Ronnefalk tops seeding in Las Vegas

David Ronnefalk is the top seed for qualifying at the 16th running of the 1:8 Offroad World Championships.  The former multiple European Champion headed a HB Racing 1-2 as team-mate Ty Tessmann posted the second quickest 3-consecutive laps in Las Vegas.  Only 7th fastest in the first of the 2 seeding rounds, he would set the pace by 2/10ths of a second from the reigning World Champion with up & coming talent David Ongaro completing the Top 3, the 15-year-old the only one of two drivers in the Top 10 who failed to improve their time in the final practice.

Making both a suspension and a body change on his Orion powered D815V2, Ronnefalk said the changes ‘felt really good’.  The Swede said the suspension change made his car absorb the bumps better while also giving more rear traction.  Switching from a JConcepts to a Pro-Line body this made the car ‘a little more stable’.  He said, ‘I like both of them.  The JConcepts has more corner speed but is a little too aggressive.  The Pro-Line is more easy to drive and so I’m more consistent with it’.  Continuing to run AKA Grid Iron tyres in super soft since the second round of practice he said ‘they are really good’ and the plan for tomorrow is to wait and see how the track is.  With the track getting more bumpy he said ‘you can see a lot of changes in the standings as it get bumpier and we are not starting to see what was expected.  I’m looking forward to qualifying’.

‘That was good.  The track is getting fun to drive now.  You get rewarded for a certain line which is nice’, was how Tessmann summed up the final practice.  After his troubles in the first seeding round when he broke a C-hub and had to do the run with a difficult car after a quick repair with a slightly different part, with the correct C-hub back on the car he said it now ‘felt really good’.  Running his D815V2 set-up unchanged and again on Pro-Line’s Electroshot tyre, with the event now moving into qualifying the Canadian said, ‘we just have to watch how big the bumps get for tomorrow and then decide what needs to be changed’.

Having backed up his somewhat surprise P3 topping pace with the fastest time in the first seeding round, Ongaro wouldn’t improve on that time.  Only 18th fastest in the final practice, the Italian said changing to a wider rear track, while making the car safer to drive, had also made his MBX7R ‘slower’.  Feeling that track conditions later in the round also favoured those drivers, the track appear more watered in his opinion, he said he will revert back to his earlier set-up for Q1.  Deciding to try a new compound Procircuit have in the Claymore tyre in the final practice he said it felt better than what he ran in the previous rounds and he will use it for the first round of qualifying.

‘I could have gone faster but there was crazy traffic, I even got knocked off the track’, was Boots reaction after the final practice. The Kyosho driver added, ‘there was half a second in there’.  In terms of his MP9 he said he ‘left it as is’ and going into qualifying he is ‘pretty happy with where (he) is at’.  Describing the car as ‘really consistent and easy to drive’, the European Champion feels he is ‘more comfortable over a longer run than the 3-laps’.  Asked about track conditions, he replied ‘for that run the track held a bit more moisture’ but with hotter temperatures forecast for tomorrow he is not sure that is how it will continue.

Only 12th fastest in the morning, Dakotah Phend had a much improved afternoon run posting the 4th fastest time of the round a time that would give him 5th in the final seeding.  Having made ‘a couple of changes’ for the 1st seeding round he said the car was better than yesterday and further changes for the second run left him ‘the most confident (he) has been with the car’.  Describing his Orion powered 8ight as ’easier to drive’, he said he is also more comfortable with the track but with each run hours apart there are different holes appearing each time’.  Planning to leave the car unchanged for Q1, he said ‘on tyres I will wait and see’.  Running on Pro-Line Holeshots, he said he is ’not going to be able to use these (tyres) later in the week’.

Competing the Top 6 for seeding would be Riccardo Berton, 8th fastest in the first run he would post the fifth fastest time in the afternoon.  The Kyosho driver said he improved his MP9 with softer shocks but it was a tyre change that made the biggest difference.  Winner of the Kyosho Masters here at the RC Tracks of Las Vegas last November ahead of Jared Tebo and Boots, the Italian went from Pro-Line Holeshots to Blockades, with the latter giving better traction as the track dried out towards the end of the 10-minute – the track being watered before the start of each heat.  Over a second faster over his 3-laps in the second run, the 17-year-old said for qualifying they will ’stay the same for the first one for sure and then see if we need to change’.

Just 6/1000ths off Berton’s pace, Jared Tebo would end up seventh fastest but the former Top Qualifier feels he is looking ‘really good’ going into qualifying.  The Kyosho driver said his MX powered MP9 ‘wasn’t working on the bumps’ but making a roll centre change for the final it was ‘way better’.  Describing the car as ‘perfect’, he said with the track starting to get ‘more character’, he is ‘going to get better and better as it gets more rough and you need to drive more precise’.  Also using the final practice to run a different engine he said this was ‘so we have a back up motor tuned and ready to go’.   Having run Pro-Line M3 Holeshots throughout practice he said he’ll ‘stick with that’ concluding ‘over 10-minutes we are going to be right there’.  Behind Tebo, another of the hotly tipped event favourites Ryan Maifield would end up 8th fastest with US National Champion Spencer Rivkin and multiple Onroad World Champion Naoto Matsukura completing the Top 10.

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Ongaro continues to set pace in Vegas to top first seeding round

Davide Ongaro continues to set the pace in practice at the 1:8 World Championships in Las Vegas, the talented young Italian opening Day 3 of the event by topping the first of the seeding rounds of practice.  Having shot to the top of the time sheets in yesterday evening’s third round of practice, Ongaro proved that time was on merit as he again topped the times from Elliott Boots, the separation 6/10ths of a second.  Behind them US National Champion Spencer Rivkin found a big improvement when it counted as he managed to get inside the Top 20 for the first time with 3rd for the round ahead of Round 1 pace setter Jared Tebo.  For reigning World Champion Ty Tessmann a part failure at the start of the 10-minute run would result in the HB Racing driver ending up only with the 21st fastest 3-consecutive laps.

‘Amazing like this’ was Ongaro’s reaction to again topping the times sheets.  Backing up his impressive improvement in yesterday’s third round of practice, he ran his LRP powered MBX7R unchanged with just a fresh set of the same Procircuit Claymore tyres he ran throughout yesterday.  Asked about today’s track conditions, the 15-year-old said, ‘it is a lot bumpier than yesterday and it took the track longer to dry because of the temperature’  With the extra bumps in mind, he plans to change to a wider rear end to make the car more stable and get better traction, his overall goal to make the car ‘safer to drive’.

For Elliott Boots reverting back to a lower roll centre left the European Champion more happy with his Red Racing powered MP9.  His mechanic Mike Cradock, made the change after seeing his driver struggle with the right side of the track in P3 yesterday evening.  With the car now more aggressive to drive, a style Cradock says his driver prefers, he said the big benefit is that he can now get the car where he wants it which is important for negotiating the bumps and ruts that are appearing more and more each round.  For the final practice Cradock said ‘we might leave the car the same but try a different tyre.  It still very dusty for a Holeshot tyre’ adding the ‘track is so changeable, it has good grip and then completely changes with the dust’.

‘The car & I are getting better’ was how Rivkin summed up his latest practice. Running early in the round in Heat 4 of 18, he felt his pace was helped by track conditions, him saying, ‘I think the track is a little better for the first few races (of the round)’.  The 1:10 2WD World Champion also thinks there is better to come saying, ‘I thought I could have drove better’.  Running JConcepts Triple Dees on his MX powered RC8, he plans to ‘make a few changes (for the final practice) and see how they stack up’.  Asked what he was looking for from the set-up changes he replied, ‘I want to get it a little easier to driver so I can run an overall Top 10 run and not just 3-laps’.

Setting the second fastest lap behind Ongaro, Tebo said, ‘the speed is there but the rear is not comfortable’.  The former Electric Offroad Word Champion said, ‘the car was just super loose, I had not traction at all’.  Planning a rear set-up change with different suspension arms for final practice, the American said with this change he’ll ‘be right there for the last one’.

Posting the 5th time, Round 2 Practice pace setter Ryan Cavalieri said his first seeding run ‘went alright’.  The Associated driver said his ‘oils were a little thick for the temperatures and it didn’t get good til the end’. Expecting the temperatures to remain low he will ‘drop the oil for the next one’.

Completing the Top 6 for the round, Team Associated’s Steven Hartson said, ‘It didn’t feel that good but I guess I got a few good laps together’.  The 2013 1:10 4WD World Champion continued, ‘the car feels good but I just need to work on a good full run rather than 3-laps’, him feeling there is a lot to be gained from him improving how he is driving his RC8.  Having made ‘a lot of changes yesterday (to his car set-up)’ he said he is ‘now almost back to the set-up he started out with’ and for now the only changes he will try will be tyre compounds.  Running JConcepts Reflex in blue compound he had planned to try the harder red version but with the temperature today ‘so cold’ he wouldn’t have been able to test them so he again ran with the blue compound.

It was to be rough start to seeding for Tessmann.  Just as his heat started the Canadian suffered a C-hub failure on the step down saying ‘it wasn’t a hard landing’.  With his team-mates running to get a replacement for a running repair so as he could complete some laps and register 3-laps, he adding ‘it wasn’t the same part and had a different setting so the car didn’t feel great’.  Describing the car as having ‘felt really good on the first lap’, he is confident they should be good for a competitive 3-laps in the final practice.

With today the first time the ‘Race In’ competitors got World Championship track time, bringing the total number of heats up to 18, it was Mike Truhe who would be quickest of them putting his Mugen into the Top 10 with the 9th fastest time.  For ‘Race In’ winner Lee Martin it wasn’t a good run as he managed only the 62nd quickest time.

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