This past weekend, I attended Round 1 of the 2013 RC Pro Texas State Series, at Gulf Coast Raceway in Porter, TX. This is where the ROAR Fuel Offroad Nationals will be held this year. As always, the crew at Gulf Coast built a fun and challenging layout for the 184 racers attending.
PRACTICE
I got to the track at about 3 o’clock on Friday afternoon. When I got there, the track was still breaking in and was still very loose, but within a couple of hours it was already grooved up and ready for qualifying the next morning. My Xray rides were very easy to drive and fast, as always, with M4 Blockades hooking up in buggy and M3 Blockades hooking up in truggy!
QUALIFYING
The qualifying format for this race was 3 rounds of 5 minute qualifiers, taking your best 2 to seed you for the mains. In the first round of truggy qualifying, I just wanted to get a nice clean run in, and I did. I was able to TQ this round just 1 tenth of a second over Serpent’s Jeremy Cupps. In the second round of qualifying, I had another solid run, and bettered my first round run by just under 2 seconds, but Jason Branham was able to take the TQ for the round. In the third and final round of qualifying, I was going to try and push it and go for a really fast run, and it cost me, I made a lot of mistakes, which resulted in an eighth for the round. My first two rounds were good enough to secure me the overall TQ going in to the 30 minute main that evening!
My plan for buggy qualifying was to stay consistent and on all fours, and see where that put me. In the first round, I was able to have a clean run and get 5th overall for the round. In the second round, I had an even better run, but ended up getting another 5th overall. In the final round of qualifying, I had a very good run, and got 2nd overall for the round, just 3 seconds off of Jason Branham’s TQ run. My qualifying efforts set me up to start 4th on the grid for the 30 minute main that evening.
MAINS
I got off to a good start in the truggy main, and was battling it out with Jeremy Cupps for the first 5 minutes. We stayed within a couple of seconds from each other up to the first pit stops. Jason Branham took over the lead after the first pit stop, and was able to build up a good lead over me with the help of his 2 stop pit strategy, while I was on a 3 stop strategy. I settled into second and was able to hold it for the rest of the race, with Cupps finishing only 9 seconds behind me. My XT8 and M3 Blockades were awesome the whole race!
In the buggy main, I got off to a bad start and was 8th after the first lap. I was able to slice through the pack and get up to 4th after a couple of laps, but ended up getting taken out and sent to the back of the pack. I battled back for the rest of the main and ended up finishing 6th. My XB9 and M4 Blockades were awesome!
I felt that I had a good weekend overall. I was consistent all weekend, which was my goal. I feel very confident going into the second round on April 13, at my home track in Corpus Christi, TX. I want to thank James Manderano on directing a great race, and Gulf Coast Raceway for hosting it!
Till next time,
Cade “Young Gun” Whitenton
