Man, so much of this going on, arguing over braces, pins, center chassis, etc. I'm going to say this once. Read carefully, it may be the most important piece of setup advice you ever get. Ready? CAR SETUP IS NOT STATIC, IT'S DYNAMIC, IT'S FLUID! It changes, track to track, driver to driver. There is no magic bullet, one size fits all setup, for any vehicle ever made! Nobody can give you the setup that's going to work for you. Otherwise, there would be precisely ONE Team setup on the AE site. That said, setup depends most one 2 things IMO:

1) Track conditions- What's your track like? Small, tight technical, big, flowing? Low bite, dusty, high bite blue groove? Smooth, blown? Lot of braking required, or do you need a lot of turn in, or mid to exit-steering? You have to figure out what it is you need your truck to do for the track you're on, then make changes to get it where you want it. Even that's not static, because tracks can change during the day. Pay attention, adjust accordingly. There are times where I leave my car alone even if I'm not happy with it early, because I know the track will come to me. Which brings up Item No. 2.

2) Know your limitations and setup accordingly- IMO, this is the thing that matters most. I'm just going to use me and Mantis as an example. We drive differently. He is much more aggressive than I am. Part of that is track time, he's put in more time this month than I have all year LOL. I had a hard time with Sym's car (Mantis setup) last time I drove it, I can't handle an edgy car the way I used to. But, it obviously works for them, because they are turning some ballistic laps, and starting to string them together too. Since I know where my skillz are right now I set up accordingly. I need a truck that's smooth and easy to drive. I am intentionally giving up 0.5 to 0.75 seconds a lap for the ability to run 10 or more laps consistently. I raced mine first time 2 weeks ago. Unpinned, stock chassis config, stock slipper. TQ and win, lapped everyone but 2nd place Losi with it, and he's lucky the horn sounded. I wasn't turning the fastest lap times, but we were 8 minutes into a 10 minute race before a marshal ever had to touch my truck, and that was the only time the whole race. For me, a truck that I can do that with gives me the best chance to win. For Mantis, he can drive a more aggressive setup, because if he makes a couple mistakes he can come back from it. Three or more and I have him though ha ha ha.

Pinned, unpinned, stock slipper, basket, brace, no brace, saddles or not, Garodiscs, Exotek, whatever. There are a million tuning options on this truck, and no use arguing about what's "better". Try it, see if you like it. There are several options I haven't tried yet, but I plan to. If you hate it, put it back the way it was before. Pay attention to your track, what your truck is doing on the track, and what you want it to do, and you'll be a lot better off. As an FYI, with a new car, I usually look for a setup on the AE site that has track conditions similar to what I'll be running. I usually pull several others (usually a high bite and a low bite, then a smooth and a bumpy if available) to see what the Team drivers are changing for different type tracks.