USWNC: Desoto, Gray and Morganti shine in Q4

0 Dec. 4, 2015, 9:47 p.m.

By Thomas Tran
LiveRC.com

2015 World Nitro Cup - Friday Round 4 Qualifying

After a full round of qualifying with open practice after round 3, the track started to come back to the racers. With the steady increase in grip, the lap times adversely started to drop. Cars were able to get back on the power and hold traction under forward acceleration and drivers were able to take corners with more confidence and speed. With that, came another round of excitement in qualifying.

Making it a perfect 4 for 4 of TQ runs, Shepherd’s Armin Weihart was unstoppable in the 200mm Open class showing he’s in a league of his own.

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Finding another gear against his competitors in the GT8 Port Spec class, Desoto Racing’s Joaquin Desoto put on a clinic and was the only driver in the field to run 13 laps in qualifying all weekend with a 13 lap 4:25.84. Zuriel Aular was fighting hard to contest Desoto, but was only able to set the 2nd fastest time in rd 4 with a 12 lap 4:03.98. Closing out the top 3, it was Samuel Zayas putting in his best run of the weekend with a 12 lap 4:05.42 and finishing 4th overall for qualifying.

Joaquin Desoto was on fire once again in the 1/8th masters class outpacing his rivals and taking the top spot and snatching the overall TQ from Desoto Racing’s George Martinez in the final round of qualifying. Making their first appearance to the top 3 list was Todd Roman and Peter Breton who would finish 2nd and 3rd in rd 4 with a 15 lap 4:00.7 and 15 lap 4:01.67 respectively. With each round, Desoto’s competitors are looking stronger and getting closer to Desoto’s time which is undoubtedly setting up for an interesting triple A-mains for Sunday.

1/10th nitro saw Serpent/Picco’s Scotty Gray bounce back from a bad qualifying round 3 to earn another TQ in round 4. Saying he would, “not make any changes to his car and wait till the track comes back [to him].” Gray looked to have similar pace to his previous rounds before the rain hit. Thilo Toedtmann would put in another fantastic run and move up on the overall with a solid 15 lap 4:09.31, just 2 seconds back to Gray’s TQ time. Capricon/Novarossi’s DJ Apolaro would have to settle for 3rd best time after saying his early setup change in rd 3 was “no good” and was going back to “my earlier setup that was much better.”

Finally, in the 1/8th Open class saw a new name added to the TQ list and a name quite familiar, Serpent/Picco’s Paolo Morganti. Morganti was the only driver in rd 4 to run 17 laps edging out the 2nd fastest time set by Vince Jackson. Michael Palazzola would finish in the top 3 for the first time in qualifying this weekend. The times were 17 laps 4:16.28 by Morganti, 16 lap 4:04.59 for Jackson and 16 lap 4:06.69 by Palazzola.