Seeding Bracket Results from 2024 Formula DRIFT PRO Championship Round 5 & PROSPEC Round 3
World Wide Technology Raceway and Formula DRIFT made significant course revisions, which included K-rail additions to Outside Zones 1 and 4 to prevent vehicles from damaging the infield.
The weather for the Link ECU PROSPEC Seeding Bracket was sunny with scattered clouds and a cool breeze. Conditions were cooler for the K&N PRO Seeding Bracket, which occurred at night under floodlights.
Solo qualifying runs have been replaced this year by competitive tandem runs. Only the lower-ranked drivers are required to qualify this way once the previous round has determined the top positions. For PRO, that meant Round 4, while PROSPEC was based on Round 2, both in New Jersey.
In the PRO Championship, New Jersey preset the first 24 positions, while the remaining 12 drivers competed in the Seeding Bracket to claim one of the remaining eight competition places, populating positions 25-32.
The K&N Top 16 Seeding Bracket for the PRO Championship was won by Brutskiy, with Stuke second and Power third.
The full list of PRO drivers who qualified through the Seeding Bracket drivers is listed below, with the top eight finishers advancing to the Top 32 competition heats. The remainder were eliminated.
There was a delay to the start of the PRO Seeding Bracket after discovering that the paint markings in Outer Zone 4 hadn’t fully dried, causing drivers to spin. An appeal was lodged, and the judges decided to re-run the first two battles to ensure fairness.
For the repeated matches, Brutskiy advanced to the Top 8 while Andy Hateley (USA), judged to have won his first heat against Derek Madison (USA), could not start the re-run after his water pump broke. And despite experiencing power steering problems himself, Madison advanced to the Top 8.
After an incredibly frustrating 2024 season, the 2023 PROSPEC Champion Ben Hobson (USA), driving the Pennzoil / BC Racing Mustang RTR Spec 5-FD, finally reached the FD PRO Top 32 competition heats for the first time this season after defeating Alec Robbins (USA) in the Seeding Bracket.
The PRO Championship drivers eliminated from the Seeding Bracket were Rudy Hansen (USA), Alec Robbins (USA), Andy Hateley (USA) and Federico Sceriffo (Italy).
PRO Spec
In PROSPEC, the first 16 positions were preset, with the remaining 30 drivers competing in a seeding bracket to claim one of the remaining 16 places in the Top 32 competition. With so many drivers, the PROSPEC Seeding Bracket is sudden death, with the loser of each tandem run eliminated.
The names of drivers who advanced or were eliminated are listed in the PROSPEC table below. The successful drivers will compete in the competition heats today (Friday), populating positions 17-32.
Two drivers compete in the 2024 Formula DRIFT PRO and PROSPEC Championships: Dmitriy Brutskiy and Rudy Hansen. Brutskiy qualified for both in St Louis, but Hansen narrowly missed out on PRO. Brutskiy has different cars tailored to each Championship, while Hansen has entered the same Team Hansen Supercharged Nissan S13 in both.
