Rivkin & Maifield clash, Phend right in contention

The penultimate round of racing at the 22nd running of the Reedy Race of Champions produced fireworks at OCRC as Spencer Rivkin clashed with Ryan Maifield, the reigning champion coming off the worst.  The opening race of the fifth round of 4WD would see Maifield start 4th and Rivkin 8th with the pair going to the front when Dustin Evans had a rollover on the step down half way through the race. Running on his mentor’s rear wing for 5 laps, Rivkin would attempt an ambitious inside pass through the sweeper which he couldn’t execute.  Making contact with Maifield the incident was exacerbated when a delayed Maifield could connect with team-mate Dustin Evans over the following double sending Maifield tumbling.  With Rivkin coming out in front, Maifield would resume in fifth but with just three laps to recover could only salvage third behind JP Richards.  While Rivkin felt the second incident with Evans was Maifield’s undoing Maifield had a very different view saying ‘he (Rivkin) lost a friend in that deal’.  With Jared Tebo going on to claim his first 4WD win in Race 2 ahead of Kyle McBride, the significant result of the round would come in Race 3 with Dakotah Phend winning from 9th on the grid.  Describing it as a ‘very important’ result the win now puts the TLR driver in contention for the Reedy Race title with him equal on points with Rivkin when dropped scores are taken into account with Maifield one point behind them.

Giving his view of the race, Rivkin described the race as feeling ‘very long’.  Working his way through traffic, the 2WD World Champion said the race ‘took forever to get going’.  Running with Maifield, he said ‘I came in hot on Maifield and made contact but he came out of it in the lead’.  He continued ‘then he hit Dustin over the double and went flying off the track’.  With little more to add about the incident and looking to the deciding race, in which he lines up 4th, Rivkin said ‘I’ll be smart and patient and see where it puts me’.

‘I was racing my friend, well I thought he was my friend, and he went & put a bad move like that on me’, was Maifield’s view of the race.  Feeling the clash has cost him the chance to retain his Reedy title, Maifield continued, ‘he has created a bad situation for everyone’.  Having taken Rivkin under his wing with Rivkin himself attributing his World Championship win to him, Maifield final opinion on the incident was, ‘Everyone is high fiving him on the win but that kind of driving is only adding to his bad reputation’.

Having never been in contention before for the Reedy Race, Phend said ‘I got a clean start and just kept chugging away waiting for mistakes.  Then they all piled up and I don’t know how I did it but I made it through (to the lead)’.  Trying to run clean fast laps he would have one mistake but at the same time so would the pursuing Ryan Cavalieri. Cavalieri would suffer a broken driveshaft in the race while second and would struggle home in 8th. Lining up 5th for his final race, pointing out his two key rivals will go up against each other in the same race, Phend said he would not be going for any passes off the start. Aiming to ‘be patient’, he said the key to moving to the front was to avoid mistakes.

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Maifield adds third 4WD win in Round 4

Reigning champion Ryan Maifield has added a third Reedy Race win in 4WD, the TLR driver recovering from an early tangle with fellow front row starter Joseph Quagraine for a win that gives him a 2-point lead with just two races remaining.  Unable to get the holeshot on Quagraine, Maifield would follow the Schumacher for three laps before the pair tangled on the step down.  Handing Ty Tessmann the lead, Maifield would come out of the chaos 4th. Setting about chasing down the leading HB, Maifield would go to the front, 3-laps from home after a mistake by the Canadian on the landing of the first triple.  An important win, the result was more significant due to the fact that point leader after Round 3 Spencer Rivkin ended up fourth.  Starting from 9th on the grid, the teenager benefited from Tessmann’s error to go third, only to give the position up to Jared Tebo with a mistake on the final lap.

In the other two races, pole sitter Shin Adachi would lead for two laps before getting out of shape entering the straight sending cars going in all directions with Ryan Cavalieri finding a way through to the lead.  Having started 6th, the Associated driver would go on take an easy win over Rick Hohwart.  Reedy Race title contender Dakotah Phend would get third in the race, the TLR driver doing well to recover from being delayed by other’s mistakes.  In the third race Steven Hartson continued his run of wins.  Starting 4th, the former World Champion went to the front after a mistake at the JConcepts kicker from row starter Tanner Denney. Denney would recover from the mistake to bring his TLR home second ahead of team-mate Dustin Evans.  Starting from 9th on the grid, the result would be Evan’s best 4WD result but for the 2WD points leader the result has come to late for him to add a second title to his 2011 Reedy Race crown.

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Rivkin opens final day at Reedy Race with win

Spencer Rivkin has opened the final day of the Reedy Race of Champions in the best way possible with a win that puts the Associated driver one point clear of reigning champion Ryan Maifield with three races remaining.  The overnight leader, Maifield would salvage a third from his first race of the day, the win going to his TLR team-mate Dakotah Phend.  With a 10 point result to drop after his non-finish in the opening round of 4WD yesterday, Phend’s win puts the 18-year-old right in the mix as the round effectively ended a number of key player’s chances.  Leader of the event at the end of the 2WD action, former champion Dustin Evans had another tough round, finishing only 6th as he did in round 1, meaning he will have to count one of the 6th place finishes.  The other winner of the round was Steven Hartson, the AE driver’s second 4WD pulling him up the ranking.

Having been beaten off his pole starting position by team-mate Kody Numedahl, Rivkin said ‘Apart from Kody getting the holeshot on me it was really good’.  Able to go to the front when Numedahl had a bobble on the second lap, the 17-year-old said he would have one mistake in the sweeper but such was his advantage it never threatened his lead.  The first driver to lay down a 16-second lap of the OCRC track, the 2WD World Champion said he was happy that even with the mistake he was still able to run the extra lap, his fastest so far 18-lap race time giving him the advantage should the overall result go to tiebreak.  Commenting on his race, Numedahl said, ‘I got the holeshot on Spencer but then had a bobble and after that he pulled away so I just kept an eye on the guys behind and cruised to second’.

Making the most of his pole position start to lead from tone to tone ahead of Rob Gillespie, Phend was another driver who was able to survive a ‘silly mistake’ such was the lead he had built up.  Having changed his 22-4 set-up for today, he said he ‘didn’t like it’ with the car ‘less comfortable to drive’ and for Round 4 he will go back to yesterday’s set-up.  Starting from 6th on the grid, Maifield was closing on 2nd placed Gillespie but lost time with a mistake coming onto the straight.  An error at the end of the straight on lap 6 effectively ended his changes of a third 4WD win.  Dropping to 5th he could only work his way back to 3rd.

Summing up his Round 3 win ahead of Yokomo’s Lee Martin, Hartson said, ‘I’m trying to take advantage of my front row starts’.  Starting twice on the front row today but also with a 10th spot, he said the race wasn’t perfect as he ‘crashed a few times but I was so far ahead it didn’t matter’.  Lining up in the same race as Hartson, it was not the start to the day which Ryan Cavalieri was looking for.  Starting 3rd a bad starting Brian Strange, from P2 on the grid, locked wheels with the 3-time Reedy Race Champion dropping him to last from where he would recover to a third making his chances of a fourth title a long shot for the Californian.

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