Pavidis, Evans & Easton complete Truggy grid

Mark Pavidis, Dustin Evans and Billy Easton will take up the final three spots on the grid for the Dirt Nitro Challenge Truggy final this evening after finishing 1-2-3 in the B-Main.  Starting the 20-minute final from pole AKA front man Pavidis made light work of the opposition cruising to victory with his OS powered TLR 8ight-T.  Afterwards the former Buggy World Champion described the race as his ‘best drive in a long time’.  Due to line-up 13th on the grid for the 45-minute title deciding final he said his truggy feels really good however the track layout makes it very difficult to pass but added starting from the back might play to his advantage if there is a ‘wreck’ in the opening laps.

The joy of current US 2WD electric Buggy Champion Evans was clear to see as he came down from the rostrum following a great battle with Easton.  Starting the B-Main from 9th on the grid, this is Evans first proper attempt at contest a big 1:8 nitro event and the Colorado ace is delighted to make his first ever nitro A-Main.  Benefiting from an early wreck that moved him up the order, a 10-minute fuel strategy played to his advantage as the majority of the 15 truggy field stopped on 7 minutes.  Inspecting his Orion powered 8ight-T after the race it was discovered that the lower right kingpin had dropped cutting into his wheel leading team-mate Mike Truhe to make the suggestion that Evans go buy a lottery ticket.

Filling the final spot on the grid Easton’s Serpent means 6 different manufacturers will battle it out for the 13th Dirt Nitro Challenge title this evening.  One big casualty of the B-Main was Buggy World Champion Cody King who flamed out at the start of the race ending the 2011 finalist’s chances of playing any further part in today’s action.

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Phend TQs final qualifier

Dirt Nitro Challenge debutant Dakota Phend TQ’d the final round of qualifying to secure second on the grid for Sunday’s main buggy event behind Top Qualifier Ty Tessmann who opted to sit out Q3. The TLR young gun outpaced Associated’s Ryan Cavalieri by 3.4 seconds with Tessmann’s Hot Bodies team-mate Jessie Robbers completing the Top 3. A 16-hour day at the Fear Farm which saw the last heat finish up shortly after midnight, Phend’s Q3 time was the quickest of the day 4/10th better than Tessmann’s best time.

For defending Champion Jared Tebo the 13th running of the event is proving a difficult one and he finds himself only 9th on the grid after a below par performance from the TQ Master. A late charge by the European drivers competing in the Arizona event helped them secure the final three spots on the grid.  Kyosho’s young Swede David Ronnevalk secured 10th position ahead of the Xray pairing of former multiple European Champion Renaud Savoya and Czech ace Martin Bayer.

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Tessmann is Top Qualifier at ‘The Dirt’

Ty Tessmann has wrapped up TQ honours for the buggy class at the Dirt Nitro Challenge.  Having set the fastest time in Q1, the Canadian ace again set the pace in the second of the three qualifiers, this time going fastest ahead young TLR star Dakotah Phend, to secure his first pole position start at Joey Christensen’s annual signature event.  The 19-year-old factory Hot Bodies driver, who is a former Champion of the event in Truggy, said he had a little problem with traffic which caused him trouble in the whoops section but otherwise he was really happy with the performance of his OS powered D8.  With pole position for Sunday’s final in the bag, Tessmann will sit out the third qualifier and enjoy an early night while the his rivals battle it out for the other positions on the grid in tonight’s final qualifier which is not set to end until some time after 12pm here in Arizona.

15-year-old Phend was ‘really happy’ with his Q2 run as second together with 7th in Q1 should insure the US Nationals podium finisher a place in the Main.  Running Proline Blockade M3 rubber on his Team Orion powered 8ight he said it was very easy to drive and for Q3 he just plans to leave it as is and just drive it.

Third for the round Team Associated’s Ryan Cavalieri was happy with his buggy and his own performance but like many of the top drivers he had problems with traffic.  Running 14 car unseeded heats there is a growing call for future events to have a seeding based on consecutive lap times from practice.  The US Buggy Champion said he plans to continue tweaking his swaybars and switch to a softer M4 compound set of Proline Holeshot tyres.  Associated team-mate and Truggy Top Qualifier Ryan Maifield set the 7th fastest time after a few less that perfect opening laps.

Impressing with 6th in Q1, Team Durango’s Carson Wernimont once again showed his talents with an even stronger second round to take his DNX408 to the fourth fastest time. The 15-year-old said he was real happy with how is day is going and he hopes he can carry his form into the final round.

Having dominated this event last year with Jared Tebo, Kyosho haven’t been able to repeat that performance so far in qualifying.  World Champion Cody King took his MP9 to the fifth fastest time just ahead of Tebo. The 24-year-old said he had one moment of his own doing and lost further time lapping traffic but his buggy felt ‘really good’ and he is not sure whether to risk making any changes for the final run. Defending Champion Tebo said he is just ‘not driving good’ and as a result had two crashes. Setting the 8th fastest time Austin Blair made it three Kyoshos in the Top 10.

Hot Bodies’ Jessie Robbers and new Xray signing Renaud Savoya completed the Top 10.  Former multiple European Champion Savoya said he had to drive a careful round after over filling his rear diff when switching to 3K oil.  This caused his RB powered XB8 to be unstable at high speed but the French ace feels the buggy has the potential to easily run in the Top 10 in Q3 with the critical thing being the right tyre to choose.

Elsewhere most of the paddock turned out to watch the final heat of the round to see if Adam Drake could force the overall TQ honours to go down to the final round but the challenge was short lived as the Team Losi Racing driver got put on his roof as he tried to pass a slower buggy.

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Tessmann TQs first buggy qualifier

In a repeat of his yesterday’s Truggy qualifying Hot Bodies’ Ty Tessmann has TQ’d the opening round of Buggy qualifying at the Dirt Nitro Challenge at the Fear Farm in Phoenix, Arizona.  The Canadian set a pace of 11 laps in 7:33.947 to top the first of three rounds by one & a half seconds over TLR’s Adam Drake and World Champion Cody King.

Not the perfect run as he got it wrong over the whoops on two occasions, Tessmann described it as a good solid run to start the day with.  Running Proline M3 Blockade tyres on his OS powered D8 he said M2 might have allowed him to push a little harder but looking to put in a safe run he opted for the softer compound.  With a massive 25 heats to get through each round Tessman said he will make a call on his tyres for Q2 nearer to the time.

Drake said the timing of his first qualifier was right in between a change of conditions.  Opting not to change the shock oil that was in his Novarossi powered 8ight he said it was too light for the hot conditions.  With his buggy very easy to drive initially and running on a faster pace than Tessman, the former US Champion was forced to push hard after a mistake but his shocks were too soft for the more aggressive driving style.  Drake who was running M2 Proline Blockade rubber will go to a heaver oil for Q2 leaving the rest of his set-up as is.

Kyosho’s Cody King was pleased with his first run after making a lot changes to his Orion powered MP9 last night to account for changes in track conditions since Wednesday buggy practice.  Making it a Proline top 3 in Q1 with M3 Blockade tyres fitted to his buggy, King said his equipment was good enough to get the job done and it was down to the driver on what he described as a very edgy track.

Setting the fourth fastest time with his Hot Bodies, Jessie Robbers said he drove well within his means looking to just to open his day with a clean run.  Admitting he didn’t get every lap right he said his CR8 was easy to drive and he thinks it has the potential to be pushed a lot harder.  Also running the the electric buggy class, Robbers who ran red compound Hot Bodies Megabyte tyres on his nitro buggy will use his electric run to evaluate his tyre choice for Q2.

Top Associated driver for the opening round was current US Champion Ryan Cavalieri who took his RC8.2 to the 5th fastest time.  For team-mate Ryan Maifield there was a rather frantic start to the day after he broke the front end of his buggy in the 1-minute warm-up when he hit a rock.  With his pit crew able to get him back out in time to take the start of the heat the incident meant they didn’t have time to tune his LRP engine.  Running a good pace the lack of tuning led to the Truggy Top Qualifier to run out of fuel a lap from the finish.  Despite this he still managed to claim ninth for the round.

Driving for Team Durango 15-year-old Carson Wernimont put in an impressive qualifier to set the 6th fastest time ahead another young gun Dakotah Phend.  Running soft AKA Impact tyres on his OS powered DNX408 the SoCal driver said he was hoping he can continue his form for the rest of the day and try secure himself a Top 12 spot.

The man who TQ’d and won last year’s Dirt Nitro Challenge, Jared Tebo could only managed the 8th fastest time.  The Kyosho ace said his MP9 was a little loose due to a wrong tyre choice.  Planning to switch from AKA Grid Iron to Impact for his second run Tebo said he will also make some front end shock changes along with going lighter with the oil in the centre diff and with this it should be ‘Game On’ in Q2.

Completing the Top 10 was Serpent’s Billy Easton.  The former electric buggy World Champion had to be marshalled but said if he can stay on his wheels his Novarossi powered S811 Cobra is capable of a lot more.

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Maifield is ‘Dirt’ Truggy Top Qualifier

Team Associated’s Ryan Maifield is the Truggy Top Qualifier at the Dirt Nitro Challenge backing up his Q2 performance with another TQ run in Q3 to claim pole position for Saturday’s 45-minute final.  The final qualifier saw the US Champion set the pace from team-mate Ryan Cavalieri with TLR’s Adam Drake third.

Maifield said after making a decent start to the decisive round he ran a few less than perfect laps halfway into the 7-minutes but was able to get ‘back on it’ and get the job done.  Very happy with his LRP powered RC8.2 T, the Arizona driver is confident that they are ‘all good’ for Saturday’s main event and other than maintenance work on the Truggy he doesn’t plan on making any set-up changes.

Starting second on the grid will be Hot Bodies’ Ty Tessman.  Having TQ’d the opening round of qualifying, the Canadian was once again to be hampered when lapping traffic in Q3.  Setting the fourth fastest time for the round, the 19-year-old who is a former Dirt Nitro Challenge Truggy Champion said when he ran clear laps his OS powered D8-T felt good and he believes they are in good shape to battle for the win.  It was a good day for the relatively small factory Hot Bodies team as all three of the drivers are in the final with Jessie Robbers and Tyler Vik securing 11th & 12th, the final two direct qualilfying spots on the grid which will be boosted to 15 with three drivers getting to bump up from the B.  The BQ went to AKA’s Mark Pavidis who finished 8th in last year’s event and will aiming to ensure he makes the main event again this year.

Drake, who will carry the start No.3 on his 8ight-T in the final, said he over drove his final qualifier leading to a few mistakes but feels in terms of overall pace he is right there with the two starting in front of him.  Having watched his opposition Drake feels his package gives him a great number of options in the rhythm section of the track which can play to his advantage in the final.

Lining up fourth on the grid will be Cavalieri.  After a bad start to the day with 11th in Q1 the electric buggy World Champion’s day has improved each run.  Less than a second of Maifield’s time in Q3, he said a softer shock set-up combined with a change to his steering ackerman had made his Orion powered RC8.2 T really comfortable to drive and he is confident he can easily push it harder in the final.

Setting the fifth fastest time in Q3, that is the position Team Durango’s Ryan Lutz will start the main event in front of defending champion and 2011 Top Qualifier Jared Tebo.  Tebo suffered a flame out in the final qualifier but Kyosho team manager Joe Pillars said its nothing to worry about and starting sixth is no big deal.

His first appearance at the Dirt Nitro Challenge, recently turned 15-year-old Dakota Phend will start 7th for TLR.  The other three to make the cut and secure a starting spot in the A-Main are 2011  finalists, TLR pairing Matt Castellano & Mike Truhe and A-Main Hobbies team driver Dylan Rodriguez who will line-up 8th, 10th and 9th respectively. With the truggy grid now decided, tomorrow sees the focus switch to buggy qualifying with a massive 25 groups to get through.

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Maifield ups the pace in Q2

Ryan Maifield upped the pace in the second round of Truggy qualifying at the Dirt Nitro Challenge to take the round from Team Durango’s Ryan Lutz and defending champion Jared Tebo. Setting a new fastest lap of 39.736, Maifield ran 11 laps in 7:20.335, knocking almost 4 seconds of Ty Tessman morning TQ run here at the Fear Farm. Switching to blue compound JConcepts Hybrid tyres on his Associated and running a lighter clutch on his LRP engine, the American Truggy Champion said it was decent run and other than switching back to Green compound for Q3 his set-up was ‘all good’.

After a disastrous opening lap in Q1 which saw his Durango DNX408T involved in three incidents resulting in a 51 second lap, Lutz described Q2 as ‘much better’.  Adding ‘a lot’ of droop to his Alpha powered truggy he said it felt really comfortable and he was able to put in a clean 7 minutes. Running soft compound AKA Ibeam in both qualifiers Lutz plans to switch to the Impact pattern for this evening’s final qualifier as a test for Saturday’s Mains.

The man who last year wrapped up overall TQ honours in the second qualifier, Tebo said his run was really good until he hooked a pipe on the final lap.  The Kyosho ace said without the mistake it would have been very close on time with Maifield.  For Q3 he will make a few changes to his Orion powered ST-RR including switching to a thicker oil in the centre diff and running less rear toe.

Team Losi Racing’s Adam Drake said his Novarossi powered TLR 8ight-T was really good but but ‘one bad mistake’ meant it needed to be marshalled.  Despite the 4 seconds lost he still managed 4th for the round just 2 seconds off Maifield’s time.  Having made up half the Top 10 for Q1 this time round Drake was only joined by TLR team-mate Matt Castellano who set the 6th fastest time.

Having only set the 11th fastest time in the opening round Ryan Cavalieri was fifth in Q2.  The Team Associated driver switched from M3 to M2 Proline Holeshot which he said was not the right call as the compound was too hard for the conditions.  Considering he was one of the few leading drivers to use the harder tyre he said he was pretty happy with his run which was error free.

Setting the 8th fastest time behind Kyosho’s Cody King, Ty Tessman had a potential overall TQ securing run ruined when a truggy he was lapping stopped right in front of him.  Running at a pace that the timing system was predicting would be 2 seconds up on Maifield’s TQ time, Tessman said he was cruising and running well within his limits but expecting the slower truggy to move over rather than just come to a sudden stop there was little he could do to avoid the costly contact.  Having flamed out twice in Q1 Hot Bodies team-mate Jessie Robbers said he just focused on keeping his D8-T on four wheels and he was happy to finish up ninth fastest.  Team Associated’s young up and coming talent Tanner Denney completed the Top 10.

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