Serpent S966 Sweeps ROAR Nats

S966 won both 8th scale classes at the ROAR Nats this past weekend in Lincoln, Nebraska. Rick Davis won Masters and Chris Tosolini won the Open class. Teammate Scott Kimbrow finished 2nd in the open class to make it a 1-2. Mike Pulfer also had a great race and made it 3 S966s in the top 5. Overall 5 966s made it to the finals. Jim Adkins finished 7th and Eric Jones came home 8th.

2010 AMS

Team Serpent attends first ever major off-road event. 2 Cobras direct qualify into the the A-main of Pro Buggy. Billy Easton TQs the last round and ends up 6th overall on points. Chris Tosolini, making his off-road debut in big time off-road, also makes the final. Jared Scot was an early top 10 qualifier but a bad 3rd round dropped him to 17th over all. Also, many other Cobras racing at the event and all running well. Tomorrow are the mains. The events has over 460 entries and the track is big, fast and a lot of fun. Hats off to the AMS crew.

Cobras finish 1-2 at Florida State Series Race

Billy drove a flawless race and took the win. Chris drove his heart out and finished on the lead lap with Billy. He wasn't super happy with his tire choice for the main but still managed to finish 1.5 laps ahead of 3rd. The Cobras ran flawlessly all weekend and were in a class of their own.

Cobras qualify 1-2 at Florida State Series Race

Tower of Power! GT engines now in stock.

First Cobra arrived today!

Chris & Cobra finished 2nd tonight. Only 1 second from first! Great first run.

We're done. Everything went great!

We're still running! Everything is working perfectly and the Cobra is the fastest car on the track.

Wow, super first run. Chris says "best buggy he has ever driven!". :)

2 tanks and everything is working perfect. Chris is already one of the fastest cars. Not bad for some on-road guys!

At the track! Charging up. We'll hit the track in a few minutes...

Breaking in the P5, heading to track in 30 minutes...

Almost ready!

Cobra

We received our first car yesterday. Almost ready. Will test tonight
at Mills Pond.

I hope everyone enjoyed the blog, I will do it again at the Nats...... for now, we are on the 9 hour drive home...... see ya!

End of story, Mike went on for the win. Both Jim and I were very happy with the cars, and I think we will be very competitive at the Nats.

With 25 minutes down Mike was only 5 seconds ahead, and I was pacing him and saving tires. Unfortunatly at that point I broke a rear belt.....

I was 2nd, just keeping pace with Swauger as I knew he would pit 2 extra stops than me, and also change tires. I was fuel at 5 minutes and no tires.

Sorry for the delay..... but things didn't end up good for Team Serpent this time. Jim was running 4th when his transponder wire broke

Power just went out 20 minutes into sedan main. They are running IGT main now, then 30 min sedan - complete restart

Sorry, looks like the video clip didn't work. Steve jackson had problems, leaving Mark Sweeney & Tony Clark to get their shot at the a-main

Start of 1/8 B main

B main is running now with Steve Jackson out front after 6 minutes

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: "Rich Browne" <richbrowne@me.com>
Date: May 2, 2010 11:15 AM
Subject: B
To: "Scott Kimbrow" <scottkimbrow@gmail.com>

Sunday Racing!

mains are underway!! Jim and Rich are working on preparing the cars for the Final, and I am, well...... blogging. Yesterday afternoon practice time proved to be very good for us, as Jim tested a different clutch setup in his final heat which worked very good. He put the same setup on my car and the car was much more responsive exiting corners. That along with a quick change of the Empire rear swaybar, and main event tires, and the car was feeling very racy and ready for today.
as I write, the 1/8 C-main is getting flagged off with Brett Parker shooting to the front early. The 1/8 A-main should go off about 1pm. i will check back in before the start.

1/10 a-main lineup

1/8 a-main lineup

There is a break now, then the privateer races, then open practice. We will be back on track to do more testing.

Qualifying is complete and I will sit 2nd on the grid, with Jim doing an awesom/e job qualifying 4th. Unfortunately Steve Jackson is 11th.

Mike finished about 2 seconds ahead of me and ran out just after crossing start/finish. Round 3 is under way!

Car is working very well, but we will be looking for more power in round 3. I have extra fuel to work with, so we made changes to the engine package.

Top 10 - 1/8 after round two

Ropund 3 getting ready to start at 2pm!

Top 10 sedan after round two

Serpent 966 waiting for the call to duty

Top 10 1/8 - round one

Top 10 sedan - round 1

1st round qualifying

First round is in the books, and things have started well! After a very close battle with Mike Swauger in my heat, I ended up with T.Q. for round one. Not a bad start for the 966's first run! Mike and I traded the lead several times during the heat, but Mike ran out of fuel on the last lap, leaving me to finish with the only 19 lap run of round one. Jim did a great job in the next heat to currently put him in fourth position behind Steve Rossi.
The car is great, and now that we got a good run in, we are going to get a little more aggressive with the clutch and engine since I had fuel left to spare. We will see how things go in round two which will start in 15 minutes.
I will post pictures of the top 10 in both classes shortly.

Truing tires is ALWAYS the highlight of my day!

The very stylish Jim Adkins!

Jim on track for morning practice

Saturday Qualifying

Absolutely gorgeous morning in The Sin City! Drivers meeting at 8:30am and then first heat at 9am. There are 75 entries in 3 classes with the 1/8 class having the largest turnout of 40. I think we are ready the finishing touches were put on my car last night, and Jim ran this morning with his car looking very good. I will get an update posted after the first round, but stayed tuned for a few pictures......

Friday Recap

Well, we made it through our first day with the Serpent 966 and I have to say I am very impressed. The car was great right from the first run, and has continued to improved. We had absolutely no issues with either mine or Jim's car all day. We tested a few different motors, bodies and tires.... and I am still looking for the right combination that feels just right for me. I like my car to be very stable and planted in the rear, but still have the right amount of steering. It's hard to find that, but Jim and Rich do a great job getting the car where it needs to be. Honestly, most people that have driven my car over the years think that it doesn't steer enough, but it is what feels right to me.
Jim was also very fast today. He looks to be even faster than with his kyosho car and this is a great sign since we haven't even got our feet wet yet!

As for the race, it looks to be shaping up very nicely. There were about 60 racers here today, with more expected tomorrow. The track has been nicely prepared and traction is very good, but not crazy. It is typical Vegas in that it gets a little bit slimy in the hottest part of the day, but is very good morning and late afternoon.
Mike Swauger is here along with Brian Thomas, Mike Strack, Scotty Barrera, Garen Hagobian, and a host of others. 1/8 racing will be great and I will post info on each round as we get started tomorrow. First heat goes off at 9am!! Be there!!!

Well, we thought we were done, but no! More testing and Rich is finishing up the car as the sun starts to set on the day. I will post more tonight from the hotel...........

We tested the Blitz Radical also, but lap times were a tick faster with the p909. Garen from Motonica usa has bought pizza for everyone.. time to eat

We are wrapping up our day. Jim and Rich doing some car maintainance right now while I mount a fresh Protoform p909

Rich Browne - Master Car Carrier! We are off to try a different body

Silverbowl Speedway!

More practice. Track has become a little slick, but we are making some changes to the car now. Right now lap times are on pace. Time to cut tires!

Rich and jim working hard on engine change. Myself and Scott Barnes on our way to Chipotle to pick up tasty burritos!

Turning 16.0 practice laps, and car feels good. Pulling out practice motor to put in something a little more racy!

The new Empire Racing front belt tensioner! Spiffy!

The Captain is back!

New Empire Racing rear swaybar from the engineering mind of Rick Davis! Cool!

At 10am track will shut down to get sprayed with vht, then the real practice will begin!

First run on the track, and the car stayed off the wall and in one piece! Always a good start to the weekend.

We are here in Vegas baby!! Friday morning and the weather is looking good. Just a little wind, but the forecast is good for the weekend!!

Test

This is a test post.... please check back on Friday 4/30 for my first updates from the Motonica Grand Prix!