1st time for everything

The National finals was a great weekend for us. Not only did the new bike exceed expectations but we went from being number 8 qualifier to winning the event - our first event win since we started racing nearly 8 years ago.
It didn't start off great, the first run was fairly troubled, running bad spluttering and not taking full throttle. Data showed it running very rich at wide open throttle - as if there was no nitrous going in. So we removed the bottle to weight it only to discover the bottle had developed at rattle! - the dip tube that collects liquid nitrous from the bottom of the upright bottle had sheared off inside, and hence no nitrous on that run. The next couple of passes were much better but still with a really rich top end which was robbing us of mph and causing poor running.  However, by the end of the 3 qualifying sessions we were qualified on the bump spot - 8th with a 7.69 @  only 158mph.

That 8th position meant we faced a pretty big challenge as we were to meet Lorcan Parnell on the 'Storm' dragbike, which had run a string of 6.8second passes that weekend and already set a mph record of 200mph. I had a pretty good holeshot on Lorcan, and at 1000ft i still couldn't see him, but just before the line he came flying past to what i thought was the win. What i didn't know was that he had hit the wall at nearly 200mph and was disqualified. Luckily he was completely ok - the clutch and bodywork having taken the brunt of the collision.
We ran a new best time for the new bike on that run too, a 7.54 @ 171mph, just 0.01 off our personal best time. 
The next round also required a little bit of luck, as Dave peters blew the burst panel on his bike at the 330ft mark and left us to take the win. That meant, at the bikes first full event we had made it to the final! We were against Stefan Hagenstein who had been number 7 qualifier. I never saw Stefan on the run, he had problems and never left the startline. We ran another 7.6 and took the win. Our first ever.

By now we had worked out why the bike was running poorly in the second half of the run - we increased the nitrous jet in an attempt to burn off some of the fuel that was making it so rich, but when overlaying the graphs there was no difference at all. So it seems we have reached the flow limit of the small NOS solenoid we use. I have a bigger one and will fit it ready for the next and final round.  One of the other big successes that weekend - im my eyes at least  were our ever decreasing 60ft times. The old bike ran a best of 1.15 to the 60ft, and that was after 4 years of setup. With no changes at all to the clutch, just a longer bike and different tyre we went 1.14 then 1.12, and 1,10 and finally a really nice 1.09 in the final.

Speaking of the old bike. It's now been sold already - and suddenly i've got loads of room again in the cellar!