Link to full results and lap times
RECORD 32 DRIVERS AT SEASON 3 OFF-ROAD ROUND 2
RC Sports once again set a new record for driver turnout, as 32 racers took part in Season 3 Off-Road Round #2. Of the 61 race cars in action, there were *19* Spec Slash, 13 Mini Turbo, 11 Super Ten, 8 Spec Buggies, 6 Mini Buggies, and 4 Mini-Stocks in the house.
Layla Riesenweber joined the Mini Stock class with a brand-new HBX 16889 truck just taken out of the box that night, and was fast right out of the gate, leading the first four laps of the qualifier. But then the Uridil boys vaulted to the front, first Hendrix, and then Lennox took over the lead. Lennox went on to Top-Qualify (TQ) and stayed out front for the entire main event, taking his 2nd straight victory. Parker Hawley and Layla Riesenweber went back and forth for the 2nd place spot, with Layla making the pass on lap 11 and taking the spot. Parker finished in 3rd and Hendrix Uridil took fourth.
Mini Turbo was split into two groups due to high entry counts. Jason Stephenson piloted his Losi Mini-B (brushed) to victory in the first qualifier, with Wesley Vande Voort not far behind. After a ton of lead changes early on in Heat 2, Ben Moore emerged as the leader and held off Mike Karl to the finish. Aaron Bodart emerged victorious in the highly-contested B-Main, and bumped to join 6 other drivers in the A. Mike Karl and Ben Moore once again put on a show in the A-Main, and following several lead changes over the last couple laps, Ben survived a last-turn rollover to hang on for victory by just 0.790 seconds in the closest main event race of the night. 2nd Mike Karl, 3rd Wesley Vande Voort, 4th Tom Dessart, 5th Aaron Bodart, 6th Keith Juliar, 7th Jason Stephenson, 8th Anatole Wiering, 9th Shane Thomas, 10th Travis Riesenweber, 11th Jesse Payant, 12th Ian Bodard, 13th Charlie Reed (DNF).
For the 4th consecutive Season 3 event, Spec Slash was the big show with the largest entry field. A record NINETEEN trucks entered Round 2 action and were split into 3 qualifiers. In Heat 1, Travis Riesenweber held off Jesse Payant for his first heat race victory in the class, piloting a brand new RC Sports spec truck just built 2 weeks ago. Charlie Reed made a late pass on Riley Reinke to take Heat 2, and Ben Moore set the fast qualifying pace with a victory in heat 3. With the entry count literally at the maximum number that could be fit into two mains, the track was packed with 10 trucks for two main event races. It takes a group effort to get good racing in with such a packed track, and tonight’s group did a great job keeping it as clean as possible. Collin St. Amour led early laps in the B-Main, but Anatole Wiering was quick to take over and pull away from the field to bump to the A. In the A-Main, defending class champion Tom Dessart led a couple laps early before Andrew Pfluger found his way to the front. Andrew rolled on lap ten and Ben Moore was there to capitalize. Andrew was able to race his way back to first for a couple more laps but rolled again with just seconds to go, dropping to third as Ben Moore scooted his way to victory and Tom Dessart was there to capitalize for 2nd, just 0.48 seconds behind. Andrew Settled for third, followed by Mike Karl in 4th and Travis Riesenweber who scored a very impressive top-5 finish. 6th went to Charlie Reed, 7th Phil King, 8th Riley Reinke, 9th Anatole Wiering, 10th Shane Thomas, 11th Aaron Bodart, 12th Wayne Warner, 13th Collin St. Amour, 14th Jason Stephenson, 15th Jesse Payant, 16th Blake Warner, 17th Tim Uridil, 18th Tyler Foss, 19th Eithan Geiger (no transponder).
The Super Ten class had two heats and two mains, but a lot more track space with 11 drivers in action. Phil King piloted his brand-new Arrma Senton boost to victory in his first time on the track with it, winning Heat #1. Andrew Pfluger kept Anatole Wiering at bay to Top Qualify out of Heat #2. Shane Thomas won the B-Feature and bumped to the A with his Team Associated Pro2 SC10 truck. Andrew Pfluger was able to keep it clean and lead wire-to-wire in the A-Main to score his second victory of the season. Tom Dessart passed Mike Karl late to log a 2nd, and Mike stood on the podium in third. Shane Thomas finished 4th, Anatole Wiering 5th, Phil King 6th, Nick Ward 7th, Dan St. Amour 8th, Joey Baum 9th, Ian Bodart 10th, Dallas Court 11th.
Round 1 winner Tom Dessart led almost the entire heat race in the Mini Buggy class with his WLToys short course truck conversion. But Andrew Pfluger got the hang of Phil King’s old Losi Mini B late in the race and was able to sneak around to steal the win. Pfluger would lead wire-to-wire in the A-Main, scoring the first victory of the season for the Mini-B platform. Ben Moore had a great race but unfortunately had to start at the back due to a broken part in the qualifying round, and ran out of time to catch Andrew by the end. 3rd went to Tom Dessart, 4th Mike Karl, 5th Anatole Wiering, 6th Shane Thomas.
In the premier 21.5T Spec Buggy class, Ben Moore took early control over the heat race and led for several minutes. Unfortunately, a broken steering linkage ended his race early and Keith Juliar, racing in his first off-road event ever, inherited the lead. He held on to the finish to TQ the night with Tom Dessart coming in close second, just 3 seconds behind with a new Team Associated B7. The A-Main was one of the best races of the night, with several laps going by with drivers nose-to-tail. Mike Karl had the lead early before a crash dropped him all the way back to 6th. Keith Julair then took over the lead for the middle portion of the race. Ben Moore was working his way through the pack before the steering linkage issues reared their head once again, ending his night early for the second straight round. Mike Karl efficiently worked his way all the way back up through the field and back into the lead, and held on to win his first Spec Buggy race! Keith Juliar finished just three seconds back, and Gerald “Woody” Wood followed up his round-one win with a podium finish. Anatole Wiering took 4th, Tom Dessart 5th, Phil King 6th, Sean Summers 7th and Ben Moore 8th (DNF).
Thank you everyone for coming out and setting a new RC Sports driver turnout record! Special thanks to Keith, Ben, Mike, Shane, Tom, Woody, and Anatole for all staying late to help convert the track to an oval for this coming week’s race. Oval Round #2 is this Friday, the 16th. See you then!
Full race results and lap times: https://rcsports.liverc.com/results/?p=view_event&id=425690
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