With four NHRA titles to his credit, “Steady” Eddie Krawiec of team Vance & Hines ranks as one of the top Pro Stock Motorcycle racers of all-time. However, it’s been tough sledding as of late as it has been since 2017 since the New Jersey-native won a title. With three straight championships, Matt Smith has been a problem for everyone in the class.
Krawiec, the former track manager of Raceway Park in Englishtown, N.J. recently unveiled a whole host of improvements to the V & H team, designed to help the squad get back on top.
The V&H team seemed to be caught a bit off-guard with the departure of longtime sponsor Harley Davidson following the 2020 season. The Motor company had been with V&H for nearly 20 years, through all of Krawiec and teammate, rider-turned crew chief Andrew Hines’ combined 10 championship titles.
We watched the Covid-era changed the landscape of motorsports.
Like a NFL team rebuilding after the end of a dynasty, the V&H squad has retooled and strengthened considerably heading into the 2023 NHRA campaign.
One of the category’s all-time greats and master-marketer Terry Vance was instrumental in filling the sponsorship void with another of the major factories, bringing on the coveted support of Suzuki, and also Mission Foods, a Texas-based massive manufacturer of tortillas and tortilla-related products.
At a recent pre-season test session at Gainesville Raceway Krawiec and team unveiled two of the biggest updates to the NHRA Suzuki in decades – the Gen 3 Hayabusa body and billet cases.
The Gen 3 Hayabusa body instantly modernizes the category, which can seem outdated in the motorcycle world, with the two most used body styles featuring bikes that have not been produced in years with the Suzuki TL 1000 and the Buell. Manufacturers want the bikes to look like what fans can buy off the showroom floor. This was the concept behind “Pro Stock” all along.
Vance & Hines has again accomplished that goal, after running the Gen 2 Hayabusa on both bikes last year.
The billet cases have the potential to improve what most experts say was a largely tapped out Suzuki GS combination. Many say the GS cases are getting harder to find as well. The billet will help solve both problems.
Both the Gen 3 body and the billet cases performed magnificently at the test session, with the team achieving a best run of 6.69, just .03 off Karen Stoffer’s class record, which many said would be untouchable for years.
The team has also added Pro Street ace Gaige Herrera as a rider.
Herrera was as impressive as the new body and cases in his testing debut with V&H.
In this interview Krawiec shares his excitement for the reloaded V&H team.
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