October 18, 2011
Event Name: RC Pro US Series 16
Event Location: Harlingen, Texas
Event Date(s): September 23, 2011 to September 23, 2011
The RC Pro US Series 16 took place September 23 in Harlingen, Texas. This race was turning out to be quite crucial for me (David Joor) if I wanted to continue my points lead to defend my RCP Electric National Title. Two years ago when I got into electric 1:8 scale I won the RCP Finals, and in 2010 I took home the RCP Electric National Title. The points setup has changed this year, which means so has the game. I was leading the points; Mitchel Gardner, who was fierce competition at last year’s Finals, was second. Jake Dillinger, who is in my region, has really been coming into his own this year, making every race a battle. I knew he would be attending this race. If he took a TQ and win here, he would become the new points leader. So I grabbed my Associated RC8.2s and took the venture down south.
Some of you may remember the ROAR Nationals being held at this track in 2005 (if memory serves correctly). The track was once again going to test everyone’s car control. The high bite was there; however, it was covered by what I call moon dust. Not even veterans could even keep their cars straight coming out of corners. The jumps started to crumble so that by time of the mains only one jump was semi-consistent. The RC8.2s were amazing right out of the box. I purposely ran the kit setup to see where the evolution had gone and thank goodness for all the new beefy parts because I needed them! I took TQ in electric by winning each round, but Dillinger didn’t make this easy. In Nitro my first two rounds gave me third behind Branham and Batlle, but in rounds 3 and 4 Dillinger found his rhythm and bumped me to fourth for the main.
The track being as loose as it was, Dillinger and I, both with RC8.2s, went down to 3K in the center and raised the rear hubs. There was so much more we could do, but it was pointless with the inconsistent track conditions. I tried every AKA tire in the book and the only thing that felt different on the track was going to I-Beam mediums instead of softs. The most important thing was to keep from wrecking; because of the oppressive heat and the amount of wrecking taking place, the corner marshals were just too worn out to hustle getting cars.
I took the first electric main but Dillinger made a charge back in the second main to take the win, so it was all up to the third main. This was embarrassing, but in the third main I lost such control of the car in the most difficult section of the track that I went over the pipe and had a head-on collision with fourth place! Getting back on the other side, I continued to follow Dillinger for two laps – literally a foot or two behind in each corner – trying to make him crack. Right when I began to think he wasn’t going to, he traction-rolled in the sweeper and cartwheeled off the track. So I went on to win the third main. This gave me maximum points of 218 going into the finals because I TQd, led most laps, and won two RCP events! Dillinger and Gardner are now tied for second with 210.
[source: www.rc10.com]
