The Turtle Wax Internationals is included in the FIA European Drag Racing Championship and the EDRS European Drag Racing Series. It is also a round of the EDRS Pro Nordic Motorcycle Championship. At this time around 270 teams are entered.

The entry list can be found under a separate headline in this newsletter. Please note late changes may occur. 

FIA Championship Classes briefing

FIA Top Methanol Dragster:

In championship points lead: Chris Polidano (Malta)

Entries: Five teams entered for this event.

Notes: At the last event Chris Polidano won the finals against Monty Bugeja. Sweden´s Stefan Gunnarsson ran 5.65 sec at Tierp Arena in july during testing, which was a new personal best. Europe´s quickest Timo Habermann and brother Dennis are not on the entry list for thie event. The Maltese teams Polidano and Bugeja are capable of runs in the 5.30´s under the right circumstances and not far behind, Jonny Lagg Sweden who has a PB of  5.46 set at Tierp Arena august 2013.

In the points standings Bugeja is 35 points behind Polidano (for comparison 20 points equals one round and qualification points are also at stake).

FIA Top Methanol Funny Car:

In championship points lead: Johan Lindberg (SWE)

Entries: Six teams entered for an 8 car ladder.

Notes: The Championship win this season will likely go to Lindberg Bros driver Johan Lindberg, who does his part of the driving job in Europe, while Jonnie Lindberg pilots the almost identical funny car in the US during selected NHRA events, the next one the weekend after the Tierp event. Johan Lindberg is 136 points ahead of second ranked Jürgen Nagel (who is not entered at Tierp Arena).

Mikael Larsson, Sweden does his first FIA event for the season and will be joined by both Finnish drivers Ari Pietilä and Johnny Oksa. Both have run at Tierp Arena before. Leif Andreasson lost the finals at Hockenheim to Johan Lindberg and was not content. Team Andreasson can give Lindberg Bros a tough match and Danny Bellio, Belgium who will also appear at Tierp Arena is always competitive. Anderasson ran 5.52 sec at Tierp Arena in August 2013 and won th event. Johan Lindberg ran 5.54 at the same track in june 2013. It will be very interesting to see who is quickest this time and who walks away with the event win. 

Don´t miss to check the full point standings and entry list under separate hedalines and follow the event as we proceed through any of the different option of event coverage described in this article!

FIA Top Fuel Dragster:

In championship points lead: Thomas Nataas (NOR)

Entries: Eight teams entered for an 8 car elimination ladder. Competition distance: 1000 foot

Notes: At the recent NitrOlympX Sweden´s Micke Kågered won the event .
With two races to go Thomas Nataas is the new leader after Hockenheim. But only one (!) point behind is former leader Stig Neergaard and only five points behind is Hockenheim winner Micke Kågered. Of course the Swede will try to repeat his win in front of his home crowd. To make it even more interesting, number four Anita Mäkelä is only 14 points short of the lead. At the fast Tierp Arena track, where all teams will try their very best to run new personal bests, it will be an interesting fight who will be the leader when we go to the last race, the European Finals.

Number five in the championship is Noah Stutz, but the 19-year-old Swiss will not be at Tierp. The Hockenheim runner-up got the chance to licence in the Lagana Brothers car in the States and race for that team in Las Vegas and Pomona. So Urs Ebracher will have to defend the Swiss honours like Duncan Micallef and Chris Andrews will do for Rune Fjeld Motorsport. Like at Alastaro Antti Horto will be back in one of the RFM-cars and so we will see eight Top Fuelers fight for the Turtle Wax Internationals win.   

FIA Pro Modified:

In championship points lead: Mattias Wulcan (SWE)

Entries: 21 teams entered for a 16 car elimination ladder. The entry field include teams from five countries, with a majority from Sweden.

Notes: From neighbour country Finland comes Marko Lantto, Tero Laukkanen and Tami Brander.

Well ahead in points lead Mattias Wulcan leads at 256 points with the nearest threat Roger Johansson at 167. Reigning champion Michael Gullqvist in 3rd place at 151 points. Wulcan has the destiny of the championship in his hands and the team has been performing steady this season also during difficult circumstances. Micke Gullqvist set a new personal best ET at 5.83 sec /393 km/h at Tierp Arena in July. At tracks with good traction he is extremely hard to beat. Mats Eriksson assisted by Adam Flamholc in tuning have managed to improve the performance for the Green Goblin Crown Victoria a great deal and Mats ran 5.98 sec at Tierp Arena in July. There are reasons to believe we will see a bunch of 5 second runs and new personal bests in the Pro Mod class during the Turtle Wax Internationals.   

FIA Pro Stock:

In championship points lead: Michael Malmgren (SWE)

Entries: 11 teams entered for an 8 car elimination ladder.

Notes: One Finnish drivers among the Swedes; Sampsa Palos (after the other Finnish driver Richard "Nixxon" Sundblom cancelled his participation)

Tommy Leindahl enters his first FIA round for the season and Simon Gustafsson continues to pilot the Samantha Racing Pro Stocker owned by Mikael Sjökvist (who said already during Simons first appearance in Finland that he was impressed and content with Simon´s driving job).

During last years event at Tierp  we got to see Ålund operate consistent 6.53-6.55 sec runs during the eliminations (which he eventually won). At this time we have Michael Malmgren in points lead, although only 10 points ahead of Ålund, with Magnus Petersson 38 points and Thomas Lindström 51 points after Malmgren. The event win is attractive and none of the four mentioned drivers can be counted out as candidates. And there is always the possibility the drivers who can not win the championship title can interfere with the ones who can..