Kilic tops final free practice at Thornhill

Mugen Seiki’s Burak Kilic shot to the top of the times for the sixth & final round of free practice at the IFMAR 1:8 Nitro Buggy World Championship in Texas, the Turkish driver closing out Monday’s action with a 3-consecutive lap time of 1:51.195 around the Thornhill Racing Circuit.  The round would see big changes at the top with Sworkz’ Juan Carlos Canas, Top Qualifier in 2024, setting the second fastest time ahead of American Xray pairing Dakotah Phend and Chase Lemieux, the former struggling with his bad at the end of the day and retiring early to his bed to rest it.  Tekno’s Daniel Pariente posted his first Top 5 run just ahead of Mason Fuller, the Sworkz driver having posted the second fastest time in the previous round.  While his FP5 time of 1:51.133 still stands as the fastest run of free practice, defending World Champion Davide Ongaro would use the final practice to test if he had been going the right direction with his set-up after his FP5 run and taking the set-up in the opposite direction the 7th fastest time verified he had been on the right route with set-up.  The round would also see David Ronnefalk drop outside the Top 3 for the first time, sticking with the same harder compound tyre he ran in the fifth round, with temperatures dropping for FP6 it was too hard and the lacking pace resulted in the 10th fastest time for the Swede.

Asked where his FP6 speed came from Kilic replied, ‘I just changed tyres and my car set-up a little bit, and of course my driving style, and it worked out, it was good.’  Asked about his two other runs today, the 22-year-old replied, ‘the first one was actually pretty OK.  The second one was not so nice and then I changed my whole car and tyres and it was pretty good now.’  On what he was lacking earlier on, he said the main thing was steering but now he had found lots of steering and lots of grip, but asked about which JConcept tyre he had achieved this with he replied with a smile, ‘I will tell you after the race.’  Asked if the car was now where he wanted it, he replied, ‘I think I will look to get more steering to go into the corner a little bit more that’s all.  Overall it is pretty good.’   On the track layout, the 2024 World Finalist, said, ‘the layout is good, I just don’t like the whoops cause it is really difficult, but overall it’s really good.’

Summing up his strong finish to free practice, Canas sadi, ‘We have been trying many new things from JConcepts and finally we put on something more normal and it worked quite well.’  He continued, ‘Yesterday and today the car was good but we were just trying new things and Burak also tested other things and it looks like that works super good so we will go with that tomorrow.  If I don’t like that I have the tyre that I used now that looks good.’  The reigning European Champion added, ‘Now it is just the small details but the most important thing is the tyres and we are in a good way there with Burak P1 and me P2.  We are working in a good way.’  On the track, Canas said, ‘I love it, this kind of track I love.’

‘I knew the pace was there and I just needed to find it,’ was Lemieux reaction to P4 in FP6.  With Billy Fisher as his pitman, he explained, ‘ We made a couple of changes with the car and tyres and I am just getting more comfortable with the track each run.’  A driver better known for his 1:10 Offroad exploits being a two time ROAR National Champion but also just coming off a podium finish at the 1:8 Nitro Buggy Nationals, on the track he said, ‘I think the track suit me more, it’s kind of like 1:10 scale which is what I run the majority of.  Obviously the driving of the car is still very different to a 1:10 car but the style of the track is tighter like a 1:10 track would be.’  Asked what he is still chasing in his car set-up, the 20-year-old said, ‘honestly small things.  In the beginning it was kind of out in left field a little bit but we brought it back to where it needs to be and at this point I am pretty content with the main parts of the set-up but just looking for small adjustments to really get it exactly where I want it.’  On tyres Lemieux is running the new Tokyo from Hotrace.

Asked about his final run, Pariente said, ‘It was pretty good’ adding, ‘we changed to a softer compound, softer oils in the shocks, and a harder sway bar on the rear and it was super good’.  One half of the Spanish Pariente siblings who have been making big impressions with their respective manufacturers, Adrian driving for Sparko, asked how he was finding the track layout the Tekno driver said it was ‘super different’ to what they have in Spain but added he ‘likes it’.  Summing up his performance so far he said, ‘I am happy but I still want to improve but yes I am happy’.  Looking to tomorrow’s seeding rounds, the 21-year-old said ‘We will start with what we have now and after the first one we will probably go up on shock oil.  The weather is very important for the shock oil choice.’