After a hot afternoon of racing, the 2024 JConcepts Points Series has reached the halfway point and like the weather, the battle for the points leads is heating up! After a few years of hiatus, the straight-line drags returned to Rescue RC Raceway, only this time with a twist: instead of two-jump/hold it wide open Penda-style drags, the first jump had a gap that had to be finessed in order to get to the second jump at speed before going all out to the final jump. The track made for some very close races and big upsets.
The 2.2 Mini Monster Class kicked off with Georgia Smallwood setting the fastest time in qualifying after perfectly greasing the down ramp of the first jump and getting a 3.18 time. Meanwhile, after a disaster in qualifying left him at the bottom of the bracket, Dale Udell would knock out the top qualifier in the second round before being eliminated in the semi-finals by Brian Romo and the points leading “Hater Maker”. On the other half of the bracket, Bob Tarvin qualified second with the “Copperhead” and made it to the semi-finals before falling to Round 2’s racing winner Sundeep Khatri’s “Raptor”. In the finals, Khatri defeated Romo remaining undefeated on the season since entering the class.
Georgia’s big day would continue as she would take the early lead in freestyle filling the clock without rolling and scoring a 21. The score would stand until Romo also filled the clock and took the lead with a 22. Khatri would be the final truck out and would give a valiant effort but did not fill the clock giving the freestyle win to the “Hater Maker”. However, Khatri would get enough points in freestyle to get the overall win for Round 3.
In the Bee Line Trucking 2.6 Monster Truck Class, David Heimbigner would set the fastest qualifying time with his “Bigfoot” getting a 2.66 to take the pole position of the 21 truck field. 14 trucks would qualify with a sub-3 second pass which would make for a lot of parody in the racing bracket. In the second round alone, the top 3 fastest qualifiers would all get knocked out. The upsets continued as the final four consisted of 11th ranked Zac Soares and his “Prospector”, 15th ranked Udell with “Agent Orange”, 13th “Silver State Smasher” and Jordan Jensen, and 16th fastest Romo’s “Samson”. Soares would make it to the finals after Udell stumbled over the first jump. Meanwhile Jensen made a perfect pass to defeat Romo and make it to the finals with his new identity. In the final round, both trucks would start even, but Jensen would crash going over the final ramp while Soares wheelied across the finish putting “Prospector” in the winner circle.
Jacob Smallwood would kick things off for freestyle scoring a 21 with his “Destroyer”. Isaac Soria was used to going towards the end of freestyle, but after an early exit in the race bracket, he would go out 7th and laid down a heater of a run with his “Lemon Lime Prime” filling the clock without deductions scoring a 26. Heimbigner’s “Flyin Hawaiian”, Marc Detka’s “USA-1” and Soares’ “Excaliber” would all put up high scores but would not be enough and Soria would take home his second freestyle victory on the season. Soares would score enough points in freestyle to take home the overall event championship.
The Brass Ring Fab Challenger Class proved to have some of the fastest qualifying times of the day despite being a spec class with Heimbigner once again getting TQ with the fastest pass of the day with his “Flyin’ Hawaiian” crossing the finish line in just 2.51 seconds with his “Son Uva Digger” qualifying third. Points leader Jeremy Bunting would qualify second fastest with “Titan” and fourth with “Crash Test Dummy” and Smallwood joined the class with his all-new “King Krunch” prototype Blackmarket RC “Contender” chassis to round out the top-five. “King Krunch” would knock out “Crash Test Dummy” and then top qualifier “Flyin’ Hawaiian” to make the finals. Meanwhile, in the battle of the tube chassis, “Son Uva Digger” ended the winning streak of “Titan” to make the finals. Smallwood would lay down a smooth pass in the finals while Heimbigner would have a body-shedding crash going over the final jump putting the new “King Krunch” on top for the day.
Finally, in the Blackmarket RC Retro class, Tarvin would get the top qualifying time barely beating out Heimbigner’s “Bigfoot II” and the new “Kodiak” campaigned by Soares. In the quarter finals, Detka’s 8th seeded “USA-1” would knock out Tarvin, Smallwood’s “Blue Max” beat the points leader “Excaliber”, “Kodiak” beat “Flyin’ Hawaiian” and “Shotgun” eliminated “Bigfoot II”. In the semis, “USA-1” would continue his run after Smallwood pulled a wheelie off the first jump into the second and “Kodiak” beat “Shotgun” to the line. In the finals, Detka used the down ramp of the first jump to perfection and took the win by a truck length over Soares getting his first win of the year.
The day ended with an awesome raffle courtesy of our fantastic sponsors: Blackmarket RC, AMain Hobbies, EcoPower, JConcepts, Gens Ace, and Flyin’ Hawaiian RC. Special thank you to Brandon Blanco for filming and also bringing burgers and drinks for lunch. A big thanks to everyone who came out and those who were able to help out watering the track, judging, timing, and helping with setup and teardown.
With Round 3 in the books, the points standings have tightened up and should make for an exciting final two rounds. Round 4 will take place on July 20th in Chico at the Outback R/C Raceway Oval at the all-new AMain Hobbies facility.