The warm-up race for this weekend’s Short Course National Championship was held July 22^nd at R/C Madness in Connecticut. X Factory drivers Mike “Lights Out” Aliberti and Chris Cristo qualified first and second, with privateer John Cravotta third, all driving the new SCX – 60CF, an all carbon fiber slim-design mid-motor conversion for the SC10.

It was a very large and busy lay-out with triples, doubles, a table-top and a monster berm, and as is often the case with short course outdoors, the wind make the many jumps interesting. Aliberti took the first round of qualifying by 10sec over second and that time stood up for the pole position in the main.  In the second qualifier Mike was set to improve on that time with an 8-lap run when he did a big wheelie on the straight and the truck flipped over backward! Cristo’s time in Q2, four seconds behind Aliberti’s Q1 time was good for second on the grid. John Cravotta took Q3 five seconds off Aliberti’s time.

It was all “Lights Out” in the main, as Mike Aliberti checked out for the win. Cristo was involved in some first-lap “short course racing,” and came out of it 9^th. He put he head down and worked his way through the pack to finish third.

After the race, Chris Cristo commented: “Our trucks just out-handled everything on the track.  It made my drive back through them into simple work. I love this truck!”