Jones victorious at inaugural Indiana State Indoor Nitro Champs

I attended the first annual Indiana Nitro State Championships at JCP RC Raceway in Indianapolis, IN. I usually don't run indoor nitro but after a couple days of testing at a couple different tracks, I had the nitro itch. This was my first ever race with my new Team Associated RC8B3 after joining Team Associated for 2016 with hopefully many more years to come.

 

We had open practice the day before the race so my dad and I got to test several shock packages along with other chassis setup changes. Car was very good with any change we made and that made us feel like the car would be good no matter what. We settled on a setup at the end the practice day and felt confident for race day.

 

Race day came and this would give us an idea of how I would do in race conditions not just testing conditions. First qualifier I was surprised I would be on tq pace first time racing the car. Couple issues with traffic would put me 2nd for the first round. Second qualifier came and again be on tq pace when my steering servo broke causing me to hit the wall really hard and rip the left rear off the car. Final qualifier once again tq pace and slower car didn't clear a jump and I hit the down side of the jump and had so much speed I couldn't get stopped and rear ended the slower car knocking off a spring cup so I just pulled in. After the rough qualifying I ended up 6th going into the 30 minute A-main. Little bummed but knew how fast my car was and not too worried.

 

Main time came and at the tone everyone got pretty clean start. Going into a 180* turn 3rd-5th all tangled and I had to drive way off line to miss the pile up. Came out clean in third place but the leaders had gapped the field a bit. I put on a charge and was closing in and made a mistake and spun out and got hit head on shattering my left front spring cup. So, I just kept digging with only 3 fully functioning shocks and springs! I was able to run down the leaders and get the lead. My LRP engine with The Nitro Shop fuel mod was sipping Bones Brew fuel and let me do 10:30 pit stops. Thank goodness my JConcepts Gold Dirt Webs took the absolute abuse I had to give them and the car to be able to run as fast as I did to chase the leaders down. It is pretty hard to drive a car that hard with only three shocks working and still be that fast. I bobbled before the last pit stop allowing former teammate Collin Weatherholt to get around me and pull out to a little bit of a lead. Then, he ran out of fuel during his attempted 10 minute pit stop and I retook the lead and kept it till the end. I turned the fastest lap of the whole weekend in the main even with three shocks!! Collin had won the last five races at this track and he was pretty confident he couldn't be beat but I know with our hard work and our great equipment I could beat him. I'm super excited to get outside and really show my speed again and feel confident heading into Worlds. 

 

Derek Weatherholt was second and Collin Weatherholt was third.