Took another drive to the Ohio RC Factory to attend the Midwest Champs Warmup event. While I won't be attending the actual Midwest Champs I still love the facility and track and felt it would be good to get some more track time and dial in my cars some more at a little more relaxed pace having already established a baseline for this track. As I arrived and began practice I noticed that traction seemed to be a little lower than 2 weeks ago. I worked on some set-up changes throughout practice time and felt pretty dialed in to begin racing.
As mentioned the track conditions were just a few tenths slower than two weeks ago so throughout qualifying I couldn't quite reach that same 17 lap goal last time. However in Q3 I would run my cleanest runs getting a 16 5:02 in ebuggy and 16 5:01 in NItro buggy to take the TQ for each class.
We ran the same program for mains as last time which keeps me very busy. We did a 10 minute A1 of ebuggy first and I got off to a good start and with crashes behind me set sail to an over 1 lap victory. Directly after had to adjust throttle finger to account for Nitro and our 20 minute A-main. Fired up my Alpha Dragon 4 edition 2 and away we went. I had a solid start and built out a lead and just plugged away. I'm so impressed with the performance of the engine and buggy. I can't wait to get to some bigger events and see where I stack up! At the end of the 20 minute main I won by just under 2 laps.
Next we had to marshal and then straight back on the stand for A2 of e-buggy. This was an exciting race as I crashed on the 5th lap which allowed Joey to get by. For the next 23 laps I would play catch up only to make another mistake. I would catch up again and give a little bump and then make another mistake. However with just 5 laps to go he made a mistake allowing me to get by into the lead and then I was able to hang on for the A2 victory and the overall win.
So another solid day of racing. I got TQ and Win in both classes. For tires it was AKA Ultra soft Typo for most of the day. I also tried ultra soft chainlink and they were easier to drive and a bit safer feeling and were only about 0.1-0.2 tenths off per lap compared to the typo. So a good option for longer wear and perhaps more consistency.
Setup Notes:
So I went in with what I ended with last race with plans to build off of it. However with the slightly lower grip some of the ideas I was wanting to try weren't necessarily the best option for less grip. I wanted to try heavier rear diff oil for one. I was starting with 15-10-7 and in ebuggy I went to 15-10-10. When I tried this in practice while grip was still pretty high (not as high as last time) It allowed me to get on the gas sooner and harder out of a corner and gave it more control in doing so. I'm beginning to visualize diffs better I think but I need more time yet in testing. When I can feel confident in my explanation I will make a video on it!
But what I can say regarding diffs is that based on the slightly lowered traction levels at this weekends race I feel I could have been better off being a little lighter, mainly in center. I think a 15-8-7 or 12-8-7 would have been a good balance. Reason being is I think a slightly lighter center would have allowed a little more power transfer to the front vs going to the rear and I think it would have been a little easier to drive. When too high in the center for the traction conditions I find the rear can be a little loose at times because more power is being transmitted to the rear.
Another thing I tested was foam modification. Nothing to crazy but I had a two sets of new Ultra Soft Typos. One set had full unaltered foams, the other I did the half moon out of the center rib along with a 4mm hole in the center of the center rib. The full foams felt the bumps a bit more but they were safer in the high speed sweeper and felt less tippy in that section. While the ones with the cuts and holes felt like they gave a little more traction and better bump handling.
