Remember we mentioned Mantorp has a short shutdown area? Well Paul Ingar Udtian was one of the offs this year when the chutes failed to blossom on his Q8 Oils supported methanol dragster. He did his best to fly to Norway, cleared the sand trap by some considerable distance and spent some time inverted on the way to landing back on four wheels. Somehow the only major damage was to the rear wing and, astoundingly, the Islanders team were back racing the very next day.
UEM Top Fuel Bike
Peter Svensson delivered the goods for his new sponsor Kendall, a seemingly effortless 4.13 out of the trailer gave the first leg of a 1/8th mile ET record, subsequent passes in the 4.0s ended up with a 4.063 best to lower the mark and set number one qualifier. With well over a tenth of a second over the field, it was difficult to envisage anyone stopping Svensson from taking his second Veidec title in a row, and Peter Eriksson, Ian King and Rikard Gustafsson all failed to halt the irrepressible march of the Swede.
In a very strong field of nitro burners, Rikard Gustafsson did his championship chances a power of good with his Suzuki Funnybike by tagging a runner-up spot to Svensson. Qualifying in third spot with a very good 4.251 (low 6.5 second pace over the full quarter), Gustafsson had a bit of fortune in the semi-finals when Eric Teboul’s blower problems allowed Rikard through to face Svensson where he got a lot closer than most of the fuel bikes had done to the billet flyer.