Canas is Top Qualifier as Coelho sets blistering Q5 pace
For months he has been widely tipped to become the new 1:8 Offroad World Champion, and living up to the well justified hype Juan Carlos Canas has completed the first stage and locked himself in as the Top Qualifier in Spain. The Sworkz driver topped Q2, 3 & 4, giving him the perfect score with only reigning Champion Davide Ongaro left in the TQ race going into the penultimate round. Having thrown away a potential TQ run a round earlier in Q4, Xray’s Bruno Coelho managed to omit the last lap error this time to take his first TQ and by default hand Canas an early overall TQ. Having already switched to using the remaining two rounds of qualifying as testing for the Semi Finals, Canas would still get a P2 for the round although the gap to Coelho was a massive 5.4 seconds. A rocket round, Coelho’s time almost 6 seconds better than the previous best from Q4, Ongaro would finish 3rd 0.154 off Canas with Elliott Boots having his best run in P4. The Top 6 was completed by David Ronnefalk and the TLR of top American challenger Dakotah Phend.
With it widely accepted that Canas’ Q4 run was job done in terms of overall TQ, the Spaniard was very much already moved to the next stage of his campaign. Asked about Q5, the European Champion said, ‘I tried some things like planned. It was working good, it made it more comfortable but it was a bit slower compared to Bruno, also he did a superb run, super clean and super fast.’ Planning to try another change for the sixth & final round, asked if the set-up from Q5 was something he could use in the finals, he replied, ‘maybe if the grip changes a little bit I can use for Saturday but for the next one I will try some other ideas to have more options for Saturday.’
‘Finally a clean run, that was what was basically missing’, was Coelho’s reaction. He continued, ‘the car was very good and it is giving us very good confidence for the rest of the race. We changed small things on the car and it was good, now we want the track not to change until the end of the event but we know that is not going to happen.’ On his plans for Q6 he said, ‘I can still be second (overall) but in the end it doesn’t change much so we want to try something more because I am sure the competition won’t stay where they are and will improve their package so for sure try something to make it faster’. He concluded, ‘We are very positive at the moment.’
Having struggled for pace in the previous round Ongaro said, ‘That was better than before, we completely changed the car, we switched to the 2022 World Championship set-up from here and it was better in some parts of the track and worse in others so we try to adjust now’. He continued, ‘we cannot do worse than P3 (overall) now so we will keep changing stuff ‘.
Summing up his best round so far Boots said, ‘Obviously we didn’t have the pace of Bruno, he was on a blistering one but I think we are going in the right direction. Elaborating on what he is missing he said ‘just corner speed.’ He continued, ‘you see from watching Bruno’s car how much the car rotates so that’s the way we need to go after watching his car. We had a bit more that time so we’ll keep going that direction.’ Asked how his set-up was compared to team-mate Canas, both also running Reds Engines, he said, ‘It similar but there are small changes because he drives a lot harder than me but its not far from each other. Tyres are the big thing, they act differently, different side grip and things. Before it was easier because we ran the same (tyres) so you can run the same set-up’. Looking to Q6, the British driver said, ‘we are the Semis so it is nice we can try stuff for the next one’.
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