Slated to run against his oldest son in the first round of eliminations, Arana was the recipient of a solo pass after Hector Jr. decided to sit out the round for safety purposes. Arana ran a 6.928 at 193.57 mph.
“That solo run in the first round ended up being really beneficial for me,” Arana said. “We ended up being a bit off on that run, so we were able to get the tune-up right on the bike for the next round. We also were out of the groove for that run, so we had the chance to get it right the next time.
“I sort of had an immediate sense of failure after that first-round run but we took care of it.”
Arana and his Lucas Oil Buell lined up alongside Eddie Krawiec’s Harley-Davidson in round two. Leaving off the line .011 behind Krawiec, Arana did his best to chase down the Harley but came up just .002-second short with a 6.902 compared to Krawiec’s 6.900.
“Like usual, Krawiec is always a tough guy to beat no matter what round it is,” Arana said. “That was one of the closest races we have had against each other. It’s tough to be that close and come up short.
“I’m happy though because that run was the second-best of that round. That means if we would have ran any of the other bikes, we would have been moving on. While that doesn’t change anything now, it’s nice to know that we were one of the main bikes to beat.”
Even though “the Hammer” would have loved to go further in the eliminations ladder, he is more than pleased with the progress that the Arana Racing team made throughout the entire weekend.
“Looking back at everything, we accomplished a lot,” Arana said. “We took two new bikes out here and struggled to get them under control. I was lucky that I brought my ‘Old Faithful’ Lucas Oil Buell out here as well and was able to get back with the program right away.
“We’re going home to work on what we’ve learned. We still have a lot of work left to do to get to where we want to be.”
The Arana Racing team will get ready for the second Pro Stock Motorcycle race of the season when the NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series heads to Charlotte for the NHRA Four-Wide Nationals, March 27-29.
