Drake & Tessmann set early pace at ROAR Nationals

Defending ROAR 1:8 Offroad Champions Adam Drake and Ty Tessmann got proceedings at the 2014 National Championships in Texas underway by setting the fastest time of their respective title classes. In Buggy Drake had the fastest 5-lap average of the first timed run with a 46.147 with Serpent’s Mike Truhe closest on a 46.183 pace with Team Associated’s Ryan Maifield third. In Truggy Tessman’s HB had a distinct advantage over the Mugen of Carson Wernimont and the TLR of Josh Glancy around the beautifully presented Thornhill Racing Circuit.

Drake said he was really happy with how both his buggy and truck ran adding for his truck run he was at a little bit of a disadvantage as the track was heavily watered before the start of the round. In terms of the track, the TLR driver said its ‘really fun and different’ to what they normally race on in the US and he ‘actually like(s) the layout’ but added he wished ‘they could have made the obstacles more challenging’. Describing the layout as ‘so fast’ he said it should make for close racing.

Commenting on the track Tessmann said it was a ‘little too easy of a layout’ adding while it would be easy to drive around it all day it was ‘hard to go really fast’. The Canadian said as it blows out it will get even more difficult because there are a lot of blind spots that will make it hard to judge any holes and ruts that develop over the course of the event. In terms of his cars he has been playing with gearing and tyre compounds. In the first untimed practice, which was operated by way of a ticket per car which drivers just queued up to use, Tessman said the gearing change suited his D812 but not his D8T ‘Tessman Edition’ truck. In the timed practice it then didn’t suit the buggy as the track changed so he will revert back to the original gearing he started out with. Running a few new parts on his buggy as part of their World Championship preparation he is also running a new soon to be released radio tray. The new unit which is nearly at final design stage will be included in future kits but will also be sold by HB separately for current drivers wishing to upgrade their buggy. In terms of tyres Tessmann has been playing around with compound choice of his Pro-Line tires saying they were still figuring stuff out.

Truhe was very happy with both his TOP powered Serpents. Switching to a harder front spring on his buggy for the first timed run he said it worked pretty well as the track had been clean before the run but with conditions still overall rather dusty he will go back a little softer to make it a little easier to drive when the track is loose. Commenting on his 811T he said he is running the truck the same as he did at the warm-up and he’s really happy with how it feels. Describing the track as ‘fun’, he said hopefully tomorrow it will groove up and some of the dust with go away. For his next truggy run he will try different caster blocks saying it was for no other reason other than to try them as he has a set-up he is already really happy with.

Despite his 3rd fastest time, Maifield was not happy with his opening runs. Pleased with the power of his Novarossi engine he can’t get to transfer that to the track. Describing Thornhill as a ‘cool facility’ he said the warm-up race layout was a lot more technical and the new layout is ‘too easy’ but added the big separator is going to be when the surface roughs up. The Arizona driver is having trouble with his timing of the jumps on the right side of the track with him either over jumping or chasing jumps and this is something he needs to work on. The Associated team are back running the RC8.2 with Team Manager Brent Thielke explaining the prototype they had been running was ‘not up to expectations’ and they are now working on a major redesign. In the meantime he said they will run the RC8.2 to keep their driver race sharp for the World Championships.

Second fastest in truggy, Wernimont said his MBX7T felt really good and without traffic, the practice runs being unseeded, he believes he has the pace he needs. He was equally happy with the performance of his buggy but said with the traffic today its hard to truly gauge everyone’s pace. A ‘fun’ track, the teenager said its high speed layout makes it more of a horsepower track rather then a technical one and its going to be important to ‘keep momentum up.’

Winner of the warm-up race, Kyosho’s Cody King reported himself pleased with his early runs despite breaking his truggy in the first practice after a heavy contact with another truck resulted in a broken front end. The former World Champion is running his Red Racing powered MP9 as he did at the warm-up opting to let the track come to the car rather than go after a set-up. Expecting it will take time for the track to get grip, he said he knows they aimed to create a layout that was ‘a little more mellow to make it good for racing but maybe they over did it.’

Kyosho team-mate Jared Tebo reported a similar story to King about his runs. Using the same set-up as at last month’s warm-up event, he too is waiting for the grip to come up feeling tomorrow with be a much better indication of who is at what in terms of pace.  Describing both his Orion powered buggy and truggy as feeling good he also feels the track should be more interesting when it ‘chuncks up’.

TLR star Dakotah Phend said he used the practice runs to get his Orion engines figured out for the layout along with trying out different tyre compounds. Making some small set-up changes, the 17-year-old said he didn’t want to change too much today as with more watering the traction is going to come up and he was happy for now to wait for that to happen.

Heading the challenge of Xray is Josh Wheeler, the World Championship finalist declaring himself very happy with his early pace.  Liking the layout of the right side of the track, he said the left side is much too easy. Changing a couple of small things between runs, for his next practice he will try Xray’s weights for under the hubs which he said is stuff they would normally not use in the US but should give an advantage on the ‘wide open track’. Factory Xray driver Renaud Savoya has made the trip over to pit for Quebec driver Jérôme Treignier but should be able to offer strong support to Wheeler with set-up for the European style track. On Monday, Savoya, as part of his World’s preparations, will test for the day at the track.

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