Ronnefalk delivers in Q3 at SIGP
David Ronnefalk has delivered a TQ run at the Sundapow International Grand Prix, the Xray driver ending Kouki Kato’s reign at the top pf the time sheets as he took the third round ahead of the Japanese driver and his Infinity team-mate Bruno Coelho. Setting the fastest lap of the round with a 32.725, Ronnefalk would eventually finish a massive 13-seconds up on Kato who, like Ronnefalk the previous round, needed to be marshalled only in Kato’s case he had double the mistakes on each opposite side of the track. With drivers reporting track conditions as even more difficult for Q3, Coelho also had two bad laps resulting in him failing to run 15-laps however overall the time still gave him a three for the round. 5-seconds behind the multiple class World Champion, promising future hope Jung Hyunkyu enjoyed his best round result with P4 for the Team Associated teenager ahead of Mayako’s Joseph Quagraine. Unfortunately for JQ’s lead driver Pekko Iivonen it was another throw away round as he lasted just over 2-minutes before his engine moved.
Reacting to his Round 3 TQ double, the 2024 eBuggy winner also going fastest in eBuggy for the first time, Ronnefalk said, ‘That was the first time I felt I could drive through some of the bumps out there. Working on the shock package is key on this track and I think we found something that was really good there because both cars were on the same set-up change and improved a lot. I was able to go mistake free pretty much in both nitro & eBuggy. Now it feels good again. I was kind of struggling a little bit with the feeling and not being able to drive the way I wanted to out but now I didn’t change much in my driving, the car was just absorbing the bumps out there a lot better.’ Asked about the changes he made to the shocks, the Swede explained, ‘mainly the piston and the amount of pack and how quick the rebound you want to have for the condition. I felt I had good grip and support in landings before but they were a little too sensitive over the bumps especially high speed and now I felt maybe I sacrificed a little bit in the landings but they work much better over the bumps and it’s so much more drivable.’ On track condition the former World Champion said, ‘It’s not easy out there, it is getting more & more dusty. I didn’t know they are not going to fix the holes. They re-glued the track yesterday and it looks like they are not going to fix the holes until the end of the race so it is definitely going to be tricky this afternoon and come tomorrow it is going to be even more tricky so I need to stay on top of things.’
Suffering his first rough round, Kato said, ‘My car got a little bit nervous in that one and was difficult to drive. The traction is getting lower so I needed to adjust (his driving) but I didn’t do it enough.’ On his two costly mistakes, the ABC Champion explained, ‘I hit a bump and had a mistake and I also had one on the left side on the back straight which was also a big mistake so it was a tough run.’ On his electric car, having said after Q2 he would change his diff oil, he said while it was a slight improvement he still needs to find more grip.
While a far from perfect run, Coelho was more positive about his nitro buggy this time saying, ‘the car was a bit better, I did some small mistakes, but I think we are on the correct direction now with the set-up details.’ Asked what they had discovered he replied, ‘we changed the wing to one that generates a little bit more stability on the car and we changed also a little the position of the shocks on the front to have more corner speed and less steering and it worked good so we will probably try to go more in that direction.’ Like Kato in nitro, Coelho was unable to seal the early overall eBuggy TQ explaining, ‘Electric was good but I got some traffic. I got one guy coming out from the infield into the track and I crashed into him and I lost 1 or 2 seconds and basically lost the TQ by 1 or 2-seconds. Without that it would have been OK.’
Asked how he was doing now, Hyunkyu replied, ‘Not good, I am struggling a lot.’ Despite recording his best run which sees him sitting P4 overall in the latest qualification ranking, the 14-year-old said, ‘It’s pretty terrible out there. My car was pretty difficult to drive, it is better than yesterday but still we are pretty off the pace to the Top 3 guys. The shock package is pretty important here so I will a different spring for the next one and see what happens.’ On his own driving he said, ‘I think my driving was so stupid. Q2 in electric was super nice and I was only 1-second behind Kouki but the nitro I was over excited so I just need to settle down out there. I need to be more smooth and calm.’
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