April 10, 2011

Tessmann & Tebo TQ 2011 Silverstate

Sat-TyTessmann

Saturday kicked off with the 3rd and final round of qualifying. The track was well groomed by the crew after Friday’s rounds of racing. All of its gaping wounds were patched up and a healthy dose of water was laid down on the dirt. Cody King and Ty Tessmann were looking to get TQ’s for round 3 of expert truggy and wrap up the overall TQ, but it was Jared Tebo with an excellent run leading from the first lap to the finish. Although his efforts were grand, Tessmann won the overall TQ with his best two finishes being a 1st and 2nd. Many of the truggy drivers were switching between smaller pin tires and larger pins. The smaller pins seemed faster and a bit more forgiving in the ruts, but the larger pinned tires had more traction, especially when driving in the fluff outside the lines. I asked Ty about his tire choices throughout the race and he was going between the Proline Holeshots and Calibers. He thought the Calibers were a bit “edgy” but had more traction so those would most likely be his choice for the main.

Sat-Mud

Shortly after the expert truggy races wrapped up, the skies began to turn a dark shade of grey. A light rain started to fall but it wasn’t enough to suspend racing. Then out of nowhere it began to snow. When the snow subsided it was followed by a good down pore. Two races later, racing was suspended to let the weather pass.

Sat-MattCastellano

The dry desert terrain didn’t have a problem soaking up the brief rains. In fact, the rains left the track with the perfect amount of moisture for the start of expert buggy. Team Losi’s Matt Castellano took advantage of the conditions and set the TQ bar quite high all the way from the “C” qualifier. It held its way through the B and the only person standing in its way in the A was none other than Jared Tebo. Throughout Jared’s run he fell on and off the pace only to come down to the last lap and a .5 second deficit to make up if he wanted top honors. If it was anyone else I would have had my doubts but Jared drove one of his fastest laps of the race and topped Castellano’s TQ by .15 seconds. With his 2nd TQ, Jared will be on the pole for Sunday’s A-main event.

Sat-TeboBug

Since there was only one more round of qualifying today, the lower mains got started. Lee Martin struggled a bit in qualifying with his Tamiya and started on the pole in the E-main. Lee won that race by a large margin bumping up to the D-main, which he won as well. The last race of the evening was the expert C-main. Lee must have figured something out because he finished 3rd and now finds himself all the way up into the B-main on Sunday morning.

The Nevada weather has been nothing short of unpredictable but Sunday should be the day of sunshine. The race is still anyone’s for the win. The track will be very worn and rutted by the time the A-mains run which will make for a lot of crashes but will also set the stage for some exciting racing.

View the complete mains listings here.

Video

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcIvktxsqfo[/youtube]

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