We showed up to the 2013 1/8th IC Off Road Victorian State Titles at Barmah to find a completely different surface than we've experienced in the past. Barmah in the past has been very hard packed with a slippery silt layer on top. Instead the track that looked more on road than off road in colour. The club had sprayed a heavy layer of molasses on the track to reduce the silt. Straight up we were on the back foot with all the wrong tires and setups.
After a few runs in practice and a long list of setup changes (sway bars, shock oil, angle and springs, toe, roll center, ride height and droop) we found a setup that was stable and about as forgiving as was possible with all the grip on offer. We found that once warmed up, bald tires were an option but still not the best option. We tried some Blockades, Big Blocks and Diamond Backs settling on the X3 and X2 Diamond Backs. Only having a few sets of X2 on hand I pulled out of buggy so Ron would have the right tires for the final.
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The first few rounds of heats went as expected, lots of breakages in the field. Ron had some trouble in truggy loosing his front body pins loosing him some time in R1 then had a shock bend in a heavy collision in R2. He kept out of trouble in buggy and was sitting in the A main qualifiers group in buggy as was I in truggy. Early in R3 the rains rolled in and the day was washed out.
On Sunday we returned to find the rain has washed away a lot of the molasses catching most people off guard as the track had become loose. I picked it quite quickly and was able to change my setup back as close to my standard setup before my run. a tire change to M3 holeshots gave me a great run for position 2 in the round. Ron had strong results, cementing his buggy A main position and lifting his position in truggy. In the last round of qualifing most people had made setup changes and I continued to refine my own. Ron and I again had strong results and qualified straight into the A mains. Ron Q6 in buggy, Q8 in truggy. Myself Q6 in truggy.
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Truggy A-Main Results
1. Ronald Maya - XRAY XT9
2. Shane Hancock 3. Alan Nankervis - XRAY XT9
4. John Bateman
5. Dave Trevethan
6. Paul Goodie
7. Matt Chatz 8. Savage Sam - XRAY XT9
9. Glen Cook - XRAY XT9
10. Shane Kelly
11. Mich Campion
12. Charles Borg
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Buggy A-Main Results
1. Matt Griffin
2. Shane Kelly 3. Ronald Maya - XRAY XB9
4. Mark Rayner
5. Shane Hancock
6. John Bateman
7. Mich Campion
8. Justin Strickland
9. Jamie O'Brien
10. Paul Goodie
11. Karl Piepkorn
12. Scott Chettleburgh
