Held this year in the usually sunny and hot Maitland. Although the weather was different this time around...
Practice:
My XB4â 15 on practice day was good. Being a local to this track, I had a firm setup that I felt comfortable with already and decided to run with this as the track was dry and slippery. I opted to remove the front sway bar entirely to generate more turn in and out of the corners and that was the only change I made for practice day.
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Sunday Race day:
So, as expected we had a huge down pour of rain Saturday night and early Sunday morning. Racing didnâ™t get underway until lunch time and at lunch time we received another healthy down pour of rain which delayed racing even further back to 2pm.
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At this stage we had to reduce qualifying down to 3 Rounds and A Finals to 2 Finals.
Q1 for me went well, bit scratchy as I hadnâ™t driven 4wd since late Friday afternoon, coming in at P2 for the Rnd behind QLD fast guy Mitchell Steer.
Q2 was the same again, only finishing 0.1 behind Mitch again which secured Mitch the overall TQ. My car was edgy and hard to drive as the rain had created maximum grip. Made some drastic changed for Q3 such as super heavy front diff oil and bring back the front sway bar.
Q3 Saw me in P2 again but this time behind W.A and Multi National Champ Josh Pain. He got his car working well in P3 only finishing again 0.1 sec behind Painy.
Due to three P2 finishes, I start off P3 for the main.
A Mains had been reduced from 3 A mains to 2 A Mains. Therefore meaning the fastest win would take the title. My car was super fast now since the setup changes with the diff oil and front sway bar so I got some confidence back.
A1 saw me and Josh pain quickly capitalize on Mitch Steer's early mistake and the battle was on between me and Josh Pain. I managed to reel him in quite fast, attempted a passing move and could not pull it off, allowing Pain to take A1 win in 10 laps 5min 22. This was the time to beat for me to take the title. Hard task, but possible.
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A2, Saw the same outcome as A1, Mitch making some early mistakes and it was heel to toe for me and Pain again, this time taping Josh Pains rear bumper at virtually every corner , letting him know I was there for business. Only 2 laps in, Pain push hard down the straight and into the 180 turn corner at the end of the straight he pushed wide by about 2 car widths wide, I threw it up the inside for a clean and sharp pass and into P1.
From there I had to charge hard and fast but clean to then work on Josh Pains time. I ran a faultless run and I knew at the end it was a fast run. After the officials deliberated, I finished in 10 laps 5min 18seconds to beat Painy's time by over 4 seconds and take the championship.
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1. Jarred King - XRAY XB4
Iâ™d like to take opportunity to thank Ari and HEI for all their Support with the XRAY XB4 15 car.
