Getting Real

Words and Pics by Matt Polito

AMA/Prostar is expanding it's already strong lineup of sportbike drag racing classes with Real Street - geared toward the hundreds of built-up sportbikes already roaming the streets and the traffic-light-to-traffic-light Rickey Gadsons who ride them.

For streetbike racers there is a big gap between Prostar's entry-level Street ET bracket class and the heads-up, professional-style SuperSport and Super Street. Real Street is intended to fill the gap with late model sportbikes fortified with motor kits, mild turbos or dry nitrous kits.

The challenge was to come up with a set of rules that allows the budget-minded racer who isn't a 140 pound jockey to be competitive without stringent, costly and time-consuming tech procedures. To accomplish this AMA/Dragbike officials came up with a novel approach: all bikes to run stock, OEM fuel injectors. The theory is that expensive engine mods and power-adders will be useless if you are limited by the volume of fuel you can pass through the OEM injector. Engine teardowns become a thing of the past.

In addition to the stock fuel injectors the class required stock bodywork, 64 inch max wheelbase, DOT rubber and 2 inch ground clearance. Lockup and slider clutches are prohibited. Beyond that you can have at it.

The class debuted at the Pingel Thunder Nationals at Indianapolis and saw a healthy 14 entries with some boisterous competition and head-shaking performances. As feared, the lightweight riders buoyed to the top with Jeremy Teasley qualifying in the number one spot at 8.40 seconds on his all-motor Hayabusa and running a stunning 8.36 in the final against Chris Cason on his nitrous ZX-14. Number two qualifier Eric Sanzotera (8.47) turned the fast lap of the event at 171 mph on a nitrous Busa.

With one race down the rules were adjusted to even out the advantage of the lightweight riders. Borrowing a concept from the MIROCK series, rider weight (not bike and rider weight) will determine maximum wheelbase. Lightweight riders (like Teasley and Sanzotera) will have to run at 60 inches while riders over 200 pounds will have an advantage to run at 64 inches. Prostar officials think the rule change will keep the performances at the 8.70 range.

Real Street will be run as an exhibition class for the remainder of the season with the plan to have it on the full 2008 AMA/Prostar championship drag racing season. For more information check out www.amadragbike.com.