Tebo tops 4WD seeding at JConcepts Finals

Jared Tebo topped seeding practice at JConcepts Indoor National Series Finals in Mooresville, North Carolina, the Kyosho driver fastest over 3-consecutive laps of the Speed RC track.  With just a single round of seeding practice, the Kyosho driver was over a 1-second fastest than his close rivals with Spencer Rivkin and Alex Kosciuszek recording an identical time of 49.660.  The JConcepts Indoor National Series’ first visit to the track of ex Formula 1 and Nascar racer Scott Speed, the event is set to decide this year’s overall 4WD champion with the three winners from the season’s previous four events, Rivkin, Kosciuszek and Max Flurer. Winner of the 4th round in Boston back in October, Flurer would struggle in his seeding round setting the 5th fastest overall behind Matt Cline with Daimon Borkowicz completing the Top 6.

Describing his seeding run as ‘really good’ and also managing the best 5-minute time, Tebo said his new ZX6.6 ‘might be a little soft’.  Planning to ‘go up in the shock oil a little’ for tomorrow’s opening qualifier, the former World Champion felt his 5-minutes was probably better than his 3-laps’ adding he is feeling confident going into qualifying. Running Pro-line’s Electron tyre on the front and Positron on the rear, he said of the combination ‘I like it a lot and with stick with’.

Running in the heat before Tebo, Rivkin felt he ‘lost a lot of time with traffic’ adding ‘Tebo had a cleaner run than me’.  Running JConcepts’ all new Octagon tyre on his B44.3, the 18-year-old said while the car and tyres where ‘pretty good’ he ‘didn’t drive that disciplined’.  Feeling the car is gong to get better as the tyres get more laps, the winner of Rounds 2 and 3 of the series plans to leave the car unchanged for Q1 but will ‘freshen up’ shocks as this should make the car ‘a little smoother through the turns’.

‘The car was really good that time’ was Kosciuszek reaction after the seeding run.  The Team Associated driver said work to his JConcepts Octogan tyres had improved the car from the earlier practice.  Thinking about qualifying, the winner of the season opener at SmacTrac in St.Louis will change his rear shock set-up on his B44.3 to improve it through the corners and to soak up the ‘random bumps better’.  Describing the grip from the dirt as ‘good’, he concluded, ‘I like the track a lot’.

Having rebuilt his shocks ahead of the seeding round, Cline said his B44.3 was really good.  The Ohio driver is another driver who likes the track layout describing it as ‘smooth and consistent’. For qualifying the 22-year-old said he will ‘probably leave the car alone’ and instead focus on driving ‘more consistent’.

With Speed RC his home track, Flurer will be looking for improvement tomorrow.  The TLR driver described his seeding performance as ‘pretty bad’ adding his car ‘pushed like a dump truck’.  Running on JConcepts’ Spacebar tyre he said the handling was probably down to tyres and he ‘work on tyres tonight’ as well as ‘go through the car’ which he said ‘hasn’t been looked at for a while’.

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