July 30th marked the start of the 9th annual Futaba/O.S. Nitro Challenge, a race hosted by St. Louis Dirtburners, which also happens to be my local Track and club.
The conditions made the track pretty edgy and hard to be consistent on, but my Pro-Line Tires gave me all the consistent grip I could ask for and kept me in the racing line.
Every year this event seems to draw a larger and larger crowd with bigger and better giveaways for the racers. This year the Hobbico crew went big and gave away some big ticket items like car kits, engines, servos, and other cool products. In addition to this, the winners of the nitro classes walk away with similar items (radios, engines, servos…). All these giveaways and prizes draws out a huge crowd every year and makes the racing as competitive as ever. This year Levi Jackson was on hand to build the event layout which no doubt made the racing even more competitive and fun to watch for the spectators. This would be my fourth time running at this event, and it turned out to be one of if not the best so far! For this event, I decided to run the still very new Tekno EB48.3, as well as the just released NB48.3 I had built the night before the event. It was quite the gamble to say the least but I was able to make the cars work well for me pretty quickly.
We arrived Wednesday to a very technical and unique layout which looked like it would provide some great racing. The decision was made to water during practice to keep the track together as best as possible. Once the track had grooved up a little and packed down the choice was instead to stop watering the track and simply let the groove hold it together. Unfortunately this didn’t work out as planned and the track had already developed some pot holes and cracks by the end of practice. An effort was made every night to repair these sections but the track kept fighting back.
Qualifying overall went pretty well, and I was able to secure the third spot on the starting grid for both of the E-Buggy Mains . Nitro I struggled with while trying to figure the car out to suit my driving style. I qualified just out of the A-Main, giving me the BQ spot.
Mains day was mixed. In E-Buggy I was able to stay pretty close to Ryan and Joe for both races, and take the final spot on the podium. After bumping up from the B-Main in Pro Buggy, I was determined to work my way through the field and finish as best as I could. Unfortunately the universe had other plans as I was plagued with bad luck all around. A bad batch of glue I used from another racer after my personal Glue ran out caused a Tire to pull off during the first main rendering me to rolling speed bump status. The second main, a flame-out at the start of the race was overlooked by the race announcer and I started my race about a lap behind the rest of the field. Not all that easy to makeup on the blown out track and in 20-minutes.
Despite some odd bad luck, I had a great time at this race. I was able to meet a bunch of new racers and the entire environment of the race was very laid back which took a little stress off. I had quite the learning curve with my nitro car, but I’m confident the .3 series will be a racer winner for me. The E-Buggy allowed me to show my true skill, and I was fighting with the top guys for both of the races. No doubt in thanks to my smooth Hobbywing power, which helped me keep the car in control and fast over the bumpy surface.
Huge thanks to all of my sponsors for the amazing support. Every one of them make races like this possible for me, from reliable grip of the Pro-line Tires to the quick last minute shipping from Fierce when I forget to order that special part. Thank you to the great people at:
Tekno R/C
Hobbywing North America
Pro-Line Racing
Fierce RC Solutions
Equipment used:
Pro E-Buggy: Tekno EB48.3, Hobbywing XeRun 150A ESC, Hobbywing XeRun 2200kv motor, Pro-Line X3/X2 Blockades, Pro-Line Velocity Wheels, Pro-Line Lexan Trifecta Wing
Pro Nitro Buggy: Tekno NB48.3, Pro-Line X3/X2 Blockades, Pro-Line Velocity Wheels, Pro-Line Lexan Trifecta wing
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– Carter Flotron
