Maifield takes A1 clean sweep

Ryan Maifield took a clean sweep of the opening buggy A-Mains at the JConcepts Summer Indoor Nationals at Outback Raceway, Chico, this morning winning 4WD with ease from Brian Strange but having to work a little hard for the 2WD win which he took from his protege Spencer Rivkin.  Top Qualifier for both finals, in 4WD the new Team Losi Racing signing was able to pull clear as up to five cars battled over second with Strange’s Associated coming out on top of that battle from early lead challenger Drew Moller and Eric Albano.  Run directly after 4WD, A1 of 2WD saw a mistake on lap 1 from Maifield allowing Rivkin to go to the front until he made a mistake at the same section of track a lap later.  Dropping to third after further mistakes Rivkin would benefit from a mistake by team-mate Damion Borkowicz on the last lap which dropped the number seven starter back to 3rd.

Just one more race away from completing the perfect debut with his new team, Maifield was pleased with both his own and his buggies performance in A1.  In 4WD, he said Moller applied some early pressure but having reverted his TLR22-4 back to the set-up he used in Q2, his fastest qualifier, he always felt in control as the buggy was really predictable and fast as highlighted by his fastest lap of the race.  In 2WD, having given his Orion powered TLR22 a full rear end rebuild after qualifying, he said the car was also very predicable and ‘neutral’ to drive.  Commenting on his only blotch of the opening A-Mains, he put it down to the fact that his tyres, which are almost slick, just had warmed up enough for the highly polished track surface and possibly he caught some dust with the break in traction causing his ‘little hiccup’.  Asked about the challenge from Spencer he said he knew from racing him a lot back home in Arizona that ‘he can run the laps’ and he would have to ‘play blocker at the start’.

‘Pretty gnarly’ was how Rivkin described the start of the race.  The 15-year-old said after his mistake he was able to put together some ‘really hot laps’ and started catching back up to Maifield.  Delighted with the performance of his B5M, setting the fastest lap of the race, unfortunately a second mistake ended his charge and he dropped back behind Borkowicz admitting he got lucky when his fellow teenager made a last lap mistake which let him by for second.

Borkowicz said he got a ‘great start’ and by lap 2 he was in third.  Describing his car as sketchy he said his Reedy powered B5M had too much steering and it was over correcting a moment that caused by this that let Rivkin through on the last lap. Not planning to change his car for A2, the 14-year-old said he will adapt his driving and try not to worry about wrecking and just go for it.

Having started 3rd, Mark Pavidis would finish 4th describing himself as ‘happy overall’.  In the warm-up feeling his TLR22 had too much steering he turned his dual down but he went too far and for the race he was left needing more steering.  He also added that the nature of the tight track was even with good steering going to make it always very difficult to pass.

‘Amazing’ was how Strange described his 4WD race.  Joking that he should buy a lottery ticket today he said luck was definiately on his side.  Enjoying a good race with fellow Associated driver Eric Albano for second he said he hoped he could have a similar race in A2 but said he not sure he was going to be so fortunate with his luck again.  Having run a similar pace to Maifield, his best lap being a 14.470 compare to Maifeld’s 14.413, he said while his B44.2 has the speed starting from 5th is also going to make it hard to make any serious challenge.

Asked about his race, Moller said it was ‘good other than that one early bobble’ which ended his challenge on Maifield.  Casing the table after the triple his D413 flipped over and needed to be marshalled losing him almost 5-seconds and dropping him back to 6th.  Coning back to third, the 18-year-old said the speed his there and for the next one he needs to try and cut out the mistake.

4WD Buggy A-Main Leg 1 Result
1.(1) Ryan Maifield – Team Losi Racing – 22/5:13.117
2.(5) Brian Strange – Team Associated – 21/5:02.757
3.(2) Drew Moller – A-Main Hobbies (HB) – 21/5:05.258
4.(6) Eric Albano – Team Associated – 21/5:06.696
5.(4) Damion Borkowicz – Team Associated – 21/5:09.273
6.(3) Tyler Vik – Team Xray – 21/5:09.300
7.(11)Mark Pavidis – Team Losi Racing – 21/5:11.385
8.(10)Chris Jarosz – Team Associated – 21/5:13.664
9.(9)JR Mitch – Team Losi Racing – 21/5:14.439
10.(8)Derek Stephansen – Team Xray – 20/5:01.808
11.(7)Steven Hartson – Team Associated – 19/5:00.876

2WD Buggy A-Main Leg 1 Result
1.(1) Ryan Maifield – Team Losi Racing – 21/5:07.011
2.(2) Spencer Rivkin – Team Associated – 21/5:12.976
3.(7) Damion Borkowicz – Team Associated – 21/5:14.508
4.(3) Mark Pavidis – Team Losi Racing – 20/5:01.430
5.(11)Steven Hartson – Team Associated – 20/5:03.176
6.(10)Brian Strange – Team Associated – 20/5:03.874
7.(4) Tyler Vik – Team Xray (AE) – 20/5:16.222
8.(5) Chris Jarosz – Team Associated – 19/5:00.063
9.(8) JR Mitch – Team Losi Racing – 19/5:01.004
10.(6)Drew Moller – A-Main Hobbies (AE) – 19/5:01.962
11.(9)Frank Root – Team Losi Racing – 19/5:04.951

View the event image gallery here.