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| 02 March 2008: "Leapalooza" |
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| Movement Not sure if it had to do with there being an extra day this week but it certainly allowed the top players to squeeze in as many WR's as possible this month. Still working on the better SG strat, the top players made it an early priority to get some good times here and taking his spot back on the charts, #2 Giulio Centrone improved his 3lap to 1'08"518 by hopping the cloud sc 3/3 no shroom and took the flap with 21"382. #1 Thomas Bolton could not help but show some interest and try this out for himself and came up with an impressive time of 21"259 to take the record there. Thomas also managed to take back the TTC WR's with 1'32"110 and 30"223. Again, Thomas has proven BLS to be more useful on some places by taking the BC2 3lap record back with 1'32"107 and improved his WS sc flap to 36"607. Thomas keeps a more than comfortable lead in AF over Giulio in nonprb and #3 Fabien Da Silva who is #2 in prb. Switzerland was in full swing because Fabien also came out of a slumber and took 5 WR's in all spanning SG where his flap went sub 20, reclaimed the KB2 records, and SR flap from #4 Ben Stoneman. It was a good week for Ben as well because he improved his WP times yet again! He brought it down a tiny bit more with 1'59"342 and 39"247 now. The surge in top activity continues with #7 Nick Welch who has pretty much closed the gap with #6 Cole Gilbert with less than an AF point to go before passing him. Although Nick lost his KB2 flap again, he gained a new nonprb record by driving a DH 3lap 1'11"303 to beat #33 Kevin Barbieux's time from almost a year ago! Nick has some new times in queue so he'll probably realize the #6 spot next week. It's been a couple months since he sent in some new times but #15 Simon Birker came up with a 1'55"069 on BC 3lap and 43"145 BP 5lap as he tries to keep his top 15 spot. Right below and not an immediate threat, #17 Matthew Ord sent in new times again but has failed to move up in AF or ARR this week. He still has over an AF point to go before catching the idolo #16 Fabio Sacco. France seemed to wake up out of the blue with on again off again #18 Louis Vivares who sent in some new times giving him a 3 point AF cut and promotion to Myth E overall. This was especially important for him because Louis is now the French Champion! Right below, #19 Paul Gourdon made a stir this week by revealing his new times on MMF which ended the reign of Thomas' oldest 3lap time with an almost if not barely better record of 1'03"305 and Giulio's flap with just a 4 thousandths of a second improvement with 20"584. Can we expect Paul to retake his long held #1 France title? Things don't get interesting again until #28 Marshall LeVett whose 1 point AF cut moved him up a spot and reached Titan B overall. His much improved times on SG and WP got him the cuts he needed and is now #7 USA and just 1 AF point away from that top 20 spot on the prb charts. #30 Mark Engelsman sent in some new times to once again bring the Netherlands back to the top 30 as he makes his way up to Titan B overall. #35 Christian Martin Lapeira also got some new times but it was not enough to move him up in AF or ARR. Closing up the top 40 is now #39 Zach Sterling who recently reached Titan overall passed a few people with his 1.5 AF cut this week. He is very close to securing a top ten USA spot unless #37 Jeffrey Gutierrez feels the urge to play which is completely masked by his slightly more constructive activities. What is this, only two more active folks in the top 100 with an AF cut? Men at work, the apprentice to the power from the land down under, #63 Lenny Andreev who once again put up a solid week of smashing times to reach Hero B overall with that near 5 point AF cut. Starting out at #96 and just Hero D at the start of February, Lenny has definitely shown his potential for climbing the ranks and making it much much farther. Lastly, #94 Joe Sebeny moved up a couple spots with his 0.5 AF cut. Movement outside the top 100 included #116 Joep van Gelder -49.1260 (Expert D to Expert A), #183 Daniel Boettcher -74.3910, #190 Alencar Faria -0.7350, #202 Marcus Whitley -9.6880 (Advanced B to Advanced A), #218 Jacob Goldfinger -6.1410, #224 Kevin Liang -3.5940, #277 Andrew Buchan -1.1250, #301 Ellery Smith -15.1250 (Intermediate A to Advanced E), #379 Luke Cooper -27.2350 (Intermediate D to Intermediate C) and #481 Jesus Clemente -29.0150 (Beginner C to Beginner B). New Records There were 14 WR's improved (blue) and twelve non-prb times (pink). It seems like leap day really paid off this year because there was an explosion in WR activity near the end of the month. Things got started with Thomas Bolton beating BDash back on TTC with small improvements of 1'32"110 and 30"223. Fabien Da Silva was next and really surprised us on SG by not only Mercury's 3lap there with 1'01"233 but by going sub 20 on the flap with 19"954 putting that better shroom strat to work! Fabien also reclaimed the KB2 records from Mercury on the 3lap with 40"573 and Nick Welch on the flap with 12"841. Ben Stoneman now holds 1'59"342 and 39"274. The first leap day WR went to Giulio Centrone who took his RR non-sc flap back from センジュ with 38"582. Thomas was next getting BC2 3lap 1'32"107 and WS sc flap 36"607. Paul Gourdon got back in the WR groove with his MMF times of 1'03"305 and 20"584. Lastly, Fabien opened up March madness with his SR flap of 32"458. For nonprb, Thomas got TTC 1'32"110 and 30"223, BC2 3lap 1'32"107, and SG flap 21"259, Giulio got SG 3lap 1'08"518, and RR flap 38"582, Paul got MMF 1'03"305 and 20"584, Ben got WP 1'59"342 and 39"274, Fabien got SR flap 32"458, and Nick Welch got DH 3lap 1'11"303. Awards One of the next best improved players this month was active every week making huge cuts as he sliced his way through the Hero ranks. For his big AF and ARR % drops this week, Lenny Andreev wins the POW for the fourth week of February, can't you hear the thunder? It seems like he finally found his groove again and even managed to make a new WR after a long period of inactivity. His month long surge of new pr's moved him from Myth D to Myth B overall and well back inside the top ten as he approaches the #5 spot again. For drastic % cuts in AF and ARR and almost nonstop pr pace, Nick Welch wins the POM for the month of February, crazy boi! Coming soon, Kmacc curb stomp sdj!!!  ~ ETCH |
