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| The race started on Monday with one timed practice in the heats. The practice was supposed to also continue also on Tuesday, however, the heavy rain during whole day Tuesday eliminated practice for all but a few racers. Some of the top drivers drove some laps just in the harsh conditions just in order to get good qualifying heat as the practice times were to be used to set the qualifying order. |
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| The real race started on Wednesday morning with first two rounds of qualifiers. Totally there were six rounds of qualifiers from which four best were to be counted. The first heats were given to those with the best times in practice, which proved to be a big disadvantage as the track was full of mud. All US XRAY drivers and Jerome Sartel were in the first heats and they didnâ™t expect to have a chance for a good result in these conditions. The last heats had a much faster track because due to a 1m wide lane which dried on the layout. If the drivers stayed in this lane, they were able to make very fast lap times. The second round was held in much better conditions and it was Josh Wheeler who was able to set the fastest time of the round. Even with some minor bobbles in his run Josh was driving very fast in the end his time became unbeatable for this round. Joseph was doing really good as well posting consistent top ten results placing him in the top three fastest European drivers. |
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| Thursday`s and Friday`s racing schedule was the same as on Wednesday. Team XRAY was doing really well during these rounds of qualifying. It was just amazing to watch Josh on the track. Josh looked as though he was always driving above the limit, but his XB808 let him continue to drive hard. All drivers were driving carefully and they were just driving over some jumps except Josh. Josh was always trying to jump the jumps as fast as possible. His lap times were incredibly fast but also he made few mistakes due to his super high speed. Josh had a chance to set the TQ for the event if he was able to win the last round of qualifiers. Josh started really fast but then he got little slower throughout his run and finished in the top 8 placing him 3rd overall after all 6 rounds. I was wondering why Josh slowed down after his fast start and he showed me that the collar which sets the servo saver spring tension got loose and totally backed off. I was amazed that he was able to post a top 10 result in a qualifying round at the World Championships with completely loose servo saver. Although Josh did not TQ`d his position of 3rd overall in qualifying was very good result for us. It was really nice to see that a lot of private drivers were watching Josh and also the great performance of his XB808. |
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| Another direct semifinal driver was Joseph Quagraine. Joseph was also running awesome times and his results could have been much better but he was struggling with traffic in his heats. Many slower drivers were trying to fight with him for position and did not want to let him pass. This happened also in his last qualifier where he was on top 5 pace but was taken out by other driver. After the incident he was driving more aggressively and as a result he was assessed a stop and go penalty. Even with this bad luck he was able to make a top 20 result, qualifying 16th after 6 rounds. |
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Jerome Sartel was struggling a little in the beginning, but after conversation with Josh he found a very good set up and at the end he on pace with the other top drivers. Jerome could have had a chance to qualify directly into the semifinal, but with the little slower beginning to his qualifying rounds, he managed to qualify for the quarter final.
Also qualifying in the quarter final was the young and talented Ryan Lopez who was very fast all week. Leon McIntosh and Jason Branham were really unlucky in the qualifiers on the first day. With the struggles on the first two rounds it proved very difficult to have good results overall. |
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| The low finals were held on Saturday and the 1/8 final and higher were held on Sunday. The first on the track on Sunday morning was Leon. Leon had already bumped up from 1/16 final where was driving very well. He showed the same speed in the 1/8 final and could have bumped up to 1/4 final but a small error in the end caused him to lose the bump up position. Jon Hazlewood was unlucky in his 1/8 final as well. He made few mistakes at the beginning of his run and did not have enough time to move back up into the bump up position. |
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| Jerome was in the quarter final together with Ryan Lopez. This 1/4 final was really exciting from the first until the last lap. Both Jerome and Ryan had great starts and both were driving in top four bump up positions. Ryan was driving very intelligently and patiently, waiting the drivers ahead of him to make mistakes. Thanks to this strategy he was able to take a lead when suddenly the screw from the C-hub came out and the car started to turn only to one side. It was unfortuante that the driver who was one of the fastest in this final did not bump up, but thatâ™s racing. Jerome was driving smart and mistake-free. He was driving safely in a bump up position until last refueling when his engine stopped in the pits. Even with this happening in the pits, it still cost him a lot of important time, however, Jerome was able to make up enough of the lost time to secure top 4 position and bump up to the semi final. |
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| Josh was in the first semifinal and he was one of the favorites in this race. Josh was able to get a clean start and maintain his position in 2nd place. His driving was amazing and he started to catch Mike Truhe who was the leader at this time. Josh had caught up behind Truhe when his front tire unglued. Even with this bad luck, Josh was still able to drive really fast times and, though his tire was completely unglued, the distance between him and third place driver Renaud Savoya was increasing from lap to lap. Josh decided to change the tire during his first fuel stop. The tire change caused him to lose almost half lap and he lost his 2nd position, dropping all the way down to 4th position, which was still bump up position. We were excited to see that it looked like he could still make it into the final until we saw that his rear tire had also come unglued. This was an even worse nightmare when he had to go for another tire change and again lose a lot of time. After losing more than one lap, Josh lost the chance to bump up but he was still able to finish on very respectable 8th pace. Josh looked to be the fastest racer in the semifinal setting the fastest lap, fastest 5 laps, and fastest 10 laps. It was really disappointing for all of us to not see Josh in the final but, again, thatâ™s racing and things like this make it interesting. |
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We had still 2 drivers in the second semifinal who had a good chance to bump up to the main final, however, both Joseph and Jerome had bad luck at the start and dropped down on the field. They were struggling to drive through the traffic which caused them to lose important time. Although they were both driving very well they were not able to make up for the time lost the start and were unable to bump up to the main final.
Once again it was really disappointing event for us because we had very good chances to make very good results and in the end we were unable to place a car in the final. On the other hand, we were really happy with the carâ™s performance because all XRAY drivers were more than satisfied with their cars and many drivers who watched Josh came to us and said that Josh`s car was the best car on the track. |
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I would like to send a thank you to all of our drivers for their great cooperation and help provided to one another. It was a really exciting race, even with the bad luck for us, but I was really happy that the XRAY buggy was one of the most used cars at this event. |
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| Photos copyright www.neobuggy.com |
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