AMA/Prostar Series New Management and More

Prostar's co-creator and previous owner, Keith Kizer, accepted the job of roadrace director with the AMA and sold the motorcycle drag-racing sanction to Scott Valetti, Brandi Neithamer and Scott McKinney-less than a month before the opening 2007 event in Valdosta, Georgia.

During the first day, a problem arose. Victor Gotay, riding the Exoticycle Hayabusa of Johnny "Turbo" Dobrin, qualified with a 7.97 at 187 mph-not only the first seven-second run for the class, but two-tenths quicker and 10 mph faster than the next qualifier, Rickey Gadson on the Coby Adams-prepared nitrous ZX-14.

In the end it wasn't as bad as all that. Gotay went on to take the win, but it wasn't a runaway. He was outperformed in round two by the nitrous bike of Joe Franco Jr., and the final against Rickey Gadson was a nail-biter. Gadson got the holeshot and made a game of it as Gotay turned on the win light, 8.20 to Gadson's 8.26. With the holeshot, the margin of victory was four-hundredths of a second.

This prompted Valetti to make an immediate rule change to the Super Street class following the event. Nitrous bikes would be allowed to add up to 30 pounds of ballast to their bikes-where a turbo would otherwise be. If Valetti is successful in keeping parity, Super Street will be the class to watch in 2007.

Other winners at the event were Larry McBride in Top Fuel (of course -Ed.), Keith Lynn in Funnybike, Billy Vose in Pro Mod, Paul Gast in Pro Stock, Mike Slowe in Pro Street, John Hall in Super Sport, Ron Procopio in Top Gas, Mike Konopacki in Super Comp, Bob Lohr in Sunday Pro ET, Matt Smith in Saturday Pro ET and Brandon Teasley in Street ET.

Gator Nationals
2007 NHRA Gator Nationals

The new buzz for the NHRA Pro Stock Motorcycle series in 2007 is "If you make the show, you can win the race." The class is now so competitive and the racing so close that even the smallest mistake can cost a round of racing-and a starting-line holeshot can win one. No longer is it a forgone conclusion that the 16th qualifier is on the trailer after the first round.

At the Gator Nationals in Gainesville, Florida, Geico racer Karen Stoffer came from the 16th position to win the event with three holeshot elimination rounds, including a final-round win over the Torco machine of Matt Smith.

Not only is the competition close, but exceedingly fast. Stoffer's 7.03-second qualifying run anchored the quickest field in history, and Angelle Sampey qualified on the pole with a new elapsed-time record of 6.911 seconds.

Rule changes have allowed V-twin engines to be competitive, while other rules allowed the old, standard, two-valve GS Suzuki's to keep up.

Over the past two years the Suzuki's have been allowed to increase motor size from 1500cc to 1655cc and, like the V-twins, run electronic fuel injection.

While all Suzuki teams jumped on the displacement increase, fuel injection has been slow in coming. In fact, the Gator Nationals marked the first time a fuel-injected Suzuki qualified for the field (Geno Scali on the Performance Machine Suzuki equipped with a Vance & Hines EFI system).

The NHRA also allowed inline four-cylinder "metric" bikes to have four valves and be purpose-built from scratch. No team has yet to take advantage of the new rules, but when they do it will be sure to change the face of the class. Again.