Reedy title hots up as Tebo & Maifield win again

With just two of the 12 rounds of heads up racing remaining, the battle for the 21st running of the Reedy Race of Champions at OCRC Raceway in Huntington Beach is hotting up into a duel between Jared Tebo and Ryan Maifield.  Round 4 of 4WD would see both drivers bring their tally’s to 3 wins which when dropped scores are taken into account puts the pair equal at the top of the points although now it is Maifield who holds the tie-break advantage due to him having the fastest combined 2WD & 4WD race times.  For defending champion Ryan Cavalieri the round saw him lose further ground, while impressive from 9th on the grid, he could only finish 2nd with his hopes of a hat trick of consecutive Reedy titles starting to fade. Interestingly the penultimate round will be the first time in 4WD that Maifield and Tebo start in the same race, with the grid draw putting the TLR driver 4th and the Kyosho 8th.

Starting Race 1 from pole, Maifield converted that into a easy win over the Durango of Travis Amezcua the gap at the end of the 5-minutes being 2.7 seconds.  The entertainment for the large crowd of onlookers would be provided by Ty Tessmann and Carson Wernimont, the HB and Associated drivers switching back and fort as they fought over third place.  With the outcome decided on the last lap it was Tessmann’s D413 which completed the Top 3.

In Race 2, pole sitter Joona Haatanen crossed the loop for the first time in the lead from Tebo and Steven Hartson but next time round it was the two World Champion who took up the lead battle. Despite a closing Hartson, Tebo stayed in control taking the win by 0.355 seconds. Former champion Dustin Evans would get a third, his TLR22-4 having started from the 6th spot.  Another former champion in the race was Joern Neumann but it was a tough encounter for the German as he finished 5th effectively ending his slight outside chance of a second title.

The round was completed by a win for TLR’s Dakotah Phend.  The 17-year-old, starting from 6th, went to the front on lap 3 and cruised to a convincing 6.4 second lead from Cavalieri who having come from 9th on the grid was unable to do anything about the 2WD US National Champion’s lead once he got by Cody King and Billy Easton.  King, who had started on pole, would take his Kyosho to 3rd for his best result of 4WD.

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