What a fantastic weekend. Newred was a blast getting to go back and run some stock SC with good friends. Whitesides is as fast as they say. Cody Wiles made a great pass on the start and just had a perfect run to win the main and the money. I think I’ll put my stock SC back in retirement. 4×4 SC was a blast and it was great to see 6 out of 9 were Teknos. The top 3 finishers being Teknos. The EB-48 was so much fun and plus we showed E-buggies can be run on any track. Best part of the evening was Ricky Laymen handing his Tekno 4×4 to a young novice driver who broke his in the warm-up for his race. That’s what this hobby is supposed to be.
I couldn’t of capped off the weekend any better than the epic nitro finish at Capital City Raceway. Brandon Denmark and I made the trip over to Tally Sunday. The track got a lot of rain during the week but the weather was perfect Sunday and the track was ready to run on by time we rolled in. The layout was so much fun, high speed sections, camber changes, elevation changes, technical sections and a long straight. It must of been so entertaining for people visiting the park that day. Brandon and I ran 3 classes each and were running around all day getting vehicles ready for the next run. Brandon especially since I gave him the job of pit guy for the day.
For qualifying drivers were on their own clocks but free to start any time once the loop was live. Brandon and I both ran our Tekno 4×4 SC trucks and started each of the 3 rounds of qualifying with a drag race at the tone. It was so much fun going back and forth in the qualifiers. Again the top 3 were Tekno 4×4’s. E-buggy was a blast as usual and I had a great time chasing Chris Giraldo who ended up with the A-Main win.
Now the nitro was just the second time I’ve gotten to race my new Tekno buggy but it was the most epic race I’ve ever been apart of. I loaded up Carmen’s pit bag (plug) and went over the game pIan with Brandon for the 30 minute main. I had great qualifiers and put the NB-48 on the pole. Brandon got me lined up great on his first “down and quiet” and we were off. I had a bobble on the first lap and fell to 4th. The NB felt great and the tune finally seem about perfect. I kept it smooth and made it back out front a few laps later but by this point I could tell my front left tire was coming off. Brandon saw what was happening and wanted to swap it during the first pit but since it was running good and Chris was so close I decided to just keep running. Brandon called me in for the first stop but I ran out of gas before I could make it back in. Luckily I was close to the pits and Brandon was able to fill and fire me up quickly. When I made it back out I was in 4th and a lap down. I had plenty of time and went to work trying to catch up. Chris had a huge lead but I was catching and put myself back in third by the next pit stop. In and out again I was back to chipping away at that lead. Unfortunately the tire got worse and I started having to lay off down the straight. I had to come back in a couple laps later to have Brandon swap the wheel. Brandon had me in and out quickly. I was back in second but I fell back about 30 seconds from Chris. Going back out I started pushing too hard and started making mistakes. Then Brandon yelled what I always tell people, “slow and steady”. That really settled me down and I really started catching the leader. With 2 minutes to go I was 4 seconds behind. Then Brandon starts yelling, “Go, Go, Go”. Chris had crashed and I passed him for the lead. I was out front with only a minute to go. When the time expired I just had to finish my lap. With four turns to go I ran out of gas again. I couldn’t believe it. Then I see that Chris ran out of gas too. It turned into a race of the pit guys. Brandon had to run to the farthest corner of the track but he still managed to get back to the pits at the same time as Chris’s pit guy. Brandon filled it up and got me running before Chris’s and I was able to finish the race in first. Brandon won that race for me. Couldn’t of done it without him.
What a great weekend. Thank you Tekno RC, Hobbywing NA, JConcepts, Trinity, Radiopost, Boca Bearings, Boys Making Noise, Sylveris RC, NF Hobbies, and Kal-Gard for the great products. Thank you Brandon Denmark, Matt Wolter, Chris Giraldo, Daniel Lewis, Ricky Layman, David Whitesides, Tracy Carver, Doug Smith, Tom Hitchcock, and everyone else that made this a fantastic weekend.
R/C Racer - John Bernard Jr. 