October 5th, 2014 - The Monster Trucks of the RCMTC-NY series rolled in to the famed Barnstormers R/C Raceway yet again and were ready to do battle on an all new level this weekend, as they would be battling for the RC Monster Truck Challenge World Finals Racing and Freestyle Championships!!!! The event was presented by Crawford Performance Engineering and CowRC and really turned out to seriously raise the bar from RCMTC World Finals events past. 30 Monsters were on hand and ready to do battle on an awesome challening race course. the trucks would start side by side under brand new RCMTC starting gates and fly over a set of school busses. They would make a sharp turn to the outside lane and would hit what would become the great equalizer of the racing coursee...The MONSTER TRUCK CHALLENGE MOUNTAIN!! a huge roller that would test the drivers skill all day long. Once landed, the trucks would turn in towards each other and run back up the track through the mid section, trying to get some speed down before turning back to the outside for another hit on the mountain. Again fighitng to get the trucks smoothly on the ground, the drivers would hammer it down the straightaway and into the final turn and head for the final jump. The track would test the drivers throughout the day.
The new racing format was the highlight of the first part of the day. With 5 total rounds of racing, the first 4 would be qualifying rounds, where points earned from the first 4 rounds would determine your seed for the final championship bracket that would determine this year's racing champion. 3 trucks would claim the 4 rounds in qualifying with Crusader winning the first and fourth third round, Higher Education winning round number two and Max-D winning the fourth round. Kyle's Lucas Oil Crusader had the most points throughout the first 4 rounds, and won the RCMTC World Finals top qualifier award!!! It would all come down to the championship bracket.
The championship bracket was a single elimnation, winner take all bracket that really saw some exciting racing action. A great elimination race was seen between Abdul Rascoe's Big Red and Jerry Matoon's Safe Auto Minimizer. Dan's Black Smith and Grave Digger trucks were marching up through the field quickly. Kyle's Crusader and Max-D trucks were also looking good, Crusader being able to knock off the defending race champion Higher Education during the eliminations. Derrick Algieri came into the World Finals looking to get back on top, but a hard rollover in the final turn with Backdraft late in the elminiation rond would put a surprising end to his racing day. The Final 4 came down to Dan with Grave Digger and Black Smith and Kyle's Crusader and Max-D, with both of Dan's trucks advancing. The Finals would see Black Smith knocking off Grave Digger and Max-D beating Crusader for third place, making the top 3 podium finishers all CPE Terminator trucks, and crowning Black Smith this year's racing champion!!
Freestyle was completely awesome again this year. In true RCMTC fashion, a slew of insane freestyle runs were consistent throughout the entire field. It all started with young Ethan Saunders driving ZOMBIE, who was making his first start since the Winter Wars event. Ethan's driving has noticiably improved to a competitive level, as Zombie unleashed an awesome freestyle performance that would hold the freestyle lead for several trucks. Derrick Algieri's Excaliber laid down an awesome run to score a 27, and would lead the majority of the competition until the end. Frustrated with two sup bar runs with Black Smith and Higher Education, Dan came out with Grave Digger and thrashed on the black and green wrecking machine to score a 29, but it was the defending freestyle champ that would have the final say. Kyle had already scored a perfect 30 with Crusader, and was able to bring Max-D out and lay down a second perfect 30 score, thus winning the freestyle title with both Crusader AND Max-D!!! It's an impressive 3-peat in freestyle for Kyle where the runs at the finals have been getting better each year. Check out some picture and video coverage from the big event!!
We cannot thank everybody enough that was invovled with this year's event and this year's season. First off, thanks to every single racer who came out this year and every year. You guys make this series as great as it is and we are so greatful to have such an awesome group of guys and girls come out and we can't wait to have more racers come out every year and join us!! Thank you to Chris from R/C Madness for being so good to us every year and giving us an awesome venue to race at, as well as Lou from Barnstormers for being so great to work with and giving us an awesome home for our World Finals event, it means everything. Thank you to our awesome sponsors, Heath at CowRC and Brett at CPE, who time and again have shown us amazing support every year and we can't thank you enough for the coninued support. All the drivers went home with awesome door prizes from both sponsors and loved it all! It's been another fantastic year of RC Monster Truck Challenge racing and we can't wait to come back bigger and better in 2015. THANK YOU!!!!!!!!
