Evans dominates Fall Indoor Nats 2WD qualifying
Team Losi Racing’s Dustin Evans has dominated the first round of 2WD qualifying at the ‘Fall Indoor Nationals’, the Colorado driver setting the pace in Buggy, Short Course and Stadium truck all classes of which he is defending champion. In 2WD Buggy, the biggest class among the record entry at the R/C Excitement hosted event, Evans’ closest rival was 4WD Q1 pace setter Steven Hartson whose Associated was 3.8 seconds off the 19/5:01.640 set by the 2011 US National Champion.
Evans described his opening buggy run as ‘conservative’ but added his Orion powered TLR22 felt good however on running his Short Course and Truck qualifiers he believes he can improve it for Q2. Running a scrubbed set of JConcepts blue Bar Codes on the buggy he said running newer tyres on both his trucks he felt it gave him better rotation in the corners on what is a tight track. Evans said he will keep an eye on the track and see how it fares over the 42 heats that make up each round of qualifying but he is debating running new tyres for the second of the third buggy heats.
Hartson said his B4.1 was good and it had the pace for a TQ run until he had difficulty with lapped traffic. Planning to leave everything as is, he said the reseeding of the heats after Q1 should allow him to put in a clear second run and take the fight to Evans. Behind the full factory supported drivers of Evans and Hartson, were two young up and coming stars of the future – Alex Kosciuszek and Gunnar Rieck. Just 13-years old, Kosciuszek said he was himself ‘surprised’ by his pace but said his Associated felt really good and he hopes with another clean run in Q2 he can secure himself a spot in the A-Main. Backing up his strong run in 4WD Buggy 14-year-old Rieck also set the fourth fastest time in 2WD Buggy. Behind the two youngsters Mike Gay completed the Top 5.
Managing the only 20 lap run in stadium truck ahead of Gunner and Rob Betts, Evans said his 22T felt good but the biggest improvement today was to his Short Course truck. Phoning team-mate Mike Truhe & TLR team-manager Kevin Gahan, who are racing at the Reedy Truck Race in California this weekend, when he got back to his hotel he said they came up with a set-up to try for today which he said transformed the 22SCT. He took the truck to a convincing 19 lap TQ run over Kosciuszek and Nicholas Sass.
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