RCDriftCentral.com I Hit it SIdeways Series Round 1 @ VRW race track in beautiful Florida!

Saturday, February 7, 2009

Words by: Jader Lopez

www.rcdriftcentral.com

     Perfect day in South Florida for some R/C Drifting. Sunny but yet very cool weather. This event was the first of six for the 2009 point series. The event took place at VRW Raceway in West Palm Beach, FL. We had a total of 19 entries. Three race events were taking place this day, Pro Class, Advance Class and the Points Series. Qualifying began around 3pm which gave drivers more then enough time to practice the layout of the track. Top qualifiers of the day were Jader Lopez, Andrew Bowman and Patrick Salazar with a total of 33 points. There could not be a tie for top qualifier as the top qualifier would receive and extra point in the points event. So we had a 3 way re-qualifying. Andrew was knocked off the battle in the first set of laps. Jader and Patrick went at it for 4 laps until Jader hit one clipping point better then Patrick making him the top qualifier of the day. Advance tandems came around and since we had an odd number of drivers the top qualifier Glenn got a free by. After some nice battles and a couple of sudden deaths it came down to the two brothers Glenn and Scott. Glenn had the best line on both laps making him the winner of the advance class. Second place went to Scott and third went to Alain. Pro class was next up. Some improvements showed during practices and everyone knew it was gonna be a long night. Second place winner of the last event, Patrick, really showed he wanted this competition title. Jader, the top qualifier of the day was not gonna make it easy for him or anyone else. Felix, which was knocked off at an early round in the last event wanted a piece of glory as well. A few new faces were on the Pro class this time and gave some of the top drivers some pretty good runs. Andrew and Clement had some really close battles in which it was forced to move to another 2 lap tandem. Andrew came out with the win on that one moving into the final four along with Felix, Patrick and Jader. First set of races was Felix against Patrick. The first 2 laps were too close to call. The next set of laps came up and on the first lap both drivers were the same, making it seem like it was going to take forever. But the next lap Felix led the tandem battle as Patrick chased. Patrick was unable to hold a line which gave Felix the win onto the finals. On the other side of the bracket was Andrew against Jader. These two drivers have met many times before on the track and know what to expect from each other. The first lap Jader led. Jader had a big gap between them and coming into the third clipping point Andrew hit the barrier and spun out giving Jader the 6-4 advantage. Next lap Andrew led, both drivers ran a perfect lap. That lap score was a tie at 5-5 but Jader would advance to the Finals with Felix because of his previous 6-4 lap. The finals came around and these two drivers have been here before. Going up against a great driver and everything on the line. The first two laps were dead even at 5-5. This brought out another tandem battle. The first battle was another even lap at 5-5 and at this point everyone thought it was going to take forever. It's not often that these two make a mistake. But getting up to the third clipping point of the track Jader came in too fast and bumped Felix from behind. This would give Felix the win. Jader comes in at second and Patrick beat Andrew for the third slot. The points series tandems were almost identical to the Pro Class tandems. We had newcomer Ben Jr. (Papi) showing off that he has been practicing. He managed to make it to the final four along with once again Felix, Jader and Patrick. The final four consisted of Ben against Patrick and Felix against Jader to reach the finals. Patrick came out to beat Ben to reach the finals. He would go up against either Jader or Felix. Jader and Felix had to go at it again. Two laps went by again and they were both tied up one more time. The next lap just like the previous Pro class tandems went by with another tie. Then the final lap Jader makes the same exact mistake in the same exact spot and bumps Felix. This would move Felix to the finals with Patrick. Both drivers had pretty good runs but again Felix would come out on top to also win the point series tandems. Patrick would come in second, Jader came in third and Ben in fourth after they went at it to dispute the third place slot. Here are the points standings after one of six events:

Felix - 5 pts

Patrick - 4 pts

Jader - 3 pts + 1pt for top qualifier = 4 pts

Ben Jr. - 2 points

Here is a youtube video of the event: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ru7YlvXdQLI

RCDriftcentral.com would like to thank HPI Racing and Hot Bodies, Warricks Hobby Superstore, and 3G's Hobbies for all their support. It was a fun event and we can't wait for the next one.

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