Team: Associated
Neighbours: Spencer Rivkin (front), “Dyno” (left)
Charger: Orion Touch
Tools: MIP/Team Associated/Makita drill
Setup Tools: Upgrade RC buggy setup board, Tuning Haus truggy setup board, GHEA ride height gauges
Car Stand: Upgrade RC
Transport Bag: OGIO
Features: AKA mini pump bottle/CA Glue, Kicker wireless speaker, Mx fuel can, Simple Green spay bottle, iPhone6+, LV wallet, Prada sunglasses case, Starbuck’s iced coffee.
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Kody Numedahl opened Day 2 of the Reedy Race of Champions with a thrilling victory over overnight points leader Dustin Evans, the Associated driver snatching the win through the last corner to become the first triple winner at the 22nd running of the race that carries on the legacy of RC pioneer Mike Reedy. Having described his Round 4 performance yesterday as ‘A trademark Reedy Race blowout’, from pole Numedahl would get the holeshot only to throw it away when he caught the piping coming onto the straight for the first time. Dropping to fourth in the well loaded race, which in addition to Evans also had World Champion Spencer Rivkin and Steven Hartson, Numedahl would benefit from errors by long time leader Chad Due and Hartson to move to second behind Evans. Coming on the last lap Numedahl was on the rear wing of the TLR driver’s rear wing and looking to defend his position on the dash to the finish Evans took a tight line but with less traction on the inside Numedahl got the run to take a win that was well appreciated by the OCRC crowd. In the previous two encounters of the penultimate round of 2WD action reigning champion Ryan Maifield would take win No.2 while Jared Tebo finally registered his first win of the event.
‘That was crazy’ was Numedahl’s reaction to the race, the AE designer adding, ‘that was the closest race so far with so many drivers that close together’. His first front row start, the unassuming racer said, ‘I wanted to get the holeshot so went full throttle. It was a good start but then I got caught on the same pipe that cost a result in Round 4’. Commenting on today’s track conditions he said ‘most drivers don’t look as comfortable today cause the grip is up in a weird way with the cars snapping loose’. Starting his final 2WD encounter from 4th on the grid he hopes to be able to convert that into a result that allows him drop his P4 from the fourth round with him just 1-point of standings leader Evans.
Giving his reaction to the entertaining race, Evans said ‘the last lap I protected my lines but went too tight coming onto the straight and there was no grip’. Having spent a few weeks in California as part of his preparation for the race, the 2011 Champion said ‘I have been racing with Kody since I came out to California and there is no one I am more comfortable racing with. The former US Champion continued, ‘I am still happy with a 2nd and with Top 3 finishes in all my races with only one (2WD) round to go its all good’.
Commenting on his win over an impressive Rob Gillespie, Maifield said, ‘I made changes to my car to try calm it down a little and it was an improvement’. Starting from 7th on the grid, the TLR driver said having got through some ‘carnage’ at the start he drove a patient race. Following behind leader Gillespie, saying ‘Robbie was going really good’, he said with Dakotah Phend behind he didn’t want to risk a mistake that would let his team-mate passed. With Gillespie having a rollover entering the straight this let Maifield through for his second win.
Taking three laps to get to the front ahead of early leader Joseph Quagraine and JP Richards, Tebo said it was a ‘great start’ to Day 2. ‘I drove a little better’ said the Kyosho driver adding ‘my car was good yesterday I just drove bad’. Despite the ‘nervous’ driving the former World Champion goes into the final 2WD with a run of Top 3 finishes. Also in the same race was Ryan Cavalieri. Starting from last on the grid the 3-time Reedy Race Champion would tangle with Cody King on the first lap. Recovering from that to join the battle for second, the Associated driver then made a mistake at the second triple with four laps to go. Dropping to fourth he could only recover to 3rd after a late mistake by Serpent’s Billy Easton.
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Ryan Cavalieri has ended Day 1 of the 22nd running of the Reedy Race of Champions at the top of the 4WD practice time sheets. While times will count for little once the famous heads up racing event gets underway tomorrow with a day of 2WD racing, the 3-time champion would head a Team Associated 1-2-3-4 ahead of Spencer Rivkin, Kody Numedahl and Steven Hartson. Former Associated driver Tanner Denney would open his first event with TLR as the best non AE driver after the 3 rounds of practice taking his 22-4 to the fifth fastest time with Yokomo’s Carson Wernimont completing the Top 6. For reigning champion Ryan Maifield after problems in P1 & 2, the TLR driver would end the day seventh quickest, 6th to 10th separated over 3-consecutive laps by just 0.022 of a second.
‘I didn’t touch anything, just drove it and she is on the shelf now til Saturday’, was a pleased Cavalieri’s reaction to topping 4WD practice. Winning his third Reedy Race when OCRC first hosted the event in 2014, he said the only adjustment he made over the day was to his Orion speedo profile. For P3 he went with less turbo which he said ‘kept the speed right for the jumps’. With the handout Pro-Line tyres now working good he said ‘everything is ready to go racing’.
‘Really consistent’ was how Rivkin described his P3 performance. 0.177 off Cavalieri, the 17-year-old said a chat with team-manage Brent Thielke after P2 about cleaning up his driving helped. With his B44.3 ‘easy to drive’, which he added is ‘really good for racing’, he said he drove with more discipline and kept to his lines and that approach ‘paid off well’.
Numedahl described his car as ‘awesome’, adding this was the ‘most comfortable the car can get’. Making a small ride height adjustment for P3, which made it a little safer to drive’, he said the key was to be disciplined in a few spots around the track. The AE designer said running big motors for the straight this meant you had to drive safe in the infield. Making the Top 5 in the 2WD times, he said 4WD was ‘not as challenging as ‘the triples are so much easier to make’. Admitting while they don’t run 4WD for a day & half he believes his car will be fine with no set-up changes planned. Fifth fastest, team-mate Hartson was also pleased with his 4WD. The former World Champion said his B44.3 has been ‘pretty good off the bat’ and he didn’t have to touch it over the 3-practice runs.
Having only had 3-days with his new TLR cars, when he travelled out to OCRC with Maifield two weeks ago, Denney said his 4WD is running really good’. Running ‘a lot of droop’ he said this is helping him through the jumps but ‘running smooth for (his) driving style’ was a big factor to his performance today. Changing from an aluminium rear 22.4 hub to a 22 hub the 20-year-old said this made the car a little more stable allowing him to carry more corner speed. Happy to have pace he said if he can race without crashes things should be good in 4WD.
Describing his YZ-4 as ‘really good’, Wernimont said with it ‘super easy and comfortable to drive’ he is ‘not pushing’ added this is ‘what this race is all about’. Asked about the track layout, the Californian said ‘its fun but for racing its a bit too much’ adding the two triples are going to be ‘a crash fest on the first lap’. Yokomo team-mate Lee Martin would end up 13th fastest but the European Champion said his RC Concepts powered YZ-4 is ‘fine’, this being his first race with his new electrics sponsor. The British driver said ‘4WD is very close’ and it is ‘going to be anyones’ to win.
Having sorted out the issues that left him struggling in the first two practice rounds, Maifield said he didn’t really put 3-laps together in P3 but the champion was able to show his TLR 22-4 has good pace as he posted the outright fastest lap of the day with a 17.482. Describing the car as ‘still a little stiff’ he said it would be a little nervous to drive if conditions stay like they are now but if the grip comes up the set-up should work well. With a full day of 2WD racing tomorrow and a morning of 2WD action on Saturday he said he would see how the track changes before the first 4WD round of racing on Saturday afternoon and then decide if he needs to adjust his set-up. Behind Maifield, Kyosho’s Jared Tebo was 8th fastest with TLR team-mate Dakotah Phend 9th. As in 2WD Michal Orlowski was again the fastest European driver, his Schumacher completing the Top 10.
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Ronald Volker has taken his tally of wins at the famous DHI Cup to seven. The 16th running of the Danish event, Volker secured what would be his third consecutive win by taking the opening two A-Mains in Odense. Top Qualifier for the race, which marks the first international touring car race of the season, the German took A1 with ease but in A2 Awesomatix driver Viljami Kutvonen. After the strong start however Kutvonen faded a little leaving Volker celebrating the start of the 2016 season with overall victory. In A3 Kutvonen would enjoy a straight forward win over Alexander Hagberg and former winner Adrian Berntsen to secure second overall. Finishing on the same points as his team-mate Bruno Coelho, the tie breaker would leave Hagberg to complete the podium.
‘An awesome way to start the year’, was how Volker summed up his latest DHI win. First winning the event back in 2007, he said ‘In A2 Viljami was strong at the beginning and with my car a little loose in the fast corners I had to keep tight lines so as not to give him any opportunities for a pass’. With his LRP powered BD7 having the edge over the similarly powered A800 on the right side of the track, Volker said this helped him ‘break the pressure’ Kutvonen was able to apply on the left section. Thanking Yokomo and LRP, in particular his engineer Yukijiro Umino and LRP’s Ales Dobnikar, for their ongoing support the reigning ETS Champion said the win was a good boost going into Round 2 of the championship in Germany next month.
‘I’m really happy how the new car is working but today Ronald did the better job’, was Kutvonen’s reaction to finishing 2nd overall, a result he also achieved in 2014. Struggling to match Volker’s early A1 pace, the Finn said a tyre prep change for A2 worked ‘pretty good’ and he was able to run fast laps at the start. Able to pressure Volker he said ‘he didn’t make mistakes’ so I couldn’t find a way passed. Setting the fastest lap of the race, he said towards in the final part of the race his pace dropped off due to what he suspects was his rear tyres overheating. Encouraged by the run of A-Main appearances he has been able to achieve with the new A800 and looking forward to building on those results at the next ETS, he said ‘here we were losing too much time in the slow corners so we need to work on with tight corners but overall I’m really happy things are working and its a good result to start off the 2016 season’.
Having made the podium also last year at the DHI Cup, but second on that occassion, Hagberg said third ‘was the best I could do considering our pace’. The Swede said ‘the car was not brilliant for A3 but I managed to hold off Adrian (Berntsen)’. Enjoying a ‘good clean race’ with the Norwegian, the European Champion said ‘we didn’t have the pace to win this weekend and that is how it is sometimes’. He continued ‘I’m hoping for better at the ETS but I am more confident our car will be competitive on the Volante tyre’. Behind Hagberg, Coelho would mark his DHI Cup debut with 4th thanks to a pair of thirds in the opening A-Mains while Gizmo’s Berntsen would claim 5th for the new Danish company at their home event.
In the Super Stock, Tim Benson would stamp his authority on the event. Taking the TQ, the Kyosho driver drove perfect in the first two Mains to give the TF7 its first international race win. With the German able to sit out A3, last year’s winner Marek Cerny held off Xray team-mate Jan Ratheisky with the pair joining Benson on the podium in that order.
View the complete touring car event results here.
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Joern Neumann took a surprise win in A2 of 4WD Buggy at the DHI Cup, the 4-time reigning champion benefiting from a number of incidents involving A1 winner Bruno Coelho. Starting from the TQ, World Champion Coelho would get his landing wrong coming out of the back jump section on the first lap allowing Michal Orlowski to go to the front. The Schumacher driver would stay there for two laps but then as Coelho tried a move on the inside the pair made contact dropping both back down the order. This handed David Ronnefalk the lead but it would be brief, the HB driver making a mistake a few corners later at the table top with fourth place starter Neumann finding himself suddenly at the front. The Serpent driver would stay there despite a number of challenges, one of which came from Ronnefalk until a clearly faster Coelho tried a pass. Ronnefalk saying ‘I got taken out. I know I wasn’t fast but you don’t have to take someone out’. In the end it would be Martin Bayer who would come in second with Orlowski getting third ahead of Coelho, meaning A3 will decide the overall winner.
Chasing a fifth 4WD DHI Cup win, Neumann said ‘my car was much better and my lap times where much closer than before’. Having changed the diffs in his SX4 the German said it now had more forward traction and was generally easier to drive. Suffering one crash over the 5-minute when he over jumped, he admitted his rivals made more mistakes than he did and he benefited from that. Going into A3 as the current leader with a 1st & a 2nd, and much happier with his car, he said ‘I hope we have clean start’.
‘Not bad after what happened’ was how Orlowski summed up his third place referring to when Coelho made contact with him. The European Champion said his car was ‘pretty slow’ and as a result he couldn’t build up any kind of gap once he got by Coelho at the start. Planning to run new tyres in A3, the 14-year-old said he hoped this would give him better pace for the decider.
Coelho, who clearly had the quickest car on the track again setting the fastest lap, said ‘I had a bad landing on the first lap and had to open for Orlowski’. He continued ‘I then tried to overtake him on the inside and we touched. I waited but this made it difficult to go for the win’. Commenting on his contact with Ronnefalk, the Portuguese driver said ‘I was not sure if it was my fault but I waited’. After his perfect A1 performance he will be hoping he can repeat in A3 as he tried to wrap up his DHI Cup debut with the overall win.
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