Ålund continues to make progess with new Camaro
(7-15-2012) NORRKÖPING, SE – The weather continues to cause problems for the 2012 FIA Drag Racing Championship. The third race of the series at Alastaro was cut short by inclement weather.
The good news for seven-time FIA European Pro Stock champion Jimmy Ålund is that the team's progress with the new Camaro Pro Stock car continued this weekend. It started off with a solid set of qualifying rounds that showed both good performance and good consistency, two very important traits within the sport of drag racing.
FIA championship drag racing allows for four qualifying runs to set the stage for the finals on Sunday. Jimmy posted consecutive runs of 6.72, 6.71, 6.76 and 6.74 seconds and he ended up as the number two qualifier.
"Yes, it went well. Like I said before, the car is 100% a whole new product for us and we're learning new things every run." says Jimmy. "The progress is definitely there."
Eliminations on Sunday did not go smoothly due to rain showers on and off during the day but Jimmy won the quarter final against rookie Christian Sagelv driving the only Ford in this championship. The semifinals was a classic matchup in European Pro Stock racing, Jimmy went up against long time rival Michael Malmgren who is always a tough opponent. Jimmy won that race as well, the ET was 6.72 seconds which turned out to be the quickest time of the final eliminations.
All was set for a final between Jimmy and fellow swede Michael Callin who is driving a strong car this year, but the rain came on too hard and the race was called off.
"The rain was very unfortunate, we felt real good about today", says Jimmy, "the 6.72 in the semifinals was run under fairly poor air conditions and we felt there was more performance to gain later on in the day."
"In all it was a good weekend, mechanically all is in very good shape and we've now gotten to the point where we can run this beautiful Jerry Haas Camaro as hard as possible."
The team did not have regular crew member Kalle Hrupa on board this weekend and would like to thank Owe Sjölund for joining up and helping out. Owe is the president of main sponsor KW Parts when he's not at the track.
Jimmy would also like to extend a special thanks to part time sponsor World Wide Bearings and Anders Larsson who delivered a set of ceramic ball bearings for the Liberty transmission. Anders is very knowledgeable about the world of Pro Stock car racing and a dragracer with a background as a successful Pro Stock Bike racer. Jimmy again, "thanks Anders, we look forward to seeing you back to racing again soon." World Wide Bearings can be reached at
www.WorldWideBearings.se.
Last but not least, Jimmy picked up some very important championship points. The J&J Performance Racing Team is still in second place but gained more than 30 points towards the current points leader Thomas Lindström.
The next race in the 2012 FIA Pro Stock Drag Racing Championship series is the NitrOlympx held at the historic race track HockenheimRing in Germany. The qualifying starts on Friday morning, August 10.
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