KBRL - Round 1 at Competition Hobbies in Tucson, Az

Saturday, September 8th, 2012

Round 1 of the KBRL Electric Series is in the books, and it was fun and exciting event.  Round 1 was held at Competition Hobbies, down in Tuscon, AZ.  I believe there was 219 entries for this round, and the competition and racing did not disappoint, and the crew down at Competition Hobbies did a great job in hosting this event.  All though the night did go late into the evening, everyone was in good spirits and it did not seem to bother that many people.

I made the trek down to Competition Hobbies with my friends Dean and Dragi from WolfPak Racing, and our friend Ernest.  I would like to thank Dean for driving us all down, driving down as a group made the trek very enjoyable.

Ernest, myself, and Dragi in the background, all setup in the pits.

Debuting my new body for my TLR 22 Buggy, now matching my 22 SCT.

For this round I would not be racing my TLR 22 SCT, I did not have the truck setup for the KBRL, so for round one I would be just concentrating on my TLR 22 Buggy.  For this years event, I would be entering a new class debuting at this years event, 17.5 Buggy.

On to the racing:

Round 1 - 17.5 Buggy

There was 13 of us in the 17,5 2WD Buggy class, broken up into two heat races per round.  The first round went well, I was able to pull in 10 laps, and I felt that I could have pushed it a little harder, but overall was happy with what I had accomplished.  Below is the round 1 results.


17.5 2WD Buggy
Round# 1, Race# 19

Driver           Car#  Laps  RaceTime  Fast Lap
Parker Ayers      #3    12   5:22.344   25.000
Kevin Kilday      #2    11   5:10.858   25.941
John Schreck      #6    10   5:15.694   27.991
Dragi Vuckovich   #7    10   5:19.337   28.652
Frank Lilly       #4    10   5:25.304   27.848
Javier Olmo       #1    10   5:26.500   26.356
Martin Beavers    #5     8   5:09.317   30.714

17.5 2WD Buggy
Round# 1, Race# 20

Driver           Car#  Laps  RaceTime  Fast Lap

Mike Kokot        #3    12   5:09.050   24.947

Dean Vuckovich    #4    12   5:14.075   25.188

Ryan Hackl        #6    11   5:03.012   26.004      

Mike Burdeshaw    #5    11   5:06.679   25.426

Justin Ament      #1    11   5:09.177   26.382

Jo Christensen    #2    10   5:04.561   26.757

Round 2 - 17.5 Buggy

For round 2, I did not do as well as I wanted.  I changed tires and that was not a good idea.  Although my traction was way off, I still was able to pull off 9 laps.  Below is the round 2 results.


17.5 2WD Buggy
Round# 2, Race# 19

Driver           Car#  Laps  RaceTime  Fast Lap
Parker Ayers      #3    11   5:08.499   24.866
John Schreck      #6    11   5:20.791   25.656
Kevin Kilday      #2    11   5:21.997   26.327
Javier Olmo       #1    10   5:16.497   27.694
Dragi Vuckovich   #7    10   5:25.799   28.508
Frank Lilly       #4     9   5:19.154   28.627
Martin Beavers    #5     6   3:53.543   33.350


17.5 2WD Buggy
Round# 2, Race# 20

Driver           Car#  Laps  RaceTime  Fast Lap
Dean Vuckovich    #4    12   5:20.610   24.924
Ryan Hackl        #6    12   5:26.594   25.732
Justin Ament      #1    11   5:09.437   25.885
Jo Christensen    #2    11   5:12.425   26.636
Mike Burdeshaw    #5    11   5:17.676   25.854
Mike Kokot        #3    10   5:03.176   26.639



Mains

17.5 Buggy "B-Main"

For this main 2 of the drivers would not be able to make the start, so it came down to a shoot-out between Schreck, Dragi and myself.

17.5 Buggy "A-Main"

Since I was able to bump from the B-Main, I was able to race in my first A-Main in the KBRL Series.  I would be racing with my friends Dean and Ryan.  I had a great start, and was up as high as 6th place after the second lap.  But a bad jump, with me landing on another racer, I had a ball cup pop off.  Although one of the turn marshals was able to get the cup placed back on, that damage was done.  I was able to finish in 8th place.  Although I was a little disappointed in my finish, I felt overall I did well, and I learned a lot racing against some good friends.

I was also able to grab a video of my friend Dragi's A-Main in the Novice Short Course class: