Antron  Brown stole all the suspense from the Top Fuel championship chase Sunday at the NHRA Toyota Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

But Jerry Savoie poured the drama into the Pro Stock Motorcycle season showdown with his final-round 6.915-second, 194.13-mph victory on the White  Alligator Racing Suzuki over red-lighting Andrew Hines.

In the semifinals, Hines had pulled even with Vance & Hines Screamin’ Eagle Harley-Davidson teammate Eddie Krawiec. So as the Mello Yello Drag Racing Series comes to a close in two weeks at Pomona, Calif., the two share the points lead – with Savoie just three points behind them.

Savoie, as calm and collected as he is in any other situation, said the scenario “takes the pressure off, really.”

He said, “You know, last year, I said I wasn’t worried about the Countdown: whatever happened happened. And this year to do what we did here … We’ve been working hard.”

He said crew chief Tim Kulungian “went back to the shop and looked at a bunch of notes and got on the dyno and the engine that we had back home and did some work. I mean, look, it’s like football or anything else. The harder you work, the better you get. And it all came together this weekend: No. 1 qualifier every round.

“We’ve got a fast motorcycle, thanks to Vance and Hines. They give us the power. So it’s going to be very, very interesting when we get to Pomona,” Savoie said. “We’ll give them a run for their money.”

In a warning more to the entire class than just to the Vance & Hines duo, he said, “We got one bad motorcycle. These boys better pay attention, because we want to win.”

At stake is the $75,000 champion’s payout. The Vance & Hines team has won it 11 times in the past two decades. Savoie never has won it.

He said he’ll prepare for the culminating moment of the season the only way he knows:

“I’m going to get back [to home in Cut Off, La.] and go on the alligator farm and raise alligators. Friday I have some Italians coming in, some customers. The day after that, I’m going to fly to Mexico and go to my ranch, relax a little bit for two or three days, look at some Whitetail deer.”

That sounds incredibly intense.

It might be more so for Kulungian.

“Tim’s going to go back. Tim’s the guru man. He’s the man that looks at his notes and where we failed and where we showed promise,” Savoie said. “And you know, that guy’s a Rainman. He’s a brother to me.”

He said he isn’t going to fret about anything.

“I really don’t care what everybody else does out here. We do our own thing,” Savoie said. “If you’ll notice, a lot of times I’m not even out of my pit area. I don’t roam around. Even on the line, I don’t care. Scotty Pollacheck hung me out this morning for like six seconds, which it’s racing, I’m not mad at him. And Matt Smith pattin’ on the throttle . . . Let them play their games. Let them do whatever they’ve got to do.”

Savoie knows he can hold his own with any of them and that sometimes things just don’t go his way on race day.

“We lost in Dallas because we broke a sir clip on the clutch. We gave it away. It wasn’t none of our faults, just a mechanical failure. So, two in a row would have been great. But we didn’t get it. Hats off to the Harleys. They’re more consistent,” he said. “A lot of people gripe and complain. They’re consistent, man. They win races. They’re in the finals every weekend. Here we are. God, I’m so humbled to be here.”

The victory was his sixth overall, his first at Las Vegas, and his second in six finals this year. The St. Louis winner claimed his second Countdown victory in this fifth of six playoff events.

Savoie advanced to his third final round in four races past Pollacheck, future teammate LE Tonglet, and Matt Smith.

He said Las Vegas has “been a good place for me. But I will tell you this, when we win, we usually go home and go to bed. But we’re in Vegas, and I’ve been in bed at 8:30 every night this week so I can focus. We gonna party tonight. That’s a promise.”

Hines, meanwhile like was plotting instead of partying.

He’ll take his 38-10 elimination record into Pomona after Savoie denied him the victory in this first final round since the Countdown kickoff at Charlotte. There he lost to Chip Ellis.

Hines beat Joey Gladstone, Angie Smith, and Krawiec to go for his sixth victory in nine finals this season. For the record, his minus-.018-second foul start negated a 7.015-second, 190.00-mph run.