Andrew Hines said Eastern Pennsylvania’s Maple Grove Raceway was Angelle Sampey’s NHRA Pro Stock Motorcycle playground.

“Reading was kind of like The Angelle Nationals,” Sunday’s Keystone Nationals winner and points leader said after defeating Chip Ellis to tie Sampey for second place on the class’ all-time victories list at 41.

To tie her here, it’s a special deal,” Hines said. “It’s unfortunate she’s not racing here. [Her Star Racing team skipped this event]. She’s always been tough competition. I’ve always had a heck of a time trying to beat her over the years. Even when she came back, she waxed me earlier this season.”

No one waxed him this weekend.

Not even the wet, dreary weather rattled him.

Instead, Hines said he wasn’t bothered by the fact everyone in the pro ranks had just one single qualifying session.

“That kind of played into our favor,” he said. “As a team, we’re always quick off the truck, and we showed that by qualifying 1-2 in the only session we had.”

He said the single run “stacked up the ladder really funny,” but otherwise, Hines wasn’t affected by any of the quirky conditions. “We made good runs off the truck and just tuned on it from there,” he said.

Maybe his secret for this third victory of the year was sticking with his trusty parts on the Vance & Hines Screamin’ Eagle Harley-Davidson that took him to a 6.794-second, 197.25-mph quarter-mile triumph.

“I tried some new exhaust pipes we made on Monday. They showed promise but we just weren’t running the speeds we were looking for. So we threw my old set back on for the finals and boom – 197 miles an hour. Best speed of the weekend,” Hines said.

“We tried some other stuff with the electronics of the motorcycle, and it didn’t seem to perform. So [in the] second round, we went back to our old faithful stuff,” Hines said. “We got better and better every round. It was a matter of picking away and finding that E.T. and speed.”

He said his pass in the final – against Ellis’ 6.818-second elapsed time at 196.39 mph on the Junior Pippin Trucking Buell – was “probably the straightest run I made all weekend- and that just leads to big E.T.s”

Because he and everyone else “had such a narrow window” to perform at the best level possible, he said, “it kept us from going too far from where we normally would go.”

Whatever the source of the magic, it worked for Hines, who extended his lead in the standings to 89 points over closest challenger Eddie Krawiec, his teammate.

He said the victory over Ellis Sunday “could be a pivotal point” in the chase for his fifth series crown.

When he looked up at the scoreboard and saw his win-light flash, he said, “I was over the moon. I know how fast Chip had been all weekend and all year. Luckily we were able to dip into the 6.7s with him and put up a nice, tight final round for the fans.”

Hines cut a .025-second reaction time to Ellis’ equally respectable .030 and pulled away from a mid-track tie with Ellis to record his second Countdown victory and his second overall at Reading.

Hines advanced past Chaz Kennedy, Karen Stoffer, and Matt Smith.

Ellis reached the final round by defeating Steve Johnson, Hector Arana Jr., and Eddie Krawiec.

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