Stotz Racing tops the field
at NOPI World Finals
October 16, 2005
by Pete terHorst
Honda Rider’s Club of America
(HRCA)-sponsored drag racer Kent Stotz came to the NOPI World
Finals at Norwalk Raceway Park in Norwalk, Ohio this past weekend,
October 15-16, with one objective: consistency. It paid off as
the four-time AMA/Prostar champ set the quickest ET of the two-day
event on his turbocharged Honda CBR1100XX—7.26 seconds at
198 mph in a testing session—and then backed it up in four
rounds of qualifying and eliminations with ETs of 7.32, 7.33,
7.31 and 7.34. In Sunday’s final when it counted most, Stotz
laid down a near-perfect 7.31-second pass at 199.97 mph for the
overall win in the HRCA-sponsored Pro Street Tire Bike class.
“I’m very pleased,”
said Stotz. “All season long we have been posting the quickest
ETs only to spin the tire later and lose a chance to win in the
final. But we’ve been hard at work this fall fine-tuning
our CBR1100XX and it paid off in Norwalk. The parts we developed
to produce this consistency can be made for all of our bikes,
which is good news for the 2006 season. I have to give a lot of
credit to Star Racing for building a cylinder head that produces
200 mile-per-hour power and Velocity Racing for giving us a complete
turbo package that produces consistent results.”
Street tire motorcycle drag racing
is new this year to the NOPI (Number One Parts, Inc.) Drag Racing
Association (NDRA) scene and the organization’s first foray
into 500-plus horsepower motorcycle competition has proved to
be a winning package for NOPI and Stotz Racing. “We have
been showcasing our brand of motorcycle drag racing to tens of
thousands of enthusiastic, high-tech fans and they really appreciate
the performance of these machines,” said Stotz. NOPI is
well-known for its popular sport-compact automobile drag racing
series and added attractions such as car and bike shows and music
and video entertainment. An estimated 100,000 people attended
the NOPI Nationals Motorsports Supershow at Atlanta Motor Speedway
in Hampton, Georgia on September 17-18. (Catch all the action
on NOPI Tunervision on the Speed channel. Visit www.speedtv.com/programs
for scheduling information.)
The performance of Stotz’s
turbocharged Honda at Norwalk is tantalizingly close to his record-setting
pace in 2004, when he became the first racer to set the 200 mph
record in AMA/Prostar Street Bike Shootout competition with a
200.49 mph run in 7.256 seconds at the Gainesville, Florida finals.
For 2005, AMA/Prostar reworked the class rules, including a one-inch
increase in ground clearance and a two-inch increase in ride height,
and renamed the series Pro Street. Stotz countered with major
changes to the induction and electronic control systems of the
Honda, netting 65 more horsepower (550-plus overall) while running
the same 30 pounds of boost. Stotz also pared away 30 pounds in
overall weight, allowing the bike to accelerate more rapidly.
Stotz’s unyielding search
for power and consistency turned the month of October into a busy
one. On October 1-2 at the AMA/Prostar event at Memphis Motorsports
Park, he ran the quickest ET in his class, a 7.32-second pass
during the second round of qualifying. One week later he was setting
low ET again at Byron Dragway in Illinois, where he competed in
front of 13,000 appreciative fans at the 11th Annual World Power
Wheel Standing Championships.
Stotz’s achievements have
attracted considerable attention. In the November 2005 issue of
Cycle World magazine, contributing editor Nick Ienatsch gives
readers a first-hand account of the immensely powerful Stotz-tuned
Honda during an AMA/Prostar competition at Gateway International
Raceway in Madison, Illinois. To find out how the former AMA road
racing champion performed, pick up a copy on newsstands—the
seven-page feature begins on 106.
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