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The opening round of the European drag racing championship tour took our European correspondent to Kunmadaras, Hungary, for the opening round of the 2011 UEM Drag Bike championship.

As always the championship opener springs a few surprises and some debuts that will no doubt impact greatly on the rest of the season.

Among these were the win on debut for the new Gulf Oil/Grand Prix Originals Puma Engineering bike of Ian King that shows a massive amount of promise for the season after being fired up on nitro for the very first time at the start of the weekend.

It was a hugely impressive debut for the Sovereign Pro Stock Bike multi-bike team headed up by Jesper Thiel that propelled the Dane and his G2 Buell to the event win on the back of a string of low 7.1s and 7.0s -- numbers that scarcely seemed possible on the far-from-perfect track that hosts the easternmost fling on the European tour.

Other winners include a first trophy for sophomore Jan Sturle Hegre in Super Twin Bike, Rikard Gustafsson in the UEM Funnybike Cup event and Dave Smith in a European Super Street Bike eliminator. (Ivan Sansom photos)

http://www.dragracingonline.com/agent1320/2011/1320-xiii_4-57.html