Another weekend of beautiful weather for buggy! We had two smooth days of rolls with only a few incidents, and all were just the type of actions you would expect to see as new drivers start gaining speed. We saw the same 6 orgs out again this weekend, we hope to see a few more returning teams back soon, read on for more details!

Roadrunner rolling out, one of 5 CIA buggies from this weekend

• Some speed was gained this week and coupled with newer drivers and some possible line experimentation, this led to more incidents than last week. We saw the most incidents from Spirit as each of their buggies out had a close call or an actual spin. But most other orgs had one problem or another, CIA had a bale clip and SDC and Fringe had some concerning turns. Some more details in the writeups below!
  

Zuke drifting, it was a tail-to-bales connection after this

• All teams were doing full Hill 2s for at least some of their pushes and Apex and Spirit also did some full Hill 1s. And, all 5 non-robotic teams that have rolled so far now have at least one “new-to-buggy” driver with a credited roll, which is great to see!

There’s Blind Faith again

• All of Pittsburgh was celebrating the end of summer! Schenley park was host to a food festival on Saturday, and a big Pitt social hour on Sunday, meaning we had more people watching than usual, as well as many more walkers to direct. Thankfully they were cooperative. (Hopefully unrelated to the food festival: carrion had to be cleared from the road during sweeping again on Saturday morning.)

Cooking up something good on Flagstaff

• Apex. Apex was well-represented again both days. One roll Saturday the rear hatch of Helios was not secure and flew open by the chute, you can see images in our gallery if you look closely! Otherwise their driving was quite solid. Their pushers were still getting used to non-bagged rolls and I saw at least 1 pusher get completely burned by Scorch at the bottom of Hill 3. But by the end of the day Sunday, they had Helios doing full Hill 1s.

Scorch through the turn

• CIA. 4 buggies were rolling Saturday for CIA with the typical large group of pushers and mechanics all over the course. 3 were still out Sunday, making 5 different active buggies for the weekend. A drone was spotted above the course getting data for them at one point. They had a stop after Kingfisher grazed the bales. This was the first buggy in the order, so stop flag was thrown, all buggies stopped, and were cleared to leg it back up through the backhills.

Kingfisher sprint finish (later)

• Fringe. Bermuda, Fringe’s build from last year, returned to the course this weekend. It’s first chute turn on Sunday we saw a dramatic over-turn and for about 2 seconds she was heading straight for the inside bales, before correcting. Blind Faith was out again, one roll it was making some very-non-Fringey noises, which we assume were brakes rubbing, corrected on the next roll.

Bermuda, Bahama…

• Robobuggy. Robobuggy was only rolling Saturday, which meant a break in the rolls order on Sunday. Some type of VR setup was being employed with Short Circuit. I don’t have more information on what that actually means, but the BAA is always interested to hear about what y’all are cooking up!

Short Circuit coming up near Hill 3

• SDC. Paranoia is racking up the rolls this year already, and SDC was even keeping the buggy elevated until right before starting rolling, usually a sign of wheel heating. Our roving timing correspondent reported Paranoia also had the fastest top speed so far this year on Sunday. Avarice also returned to the course this weekend with a new driver, and Lust was turning late (IMO) and making me a little nervous watching. SDC also had a drone out gathering data. Last year they partnered with the BAA to show some lines from rolls and Raceday in our galleries. We’d love to see this again!

Avarice Returns

• Spirit. Spirit has been very consistently building speed including with new drivers. This weekend this did lead to some chute action, as on Saturday we saw Kingpin spin and the nose contact the inner bales. Driver was cleared quickly. Sunday, Zuke spun in a similar way but slid backwards with the tail hitting the outer bales. Inviscid almost spun on another roll but recovered after kicking up some leaves very close to the bales, your experienced driver showing how it’s done.

Inviscid moved well after early shakiness