October 6, 2012

Hartson tops 4WD Buggy Q1 at Fall Indoor Nats

Chasing his fourth consecutive win in this year’s JConcepts Indoor National Series in 4WD Buggy, Steven Hartson got the fourth round of the series, the ‘Fall Indoor Nationals’, off to the perfect start as he took his Associated around the RC Excitement track in Fitchburg, Massachusetts, in a fastest time of 20/5:03.910 ahead of last year’s Top Qualifier Mike Gay with JConcepts’ Jason Ruona third.

Setting the fastest lap of the round with a 14.658 compared with Gay’s best of 14.937, Hartson was overall pleased with his run despite twice parking his Reedy powered B44.1 in the corner pipping.  Running JConcepts blue compound Bar Codes all round, the 20-year-old Californian said his buggy benefited from the wider groove the track had developed since yesterday’s practice and other than trying to get a clean run he wasn’t planning any changes for this evening’s second qualifier.

Also running Barcodes on his B44.1 but in green compound on the rear, Gay said he found his buggy a little squirmy out of the corners this morning compared with yesterday’s practice.  The 23-year-old said he didn’t make the best of starts to the round with a few less than perfect laps but by the end of the heat he had settled into his rhythm and is confident he can be much closer to Hartson’s pace in Q2.  Not planning to change his buggy set-up he said he will watch the track over the day and then decide what way to go in terms of tyres but at the moment he feels a switch from the green to blue compound rear tyres is probably the way he is going to go to make his buggy a little more stable out of the corners.

Also running a B44.1, Ruona described his buggy as ‘awesome’. Having turned down the power of his LRP speedo for the first qualifier after finding it a little too powerful in the single 4WD practice run he ran yesterday, the Florida driver said it was very consistent to drive.  Making a couple of small mistakes towards the end of his run, Ruona said he needs to clean up his driving a little and overall needs to drive with a little more aggression which should allow him to be closer on pace to Hartson and Gay who where 8 and 1.6 secs faster respectively.

Setting the fourth fastest time, Gunnar Rieck said his LRP powered B44.1 was ‘pretty dialled’ but he lost a little time as he got ‘roughed up’ a bit in traffic.  His third annual visit to the RC Excitement track, making the B-Main last year,  the 14-year-old said this is one of his favourite 1:10 tracks.  Despite the event attracting a record 367 entries, to make it the biggest ever JConcepts Indoor National Series event, the Pennsylvania racer said he is confident that this year he can make the main show.

In 4WD Short Course, MIP team driver Matthew Olson set the pace in the opening qualifier just missing out on a 20 lap run.  Setting a time of 19/5:00.997 over Steven Harston’s second fastest time of 19/5:06.282, the recently crowned JConcepts Clash Champion said his truck is ‘working really well’ and without the two roll overs he had in Q1 a 20-lap run is easily on the cards in Q2.  Running JConcepts Pressure Points on his MIP Pro4-mance converted Losi, Olson said the only thing he needs to change for next run is to keep his driving clean.

Hartson, who ran Blue Barcodes on his Associated SC10 4X4, said his run was not perfect as he made a few driver errors and also had some issues with traffic.  Planning to follow Olson in terms of tyre choice for Q2, he said things should be a lot closer next time out.  Completing the Top 3 in 4WD Short Course was 14-year-old Damian Lamy at the controls of an Associated.

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October 6, 2012

Practice Update

With no official timing, today’s open practice for the JConcepts Fall Indoor Nationals at RC Excitment was a very relaxed affair with drivers getting plenty of time on a track which they all reported as been super consistent throughout the day meaning little set-up changes, the focus instead being on tyre compounds. Steven Harston, who is chasing a fourth straight ‘Indoor National Series’ win this weekend in 4WD Buggy, said he was pleased with all three of his factory Associated cars.  Describing the track conditions as a little loose he said they have been consistent all day and having switched to blue compound Bar Codes for his evening runs he feels he is in good shape for tomorrow’s qualifying.

Team Losi Racing’s Dustin Evans said he focused most of his attentions on his 2WD buggy running his 2WD Stadium truck and Short Course truck just once each with both feeling really easy to drive.  Having had to change very little on the set-up of his Orion powered TLR22, last year’s 2WD Buggy victor said everything felt good for tomorrow and he used much of his track time scrubbing in tyres for qualifying.  Running JConcepts blue V1 Bar codes on the rear and blue Bar codes on the front, he said for now the tyres gave him a good feeling with the buggy but with the temperatures in the Fitchburg area set to drop considerably on Sunday he said he is not sure how that will effect the track and his tyre choice for the mains.

Local track expert Mike Wilder, who joined Evans on the podium at the Massachusetts event last year, focused most of his attentions today on his Viper powered Associated B4.1.  Having only this week received Associated’s new big bore shocks, the 25-year-old said he was really happy with how they work and after fitting a new rear diff near the end of the day he said he is confident he has the pace to again make the podium.  Commenting on 4WD Buggy he said it was pushing a little but with his front diff a little rough he plans to fit a new one for the morning which he is confident will give him the little steering he is currently lacking.

Top Qualifier in 4WD Buggy last year, Mike Gay said he focused on his tyre combo and has decided on JConcepts Bar Codes blue fronts and green rears.  The Associated driver said this gives him good forward bite and helps pull the buggy through the corners.  Describing his 4WD as ‘very good’ he said his 2WD is ‘nice and consistent’.  Gay said his biggest concern was how the track was going to react to Sunday’s forecasted weather change but he hoped it wouldn’t change things too drastically as he was looking forward to some good close racing.

Chasing his first podium finish in his own series this season, JConcepts boss Jason Ruona said things were going ‘so far so good’.  Changing from green to blue compound Bar Codes on both his 2WD and 4WD Associated chassis, he said it improved the overall feeling more so on his B4.1 allowing him to post his best run of the day.  Describing the track as ‘super tight’ the highly regarding r/c product designer said his plan for qualifying was to ‘stay smooth’ as the track punishes mistakes heavily.

Managing a best lap of 15.2 with his MIP 4WD Short Course truck, Matt Olson said it was a productive day.  Focusing on tyre choice he said he tried both Bar Codes and Pressure Points finding the latter to be slightly better.  Also playing around with compound choice he used the cooler conditions of the evening runs to see if he could get an idea of what to except for Sunday but he said the temperature change was not significant enough and the track was stayed ‘very consistent’ all day.

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October 5, 2012

JConcepts Indoor National Series touches down in Massachusetts

JConcepts’ Indoor National Series today touched down in Massachusetts for the penultimate round on the 2012 calendar with RC Excitement in Fitchburg, which is about an hours drive north east of Boston, playing host to the electric offroad event. Known as the ‘Fall Indoor Nationals’ this is the fourth of five events that makes up the series which is now in its second season with an entry of around 300 racers expected to book in before tomorrow morning’s opening qualifier.  Having already visited Missouri for the ‘Winter’, Texas for the ‘Spring’, California for the ‘Summer’ and set to culminate with the ‘Finals’ next month in JConcepts’ home state of Florida, this is the 3rd time the well known tyre & body manufacturer has brought its events to Todd Anderson’s RC Excitement track.

Heading the entry for the event will be factory Team Associated driver Steven Harston who has contested and won at all three previous rounds of the series, the 20-year-old having already bagged the overall title honours in 4WD Buggy a class in which he remains unbeaten this year. The 20-year-old from California missed this event last season but has previously raced at the venue when it held a JConcepts event prior to the creation of the Indoor National Series.  Describing the track as ‘tight but fun’ Harston said his biggest challenge this weekend is going to be in 2WD Buggy both in terms of getting his B4.1 ‘dialed in’ and in terms of the competition with Team Losi Racing’s Dustin Evans making his first appearance of 2012 in the series this weekend.  In addition to both buggy classes Harston will also contest 4WD Short Course.

Evans, who took the win in 2WD Buggy, Truck and Short Course at this event last year when he made his only appearance in the 2011 series, says he is looking forward to the weekend as its a track he really likes as it requires ‘tight precise driving’ which he is how he likes to race.  Expecting a good battle with Harston in 2WD, the only class the duo will go head to head here, the 2011 Reedy Race Champion said he expects local Boston racer Mike Wilder and Pennsylvania’s Mike Gay to be knocking on the door with JConcepts boss Jason Ruona also one to keep an eye on.

Driving for Team Associated Mike Gay was Top Qualifier in 4WD Buggy last year but in the final had to settle for second in the final behind AE team manger Brent Thielke.  The 23-year-old said the RC Excitement track, which is bigger than what he is used to racing on back home, has a nice flowing layout and his aim is to mix it with both Harston and Evans.  Describing his B44.1 as dialed he said his focus for today’s practice is to work on his 2WD Buggy set-up.

In 4WD Short Course JConcepts Clash Champion Matt Olson will be looking to further add to the list of successes for his MIP truck.  This is the 21-year-old’s second outing in the series this year having contested the third round at A-main Hobbies’ track in California where he battled it out with Harston for the win.  Losing out to the Associated driver he said he hopes he can reverse the result this weekend. Also competing in 2WD Short Course Stock class with an Associated SC10, Olson is testing a number of new soon to be released MIP parts on the truck.  Designed to reduce drag and aimed specifically for use in stock racing he is running aluminium drive shafts with replaceable pins made of a delrin material, aluminium out drive cups and an aluminium top shaft.

Today’s schedule at the Fall Indoor Nationals is open practice per class with the serious business set to start in the morning with the first of three rounds of qualifying, the best two of which will determine the grids for Sunday’s finals.

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September 24, 2012

Maifield completes ‘Clash’ title defence hat trick

Ryan Maifield pulled off a hat trick of wins at the 6th Annual JConcepts Clash with the factory Team Associated driver successfully defending all three of his 2011 titles at this year’s event which took place in Mississippi.  Having wrapped up 2WD Buggy & Short Course earlier in the day at the Flowood Indoor R/C Park, Maifield completed the perfect event when he dominated the 30-minute 1:8 Nitro Buggy finals as his main rivals hit problems.  In the end Maifield took the win by four laps from the Losi of Jason Smith with Top Qualifier Dustin Evans recovering from two engine flame-outs to complete the podium.

Pleased with his weekend in Mississippi, from where he will tomorrow travel straight to Argentina for the 1:8 Buggy World Championship warm-up race, Maifield said he had expected a tougher race. Having worked on his RC8.2’s set-up throughout the four days of the event he said it was ‘dialed’ in the final, a fact that was endorsed by his 20.594 fastest lap of the race.

Running one less stop than Maifield, Smith was delighted with second spot as he held off factory TLR driver Evans by 4 seconds.  Competing in his fifth JConcepts Clash, the North Carolina driver benefited from being able to get 10-minutes between stops from the Novarossi engine in the back of his 8ight.  Suffering from brake fade for much of the run he said knowing he had the buffer of one less stop than his rivals he was able to work around the problem.

Running up on a pipe on lap 2 which allowed Maifield to the front, Evans said he had the better car at the start of the race but it counted for little once he had his first flame out 13 laps in.  Cutting twice on the landing after the triple, Evans said increasing the idle cured the problem but having run without problems before the final he had no idea why it suddenly changed.  With his Orion engine running fine following the adjustment he said as the race went on his 8ight got harder to drive as his tyres wore down and developed more and more grip.  TLR/Orion team-mate JR Mitch, who started fourth on the grid, was the first driver to hit trouble in the race when he too suffered a flame out at the triple just 3 laps into the race.  Suffering two further flame outs he called it a day just half way through the race.

Starting from 6th on the 12 car grid, Tanner Denney looked like he might take a podium. Running the 3rd fastest lap of the race, joining Maifield and Evans as the only drivers to run under 21 seconds, the 17-year-old was battling with Smith over second spot when his Reedy engine stopped on lap 41.  Losing a lap as his RC8.2 was brought back to the pitlane and fired back up he rejoined in 7th from where he recovered to finish fifth behind Tim Smith.

With the 1:8 Nitro Buggy final out of the way the schedule moved on to the 3rd round of mains for the electric classes.  With Maifield having wrapped up the two higher profile classes of the event, 2WD Buggy and 2WD Short Course, A3 was all about deciding who was going to be runner-up.  First up was 2WD Buggy which with Maifield sitting the race out had Evans at the front of the grid but the race was to produce no less than four different leaders with Evans, Ruona, Denney and Flurer all getting to run out front it was the former who took it to secure second overall ahead of Flurer.  Evans also went on to win A3 of 2WD Short Course with his 22SCT but despite retiring his example it was Mitch who finished overall runner-up on a tie break.

Elsewhere in 1:8 Electric Buggy Max Flurer won the third A-Main to take the overall win from Jake Dellinger. Top Qualifier and AE team boss Brent Thielke had to settle for third overall on a tie break with A1 winner Dellinger.  In 4WD Buggy event creator and JConcepts founder Jason Ruona took the spoils ahead of A2 winner Denney as he repeated his A1 win in A3 while Max Flurer completed the overall Top 3.

So another JConcepts Clash is in the bag. Having had to contend with rain for the past number of years the 6th running of the event ran swiftly and without interruption. The first time to hold the race indoors the Flowood Indoor R/C Park proved very popular with racers.  JConcepts, who supported RedRC’s coverage of the event, would like to thank everyone who made the trip to Flowood possible, track owner Bubba Barham for the use of the great facility along with Reedy, LRP, Associated, A-Main Hobbies, P1 Brand, Airtronics, Durango, O’Donnell and Futaba for supporting the event.

1:8 Nitro Buggy
Overall Result
1.(2) Ryan Maifield – Associated – 83/30:00.688
2.(5) Jason Smith – Team Losi Racing – 79/30:12.782
3.(1) Dustin Evans – Team Losi Racing – 79/30:16.705
4.(9) Tim Smith – Associated – 77/30:15.811
5.(6) Tanner Denney – Associated – 76/30:04.935
6.(8) Jake Dellinger – Assocaited – 75/30:03.691
7.(10)Kevin Hawkinson – Team Losi Racing – 73/30:13.783
8.(12)Shane Ogden – Team Losi Racing – 73/30:21.118
9.(11)Blake Boggs – Associated – 73/30:22.291
10.(3)Cole Odgen – Team Losi Racing – 68/30:06.761
11.(7)William McIver – Team C – 60/24:47.393
12.(4)JR Mitch – Team Losi Racing – 29/14:30.954

2WD Buggy
A3-Main Result
1.(2) Dustin Evans – Team Losi Racing – 16/6:16.401
2.(7) Max Flurer – Associated – 16/6:16.569
3.(6) Jason Ruona – Associated – 16/6:18.556
4.(3) JR Mitch – Team Losi Racing – 16/6:22.730
5.(8) Tanner Denney – Associated – 16/6:23.296
6.(5) Zack Genova – Kyosho – 15/6:00.012
7.(9) Daimon Borkowicz – Associated – 15/6:02.253
8.(10)Steve Bortolotti – Tamiya – 15/6:04.811
9.(4) Brent Thielke – Associated – 15/6:07.975
10.(11)Paul Wynn – Associated – 15/6:12.646
11.(12)Jeffery Fleckenstein – Associated – 14/6:11.172
12.(1) Ryan Maifield – Associated – DNS

Overall Result
1. Ryan Maifield – 200 pts
2. Dustin Evans – 199
3. Max Flurer – 197
4. JR Mitch – 196
5. Jason Ruona – 195
6. Tanner Denney – 192
7. Brent Thielke – 191
8. Zack Genova – 190
9. Daimon Borkowicz – 187
10.Steve Bortolotti – 185
11.Paul Wynn – 181
12.Jeffery Fleckenstein – 181

2WD Short Course
A3-Main Result
1.(2) Dustin Evans – Team Losi Racing – 15/6:00.484
2.(4) Daimon Borkowicz – Associated – 15/608.614
3.(5) Max Flurer – Associated – 15/6:14.648
4.(6) Paul Wynn – Associated – 15/6:22.534
5.(7) Justin Cranford – Associated – 14/6:01.718
6.(8) Chris Viesins – Team Losi Racing – 14/6:15.220
7.(10)Brian Abbott – Associated – 14/6:17.305
8.(3) JR Mitch – Team Losi Racing – 14/6:23.239
9.(12)Brent Lebo – Associated – 13/6:11.780
10.(11)Jerold Brock III – Associated – 12/6:04.218
11.(9)Tylor Weaver – Team Losi Racing – 12/6:07.363
12.(1)Ryan Maifield – Associated – DNS

Overall Result
1. Ryan Maifield – 200 pts
2. JR Mitch – 198
3. Dustin Evans – 198
4. Max Flurer – 196
5. Daimon Borkowicz – 196
6. Paul Wynn – 194
7. Justin Cranford – 190
8. Chris Viesins – 189
9. Brian Abbott – 187
10.Brent Lebo – 183
11.Jerold Brock III – 181
12.Tylor Weaver – 180

View the complete results here.

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