Online Coverage Of The JConcepts INS12 – Summer Indoor Nationals [VIDEOS]

The JConcepts INS12 Summer Indoor Nationals was recently held at the HobbyTown USA HobbyPlex in Omaha, NE. This national series is in its 12th year and for this year’s series it consisted of five different race events. The Winter session took place in February at SDRC Raceway in San Diego, CA. The Spring session was held back in April at Adrenaline RC Racing in Winchester, VA. The next round is the Fall Indoor Nationals Series at the Hoosier RC Hobbyplex in New Albany, IN. The fifth and final round will be held at Hobby Action RC Raceway in Chandler, AZ.

For each round drivers competed for awards based on their individual results that weekend. If a driver attends a minimum of three national series then they are in the running for special series awards that are provided by JConcepts.

For the Summer session there were a total of 275 entries with 10 different classes to compete in. On Thursday night practice was held on the new layout. Race director Alex Sturgeon used nearly every inch of the HobbyPlex’s entire dirt surface to create this large off-road layout.

Even with the large layout the Mod 4wd buggy drivers were still putting down fast laps in the 21 second range by the end of the weekend.

The most talked about section of the track layout was a corner right before the front straightaway. The fast line was to clear the pipe by legally cutting the corner as you jumped over the pipe which made a straight line through that section. A lot of drivers would get tangled up here, and turn marshals were definitely getting a workout on this section of the track.

If a driver needed a few last minute items, or broke a part on their vehicle during the event, the HobbyPlex’s store upstairs was well stocked with spare parts.

This hobby shop not only carries racing parts, but also a variety of hobby related items that can be enjoyed by the entire family.

Each paid driver could also pick themselves up a free event t-shirt courtesy of JConcepts while supplies lasted.

Friday practice began at 10am and ran till 6pm that night. Then after a brief driver’s meeting and some track maintenance a round of seeding began. Each driver raced the clock for three minutes as they tried to put down their fastest laps. A driver’s best three consecutive laps were added up to determine their best runtime. Then for qualifying the next day they would be grouped in a heat with drivers already at their same pace based on seeding. The goal was to make qualifying go smoother and also figure out transponder issues ahead of time.

On Saturday the doors opened again at 7am for open practice till around 8:30am. Then the first of three rounds of qualifying began. A driver’s best two qualifying finishes were used to determine their qualifying results in each class. The top eight qualifiers in each class locked themselves into the A Mains. Positions nine and ten would be two bump up drivers from the next lowest main. So if you finished first or second in the B Main you then got a chance to race again in the A Main as a ‘bump up’ driver.

The only exception for this was the 13.5 Expert 4WD, Mod 4WD, Mod 2WD and 17.5 Expert  2WD Buggy classes. In those classes the top 10 were locked into the A Main based on qualifying, and a 11th driver would bump up if they won the B Main.

There was also an exception to this rule in the Mini Mod 2WD Buggy class. This special class was added to the event and drivers could compete in it free of charge. The only cars that were allowed were Losi Mini-Bs with an open motor rule and a 2S LiPo battery limit. This class was limited to 15 entries and they also ran three rounds of qualifying plus a stacked 15 car A Main.

Qualifying was split up into 32 heats per round so Saturday was the longest day as they ran laps till past 11pm that night. The fastest and most competitive classes of the weekend were the Mod 2WD and Mod 4WD Buggy classes.

The driver to beat in the Mod 2WD Buggy class was Team Associated/Pro-Line pro driver Dustin Evans. After finishing 2nd in round 1 of qualifying he put in back to back TQ runs to lock up the TQ position for the weekend.

Fresh off a national title at the 2022 ROAR Electric Off-Road Carpet Nationals, Schumacher/JConcepts pro driver Broc Champlin picked right up from where he left off in the Mod 4WD Buggy class as he TQed all rounds of qualifying in this class.

On Sunday the doors opened again for the final practice sessions at 8am followed by the start of the lower mains at 9am.

This allowed time for drivers to make some last minute adjustments as they got ready for the final day of the event.

Online media coverage was provided by MOD Live Media. Matt Olson and his team streamed the event live over several social media sites and channels, plus added play by play commentary for the mains on Sunday.

This was a great way to share this hobby over multiple platforms, and hopefully someone out there will see this coverage and jump into this hobby we all love so much!

The final race of the weekend ended shortly after 4:30pm that afternoon.

Awards were then handed out and the top 10 in each class received an award, plus the highest B Main finisher who didn’t transfer to the A Main.

That concluded another successful round of the INS12 race series. Class results and videos are listed below and we can’t wait to see how this series grows over the upcoming years!

13.5 Short Course Truck

1. Mack Vanderbeek (TQ)
2. Brett Nelson
3. Brenden Edwards

40+ Mod 2wd Buggy

1. Allen Horne
2. Brian Dunbar (TQ)
3. Richard Lake

13.5 Independent 4WD Buggy

1. Tj Williams (TQ)
2. Conner Herrick
3. Noah Ward

17.5 Independent 2wd Buggy

1. Tj Williams (TQ)
2. Dalton Conradt
3. Andrew Thomas

13.5 Stadium Truck

1. Will Brinton
2. Domnic Paccione (TQ)
3. Kyle Holmberg

17.5 Expert 2wd Buggy

1. Brennan Schimmel (TQ)
2. Kyle Holmberg
3. Tyler Pattenaude

Mod 2WD Buggy

1. Dustin Evans (TQ)
2. Broc Champlin
3. Aydin Horne

13.5 Expert 4wd Buggy

1. Brennan Schimmel (TQ)
2. Sammy Moran
3. Kyle Holmberg

Mod 4WD Buggy

1. Broc Champlin (TQ)
2. Dustin Evans
3. Aydin Horne

Mini Mod 2WD Buggy

1. Alex Sturgeon
2. Emerson Sturgeon (TQ)
3. Conner Herrick

Additional race videos can be viewed with this link: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLhq2k5C5pTbSQKJhxQFM2BnTWQYNrewTZ