Ronnefalk takes Q3 from Top Qualifier Tessmann
David Ronnefalk headed a HB 1-2 in the third & final round of buggy qualifying at the Dirt Nitro Challenge, the Swede outpacing Ty Tessmann by 1.2 seconds, but second for the round would be enough for Tessmann to secure the overall TQ for the 16th running of world famous track builder Joey ‘The Dirt’ Christensen’s signature event. Despite not having a good final round, TLR’s Ryan Maifield, the only driver other than Tessmann to win at DNC nitro title at the Fear Farm, will line up second followed by team-mate & last year’s Top Qualifier Dakotah Phend who also had a tough Q3. Becoming the third different driver to TQ a round, Maifield taking Q1 and Tessmann Q2, Ronnefalk will line-up 4th for Sunday night’s 45-minute final.
Happy to get the overall TQ, Tessmann described his final qualifier as ‘alright’ feeling he drove too hard at the start and ending up with a crash on lap 4. Making a diff set-up change on his D815 for the run, the Canadian said this worked out good with him able to set the fastest lap of the round. Six second down on team-mate Ronnefalk with 5-laps to go the World Champion reduced that to just over a second adding this showed the speed is there. Asked about the main he said ‘everyone is right there’ in terms of speed and ‘not one person is standing out’. Commenting on the track he said it is ‘getting more & more gnarly’ but they would just ‘have to deal with it’ come the A-Main.
Maifield was clearly not happy with changes made to his 8ight for the final qualifying with the 2013 champion saying bad decisions were made in the pits after to listening to other people. The Arizona driver said once he puts his car back to how it was in the previous qualifiers, his set-up unchanged between Q1 & 2, he knows he is faster than everyone else and his plan for the race was simple, ‘make a pass at the first corner and be gone’.
Managing only the 15th fastest time for the third round, Phend said his 8ight was good but battling with sickness it didn’t go well from a driving point of view. With the round finishing up shortly after 11pm, the top drivers having been at the track from before 7am to complete their final round of truggy qualifying, the 18-year-old said he now just want to go to sleep. With a good starting position already locked in with his results from the first two qualifiers he used the final run to test Pro-Line’s Lockdown tyre with a view to running them in the Main. Providing more traction and feeling less edgy than the Holeshots he ran previously he said he will most probably use them for the final.
Ronnefalk said for anyone watching the warm-up they would have said he had no chance of a TQ run as he made a series of stupid mistakes one of which saw Boots make contact with his D815. Adopting a ‘little easier’ driving style for the start of the qualifier he said this and having a clean track ahead of him worked out well adding he was particularly happy to do one TQ run in each of the three 1:8 classes. Having one mistake at the whoops section, adding with the track conditions as they are now you were always going to have some bobbles out there, he said the biggest difference for Q3 was his tyre choice. Having run AKA Catapults, he changed to Typos which resulted in increased traction and more steering.
Posting the fifth fastest time for Q3, that is where Ryan Lutz will line up on the 15-car A-Main grid. The Tekno RC driver said ‘the start was good, the middle was good, but the end was not so good’. Running a Top 3, hitting the top of the timing screens for a lap, he caught traffic towards the end of the 7-minutes and then made mistakes of his own. Despite this he said it was nice to be on the pace with a change to CVDs in the back of his prototype buggy curing the issue he had with the rear end of the car dumping under power. Feeling he made a lot of progress with his buggy over the three qualifiers he is confident he can run a good final.
Completing the Top 6 on the grid by backing up his P5 in Q2 with a P6 in the final round that allowed him to drop his disastrous Q1 result, Ryan Cavalieri will lead the Team Associated challenge in the final. Behind him Elliott Boots will line up 7th as the top Kyosho qualifier followed by HB’s Drew Moller, Truggy Top Qualifier Jared Tebo, Mugen’s Barry Pettit and Kyosho’s Cody King. Agama driver Darren Bloomfield secures the 12th & final direct spot on the grid which will be completed by the Top 3 finishers from the B-Main.
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