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| Race report by Reno Savoya |
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Probably one of the most famous races in the world is the Dirt Nitro Challenge. Hosted by Joey Christensen and his crew, this event is growing bigger and bigger every year. Fear Farm is the new host of the event, not far from Phoenix city center. All media was attending, from liverc.com to Neobuggy.net, without forgetting redrc.net.
The competition level is always super high, and the track design is very technical, offering me a great opportunity to perfectly tune my XB9!
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I spent a few days with my crew and Martin Bayer in California before getting to the event, in order to get a basic set-up of the car on American soil. Also, I did my first laps with an electric buggy! That was really the first laps I did with my 808e, and thanks to my Tekin/Venom combo, I felt it great since the early beginning.
Practice went pretty smoothly in all classes as I was very close to the fastest lap times. The track was more European style that I would expect, with a super-long straightaway and high speed corners! |
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| Qualification: |
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| During qualification, I worked on the cars in order to make them easier to drive in the high-bite conditions. As a result, I went with the middle position on the Ackermann plate in order to reduce initial steering. I also tried a different compound on tires and raised the camber links to make the car steer more smoothly. |
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| Unfortunately, my lack of experience in electric buggy cost me a direct spot into the A main. My battery came unplugged in Q1 and my switch went off in Q2! So, I ended up last in the B main. |
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| In truggy, I was really satisfied with my qualifiers as I opted for a safe strategy to cruise and not crash. I did all my three 7-minute rounds without crashing, but unfortunately I was too slow to get a spot in the A main. I ended up 17th so I went into the B. Martin Bayer also had bad luck in the truggy class and could finish only one round. |
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| As European drivers, our main class is buggy. Everything went according to the plan in this class, as I finished very nearly in the top 10 of each round. Thanks to clean and safe rounds, I managed to get very close to the TQ pace in every round except Q2 when I tested another tyre thread. With so much track time with the 3 classes, it's good to try new things and learn more about the cars. So, I qualified 11th overall and my team mate and friend Martin Bayer 12th. A nice job for Team XRAY with the XB9 debuts and 2 cars in the A main! |
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| Mains: |
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| I had a rough start in both electric buggy and truggy. Unfortunately, the race was only 10 minutes for B main electric and I'm not really used to race mains of such a short time like this. When I got into my rhythm I was coming up on the leaders and ended up 4th only 2 seconds behind the bump-up spot. |
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| In truggy, I was on a 10-minute pit strategy, so I knew I had the advantage over some other drivers. Unfortunately it wasn't enough, as my car was really easy to drive but a bit too lazy to close on the leaders. I finished again in the most-hated 4th position. |
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In buggy, my car was awesome and I was really fast and in control. Unfortunately, I had a problem with the clutch touching the brake disks during the final, and I flamed out which forced me to retire early. However,
I'm really happy with this result as all of my 3 cars had the potential to be in the top 10 in all classes of one of the most difficult race events in the world. |
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| I'm really looking forward to the new challenges coming up, and getting some good results under my belt. |
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