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Romine
Racing News
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Two wins, a semi-final and a show made RMC Racing the talk of motorcycle drag racing last weekend at the Texas Motorplex. Focused on winning, Mike Romine led a four-barrel charge for a team double whammy.
The highlight of the weekend was a brother versus brother race in the semi-finals. "Remember, Mom, I'm the oldest," said Mike Romine preparing to race his brother, Jack Romine. Bro Mike tuned the 2003 Weekend Frame/PRP Motor Driven flaming RMC Nitro Harley under Jack that was favored to win with lane choice and the best stats of the team of four bikes.
"I'll give it all I've got. But the more runs Mike gets down the track the greater my disadvantage," said younger brother Jack. "He's been racing longer and he just keeps working at it. We're just getting down the track every run and it's consistent so we hate to change anything."
Jack Romine officially became a part of the newly formed RMC team with brother Mike and new member Larry ?Drums? Brancaccio in December. Mike Romine, Mitch Marlowe and Dennis Paul (Chromatic) combined forces to attack the national championship at any cost. Focused on the quest, Big Bro Romine (Mike) obsessed on the three Top Fuelers as the infamous Flyin? Banana patiently waited. Mark Conner joined the team with Jim McClure (Nitro Harleys? historical favorite) sits out the season awaiting a heart transplant. Two weeks before Texas, for the AHDRA Norwalk event, Conner took over Mike?s ride on the Lonnie and Mary Ann Isam-owned entry to win and set a new standard in Pro Fuel.
In Texas, Conner qualified number one, again. Of the four bikes at Texas, Jack qualified 3rd with a 6.755. Drums was 6th with a 6.879. Mike landed an unusual 8th with a 6.887. Due to heat and track conditions, all Lonestar Nationals fuel bikes battled tire spin the entire weekend.
Sunday morning, the RMC team took advantage of the test session to re-try the track, newly scraped and prepped. Mike laid down a 6.72 lap, significantly improving his performance and mindset, but the heat stuck him with 6.80?s to make his mark in history.
Round one eliminations showed luck for RMC, save one. Mike?s first round competition had a sweet holeshot at .065 but broke before 60 feet. Mike?s RMC machine laid down a beautiful 6.85 at 208.14 mph on Mike?s .101 reaction. Jack was up next with lane choice when the competition red lit. It didn?t matter. Jack had his personal best of the weekend with a 6.772 at 208.62 mph. ?My bike left fairly good, but at about the 1000 foot mark or so it took off left real hard. So I just got out of the throttle. The final RMC Top Fueler of the round was Drums with lane choice. After an impressive burnout, he never ran. A fuel leak sprayed nitro in all directions from burnout to the launch pad. When the competition got the green, Drums was pulling off leathers and helmet to swab nitro from his skin. ?This is not the way I like to end a race, but that's racing. We had out best numbers yet and I?ll be pulling for my team the rest of the day.?
Mike took on good friend Doug Vancil who qualified second and had lane choice in the second round. Vancil left only five-thousandths before Romine and held the lead until inches before the eighth mile mark where Vancil broke a belt on the primary. A few feet later, Romine?s belt popped off. The race became a coasting nail biter. ?I was out and it felt like a fair run, Romine said. ?My belt came off and the front end slammed down. I looked over to the right thinking he would be flying by me. Then we coasted to the finish line. I beat him by, maybe, three-quarters of a bike length. It was a very lucky break. Doug will tell you as quickly as I will; that's drag racing.?
Having watched Mike win round two, Jack knew that should he win, he would race his brother in the semi-final round. Almost half a second qualified ahead of Texan Mark Revels, the younger Romine maintained the gap through round one performance, keeping lane choice. Recognizing the challenge, Revels went for the tree and succeeded with a better launch by six-thousandths. But Revels broke early in the run and Romine went through the quarter a 6.821, 207.23 mph. ?Jack revealed his strategy.? This morning we decided to make a big change on the clutch so we ran a test pass. I wasn't real aggressive with the throttle and we ran a 6.87, so we decided to stay with that tune up. I ran a 6.77 in first round?s heat of the day, which is what we were looking for. We didn't change anything for round two and we went slower, so you can see that the track is getting worse. Next round against Mike, we're not going to change anything and see what happens.?
In THE Screamin? Eagle Top Fuel race of the weekend, younger brother Jack ran quickest with a 6.838 to Mike?s 6.850. Mike admitted, ?Jack ran better than me but I hole-shotted him. I had a .076 to his .093. It was a close race. Patty (Romine, Mike?s wife) came down to get me, smiled and pointed at me, so I was happy. Either way, we were just happy to get one of us in the final.? Margin of victory between the brothers was .005.
The final round was simply a formality for Romine. Though he took reigning champion Ron Houneit quite seriously, he recognized a reason to be conservative. ?He spun the tire in the last round most of the track. We broke a belt, but we know what to do.? Romine was on a roll.
Romine launched an impressive .040 light and never looked back on the 6.817 run at 202.70 miles per hour. He was elated and dripping in sweat at the top end. ?We hadn't really changed anything for the final. We just went out and ran because Ron smoked the tire the round before. This thing, (the Nuclear Tomato), has been going up and down the track real consistently. We?re burning the clutch up, slipping it. I figured I would just leave it alone and not try to beat myself. It just worked out. Sure, we weren't the fastest bike here this weekend. We were about the 4th fastest. Doug (Vancil) and Bill (Furr) had the two quickest passes and both had belt problems. At these tracks where you're slipping the clutch that much, the belt is taking all of that heat. We broke a belt today also. We just got lucky.?
In Pro Fuel, Mark Conner confessed to never getting his rhythm. ?The field here was small and we didn?t run with Top Fuel until late in the day.? Qualifying number one, Conner made an earned bye run his first Sunday competition pass. ?I goofed up in the first round. Thank goodness it was a bye. I forgot to flip the switch for the timers which made us run that 7.113 at 189.15 mph. It?s rider error.?
In the meantime, between his two races, he was busy helping out fellow Texas racers. ?The track was a little loose, so we decided to take another tooth off just to play it safe. It was probably the right decision seeing how hard it shook and tried to spin the tire in the final.?
Conner raced reigning champion Chris Streeter for the Lonestar Nationals championship. ?I had to look at Chris for a while. It was fun. I got him on the tree but we?re running a jackshaft. His bike just 60 foots better. The combination is just right. ?Conner won on the tree with a .046 to a .079. At the finish line it was 6.953 at 197.58 to 7.599 at 157.12.
The victory in Texas was Conner?s 13th lap on the Flyin? Banana. ?The final was the most fun.? The bike is minimally different from other fuelers he?s ridden. ?It's a basic weekend frame and I'm comfortable on those bikes. It's not hard for me to adapt. Since the bike was built for Mike, (almost a foot taller), it's just hard for me to reach the handlebars.?
RMC Racing is sponsored by Oceans 11 sports bar in Hollywood, Florida, Chromatic, Advanced Design Leather, Autolite, Fram, and Romine Racing.
For more information on RMC Racing, go to www.mikeromine.com
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