Maifield, Hollis & Evans TQ Spring Indoor Nationals

Ryan Maifield, Cody Hollis and Dustin Evans have TQ’d the three main classes at this year’s JConcepts Spring Indoor Nationals in Dallas, Texas, Maifield giving Associated pole for the 2WD Buggy A-Main while TLR pairing Hollis and Evans will carry the No.1 in Mod Truck and 2WD Short Course respectively tomorrow at the at Mike’s Hobby Shop event.  The only driver to record a double TQ this weekend, Maifield will also lead away the field in the 4WD Buggy A-Main.

Running rocket round format, everything was still to play for in the third & final round of qualifying with Mod Truck producing the best showdown as Dustin Evans came so very close to denying his team-mate Hollis, who had set the pace in the opening two heats. Running a fresh set of tyres on his Orion powered 22T in Q3 in preparation for the finals, it was clear early on in the heat that Hollis would have to depend on his Q2 time standing with Evans and Maifield on a charge to try and outpace the 20-year-old.  Evans came really close, recovering from a number of moments to start his final lap just 1/10th of a second off Hollis’ provisional TQ pace but try as hard as he could he was not able to find the 1/10 he required, crossing the line to end up .095 shy of Hollis. Despite missing out, Evans said he was much happier with his truck after a change from green to the harder blue compound JConcept Pressure Point tyre and he was looking forward to a good race tomorrow with his team-mate.

Very happy at having out qualified his team-mate to take the honour of Top Qualifier, Hollis said he is confident he can see off the challenge of his more experienced team mate but added that the key to the race is going to be ‘no wrecks’.  Securing third ahead of his team-manager Brent Thielke, Maifield said his T4.2 is getting better every run but he is still not comfortable enough to really push it but he said he will wait to see what the race brings.

In 2WD Buggy Maifield had not such problems with his B4.2.  With 9 of the Top 10 improving their times in Q3, Thielke the only driver not to better his time, Maifield said he had a good run and while Evans & Hollis had good pace early on he felt he seemed to deal with traffic better which helped him to a TQ time that was 6.2 seconds clear of Hollis who will start the triple A-Main second.  Asked who he expected to be his biggest challenger in the final he said both Hollis and Evans were serious contenders but he hoped the two would end up battling one another leaving him to just try and run a clean 5-minutes.  Evans, who said the change from green to blue compound tyres on his TLR22 didn’t have the same positive effect as it did in Mod Truck, feels while his buggy has good pace, starting from 3rd it will be hard to go for the win and picking the right tyre was going to be key to him having a good race.

Coming into the final qualifier holding onto the last A-Main grid spot, defending JConcepts Indoor National Series Champion Steven Hartson managed his cleanest round to secured the fourth fastest time.  Switching to green Barcodes and a different tyre sauce he said once he got passed the first minute mark with the new set of tyres his B4.2 felt really good with him making just one mistake over the 5-minutes.

While the names filling the Top 4 places on the grid are all established racers the driver who will start fifth is going to be one to watch for the future.  Running in the C heat, reseeding being done at the end of each round,  12-year-old Austin Horne put in the drive of his life in the final qualifier to put his Associated B4.2 smack in the middle of the A-Main where he will start ahead of his father Allen who starts 7th.  Happy with how his buggy has run all day and making no changes over the day he said his impressive pace was just down to him putting together a clean round.  Delighted at making the A-Main, he said his target coming to the race was to qualifying in the Top 10 but to achieve Top 5 and out qualify his dad had made this by far his best race yet.

In 2WD Short Course, Evans managed to improve on his Q1 TQ pace by 2.3 seconds in the final qualifier taking the round ahead of 14-year-old team-mate Taylor Larsen who managed to bump Q2 pace setter JR Mitch back to third.  In 4WD Buggy it was a similar story as Maifield, who had held the TQ since Q1 managed to improve on his time in Q3 getting his B44.2 around the track marginally faster, shaving .928 of a second of his previous time.  Unable to better his Q1 time Hartson will start 2nd with Xray’s Paul Lemieux completing the Top 3 with his Q2 run time.

2WD Buggy Top 10 Qualifiers (A-Main Grid)
1. Ryan Maifield – Associated – 16/5:04.898 (3)
2. Cody Hollis – TLR – 16/5:11.117 (3)
3. Dustin Evans – TLR – 16/5:13.990 (3)
4. Steven Hartson – Associated – 16/5:16.916 (3)
5. Austin Horne – Associated – 16/5:18.102 (3)
6. Taylor Larsen – TLR – 16/5:18.615 (3)
7. Allen Horne – Associated – 16/5:18.940 (3)
8. Trevor Nault – Associated – 16/5:19.722 (3)
9. Brent Thielke – Associated – 16/5:20.228 (2)
10.Spencer Rivkin – Associated – 16/5:20.962 (3)

Mod Truck Top 10 Qualifiers (A-Main Grid)
1. Cody Hollis – TLR – 16/5:13.351 (2)
2. Dustin Evans – TLR – 16/5:13.446 (3)
3. Ryan Maifield – Associated – 16/5:14.419 (3)
4. Brent Thielke – Associated – 16/5.19.128 (3)
5. Taylor Larsen – TLR – 15/5:00.498 (2)
6. Trevor Nault – Associated – 15/5:09.041 (2)
7. Aaron Reynolds – TLR – 15/5:14.267 (2)
8. Spencer Rivkin – Associated – 15/5:15.197 (1)
9. Eric Larsen – TLR – 15/5:15.462 (3)
10.Dustin English – Kyosho – 15/5:16.526 (2)

2WD Short Course Top 10 Qualifiers (A-Main Grid)
1. Dustin Evans – TLR – 16/5:17.458 (3)
2. Taylor Larsen – TLR – 15/5:01.634 (3)
3. JR Mitch – TLR – 15/5:04.345 (2)
4. Steven Hartson – Associated – 15/5:10.973 (1)
5. Michael Twilling – Kyosho – 15/5:11.416 (2)
6. Mike Stoll – Associated – 15/5:13.699 (2)
7. Cody Hollis – TLR – 15/5:15.791 (3)
8. Daimon Borkowicz – Associated – 15/5:19.456 (3)
9. Gary O’Brien – Durango – 14/5:08.627 (3)
10.Kyle Skidmore – Associated – 14/5:10.992 (3)

4WD Buggy Top 10 Qualifiers (A-Main Grid)
1. Ryan Maifield – Associated – 17/5:17.329 (3)
2. Steven Hartson – Associated – 16/5:06.004 (1)
3. Paul Lemieux – Xray – 16/5:15.841 (2)
4. Kyle Skidmore – Associated – 16/5:17.266 (2)
5. Trevor Nault – Associated – 16/5:17.533 (2)
6. Aydin Horne – Associated – 16/5:19.437 (3)
7. Aaron Breuer – Kyosho – 16/5:19.478 (1)
8. Michael Twilling – Kyosho – 15/5:03.940 (2)
9. Jordan Born – Xray – 15/5:04.245 (2)
10.Rhett McNair – Schumacher – 15/5:04.711 (2)

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