Stoffer Poised to Defend Title at Season-Opening Gators

Karen Stoffer and her GEICO Pro Stock Motorcycle team have plenty of reasons to feel optimistic heading into the start of the 2008 NHRA season at the AC Delco Gatornationals from Gainesville, Fla, March 13-16th.

For starters, she is the defending Gatornationals champion after winning the event in remarkable fashion, from the No. 16 qualifying spot, last season. The victory marked the beginning of what proved to be the most productive start of Stoffer's career.

"We were very happy with the way we started off last season," said Stoffer, who finished No. 8 in the series marking the fourth straight top-ten finish of her career. "We fell off a little toward the end. So we are determined to stay consistent this season. I'm taking sports psychology classes to get myself more mentally prepared. We've made changes to the bike. We want to be in the top five at the end."

The most notable change to Stoffer's GEICO Suzuki is the addition of Electronic Fuel Injection (EFI). The result of this off-season improvement was immediately apparent as Stoffer won the AMA Dragbike Bikeweek Nationals in Valdosta, Ga. in early March with a personal best run of 6.91.

"We decided to stick with the inline-four Suzuki, which is the smallest motor, so we knew it was time to starting thinking outside of the box to try to find some more ET in the bike," Stoffer said. "The high-bar has been set by the Harleys and the Buells. Just getting in the show with an inline Suzuki will be a challenge."

Stoffer stayed in Valdosta following her AMA Dragbike victory for a test session the subsequent weekend. The team was thrilled with the machine's continued performance.

"In all we were happy that out of our 13 runs, 12 of them were in the six-second range," Stoffer said. "We were swapping motors and trying different clutch set-ups. We improved a lot from last year."

Stoffer couldn't help but to keep an eye on some of the stunning performances of her fellow competitors as well. The bombardment of impressive runs indicate in 2008 the unprecedented competitiveness in Pro Stock Motorcycle will continue.

"This season it's going to take low-nineties and high-eighties to get the job done. We know that somebody in this class will even have the capability of running the low-eighties," Stoffer said. "However we've been down this road before where the testing at Valdosta didn't mean a whole lot once the season started."

Stoffer went on to extend special thanks to all of the 2008 sponsors and supporters.
Geico Motorcycle Insurance 1-800-44-Cycle, Speed Dawg, Mac Tools, Bates Leathers, NGK, Airtech, Wrath Motorsports, Square One Graphics, Suzuki Extended Protection, Kymko, and Suzuki Extended Protection.