Smith's 190mph terminal shows, that requires a lot of boost. We have shortened the wheelbase, raised the front end. A lot of other racers are changing the clutch and the boost, but our changes are mainly chassis-related. I am now treating this event as a practice session for Hungary next weekend.

Top Fuel Dragster racer and Eurodragster.com sponsor Urs Erbacher has Robin Grice as fuel chief again, another short retirement from the sport. He said "Many of the Fuel teams are using throttle stop; this mechanical device on the throttle lead attached to the bugcatcher is made of aluminium and all teams have different types. We are keeping the airflaps closed for the burnout too to avoid engine problems." Robin is training new members of the team about working on the car.

Pro Modified racer Marcus Hilt ran a 8.34/317kph to go no.1 at the end of the first session and remain in no.2 at the end of the second. Famed US tuner Camp Stanley said "We are racing the track; I grew up on marginal tracks. This event is like Las Vegas - it's a crap shoot!" Camp has been putting less ignition in the car and more fuel and a softer clutch. This worked for Marcus although the view of commentators is that the nitrous cars should dominate as they can turn their power adder off and the blower car tuners can't. Camp said "Marcus eased into the run well and lifted after eight seconds. It's good for his mental outlook and will help him overcome his nerves."

Top Fuel Dragster racer Chris Andrews was in no.9 after two sessions after he shut down on the second attempt. Crew chief Ben Allum said "This was the battle of the throttle stops. You have to gamble about being conservative or not, we needed to be less conservative. With a weak track the rpm can easily go too high so we avoided doing a burnout which we didn't need, as we were going down on the throttle stop. Another technique is holding the brake on the run; it helps to stabilise the engine on the run and puts extra load on the engine." Chris said "We wanted to qualify and it was a matter of feathering it down the track".

Top Fuel Dragster racer Jari Halinen was an exponent of using the brake on the run as well as the throttle stop and his strength helped. He said "At other events the weather was poor and track good, here it is the other way round." Jari ran a best in Q2 of 7.008/263kph for no.6 qualifier.

Top Fuel Dragster racer Anita Mäkelä suffered a instant tyre smoke in her first run and the burst panel blew and deployed the automatic shutoff and parachute mechanism. "My crew chief Sami Lehtimäki makes the calls on the setup but we can't call this a race. The audience deserves a good race and you feel the crowds are with you at a good race." In the second session, Anita deployed a throttle stop and ran a 6.93/277 with a cylinder out most of the way and later a smoky 6.14/242 which was good for no.5.

Top Fuel Dragster racer Micke Kågered was qualified no.7 with a 6.69/243kph ater a pedalfest against Urs. Crewman "Scotch" Rob Inglis said "It's up to the owners and drivers to run the cars but a series running under the FIA banner needs to be up to standard. Teams always need travel money and run money and so there is pressure on teams to put a pass on and there has to be something for the fans. But we can't use the car properly and that is disappointing. We can't do anything other than back the car down, but there is only so much fuel you can take out of it. You can change many things but with the time available you can't develop a new combination. Also the last three meetings of the Championship are so close together we can't afford to damage things so we have to back off."

Top Methanol Dragster racer Dennis Haberman said after a 6.98/374kph "I pedaled the car ten times going down the track. We have run our cars at marginal tracks before as a show including runs at unprepped airport facilities. That gave us a bit of experience to use today. We will try to get some better times so we are adjusting the clutch and taken power out of the engine. We still want to do well in the points and being 1 and 2 in qualifying will help that." Later a brilliantly improvised use of VHT direct to the tyres last seen in the 1980s resulted in a 6.135/396 for no.1 position.

Top Methanol Dragster racer Peter Schöfer ran two spectacular runs with huge rooster tails of smoke behind the car, bringing back fond memories of Fuelers at Blackbushe in the early 70s to your reporter. Crew member Kirsten Krause said "It was a great show run on the rev limiter and pedaling after two seconds only. Hopefully the second pass will be better; we have taken power out and have softer clutch settings. The team had to watch the TV screens as we couldn't see the car. But at least the crowd loved it." On the second run a similar approach yielded 6.89/371kph and third a 6.855 gave him no.3 position. The team will be travelling to Tierp for the next round and are considering entering the Finals.

Top Methanol Dragster racer Chris Polidano ran 7.67 and 7.47 in the two sessions. Team manager Jerry Darien said "I haven't been on a track like this since Palmdale. With the clutch technology we are allowed, the clutch we have is what we have. The revs alter the amount of clutch applied so it's important we don't get the revs up too high off the line. We barely got off the line without smoking the tyres. The Racepak graph shows that the drive shaft speed was not going up in the curve we expected and by the time it recuperated, there was so much clutch and so little load that a lot of cylinders went out, In fact all but one had gone out by the time Chris came off the throttle at 5 seconds in. We are trying to decide what to do but none of our data is relevant to the track." He joked the team were thinking of switching to alcohol fuel. Chris qualified fifth.

Top Methanol Funny Car racer Jürgen Nagel ran a throttle feathering 7.48/360kph for no.1 qualifier after two sessions. He said "After all the burnout smoke the cockpit smelt of ashphalt and I couldn't see. Now we have some data which is important as it can tell us how much wheel spin there is so we can adjust. The problem with the temperatures is that the sun heats the track so much the grip worsens in the heat of the afternoon. So we are taking out as much as we can." He ended in 2nd place to Leif Andréasson.

Top Methanol Dragster racer Dave Wilson said of his tuning for the track "We are so far out of the box we can't see the box; it may not even exist! We know where we want to go, we just don't know how to get there. When the wheels start spinning on these cars, it's game over. And when you get off the start line, there seems to be no grip down the track and you just end up going sideways." Dave is booked for the Tierp race in two weeks' time but he admitted "We don't know how we are going to pay for it." He also expressed concern that in the heat of eliminations the racing would be less safe that it has been up until now.

Top Methanol Funny Car racer Danny Bellio suffered a flip after his 'chutes failed to open at Tierp. Danny was ok, but the car was damaged and went to ME Racing for chassis and body repair. The repainted body is shown. Danny ran 9.74 and 8.85 for no.4 spot.

Pro Mod racer Marco Maurischat was quite angry at the state of the track. "The people who made mistakes know who they are. This cannot happen; we went to Malmö Raceway which has less money than here and still ran our best times. There is no track here. We didn't change our setup because we just pedal for 400m to see how the car reacts. Our times at Tierp and Finland were not representative but thanks to advice from Adam Flamholc we ran a 4.05 at Malmö. Here is like drifting." Marco ended 6th with 8.65.

Pro Mod racer Micke Gullqvuist said "There is a serious problem with traction. It is like running on ice. I don't think it is too dangerous at this point although it is too bad to get much speed up. If it stays like this and a miracle doesn't happen, I don't think we should run for points tomorrow and there should just be show runs." Micke ran a best of 7.63 for no.2.

Pro Stock racer Jimmy Ålund would not comment on the situation with the track but was pleased to be entertaining visitors from sponsors KW Parts German outlet. KW now supplies parts across Europe. On the track, Jimmy ran a 13.824 for no.6 in the first session and, like all except two, passed on the second and third sessions.

Pro Mod racer Robert Koper made his first appearance of the year with his nitrous Firebird, although on this occasion the nitrous was switched off. "Our aim is merely not to slip and slide too much but even with only 60% of the power there is still no traction. Our traction guage reads 20 here in the pits, zero on the startline and last year it was 250 at Tierp. The good things are the weather and the crowd but we will try to improve." Robert's best was a 10.865 for no.15.

Jet Rocket pilot David Pertué has this rocket funny car based on one run by the legendary Sammy Miller. The "Hydrogen" Rocket Funny Car includes parts from Vanishing Point that recorded the all time best of 3.583/386.26mph in its original owner's hands. David took Hydrogen, with its smaller engine, to its best of 5.17 at the 2009 Bulldog Bash and will be running it in the night show here later. The rocket puts out 20,000hp and accelerates at 12g, weighing only 500kg.

David Pertué also has this jet dragster 'Go Fast Fire' in his pit. He tells us he bought it from a Chcago-based racer who built it in 2006 and it has a J85 engine putting out 8000hp. The car weighs only 480kg, has ran a best of 5.425 and accelerates at 6g.

Super Gas racer Florien Uebel of Fensterbach has this distinctive skull motif on his hood. The team is Skull Racing and the Nova they race is for sale, having been raced in the past by Harald Sturhan and Norbert Schneider. After qualifying 14th with a 9.865 they went out in round one.