Red RC » Mugen

May 3, 2025

Kilic takes final qualifier at Philippine Masters

Burak Kilic has taken the fourth & final round of qualifying at the Philippines Masters, the Mugen Seiki/Nova Engines driver finally ending Davide Ongaro’s reign at Asia’s biggest annual 1:8 Offroad race. While yesterday threatened the possibility of rain, the record entry of drivers from 21 countries arrived Saturday morning to a dry & very hot track for one last qualifying effort and it would prove to be the fastest and most exciting of the four. With Ongaro having already secured the overall TQ in the penultimate round yesterday, an early mistake from the World Champion gave his rivals the chance to go the top with Infinity’s Kouki Kato topping the timing screens and looking like he might finally deliver on the outright speed he has shown over the last two days. It wasn’t to be however as he had a bobble on his sixth lap of 9. This promoted Mayako’s Pekko Iivonan to the top of the timing screens but a bad lap dropped him off the top spot before a bobble on the last lap ended the prospect of a TQ run. Having lost over two & a half seconds in the first half of the heat with a bobble, bobble the word of Q4, a recovering Kilic took over from Iivonan and laying down the fastest lap managed to get the TQ by half a second over Ongaro with Ryan Lutz only a further 4/10ths back after putting in his best run of the 4. With Ongaro and Kilic the only two drivers to make 9-laps yesterday, today the Top 6 all broke that barrier. Overall the result means Kilic starts directly behind Ongaro for tomorrow’s 1-hour Main with Kato lining up P3 ahead of his Infinity team-mate Naoto Matsukura, Lutz and the Sworkz of Mattio Polito.

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May 1, 2025

Kilic fastest in SP2, Kato maintains top seed status

He said after SP1 he felt his car would be faster for the second seeding round at the Philippine Masters and that turned out to be the case as Burak Kilic took his Nova Engines powered Mugen Seiki to the fastest 2-consecutive laps. Going one better than he did in the morning’s opening round, Kilic’s time however would not better than that set by Kouki Kato, that time still more than 2/10ths of a second faster around the technical track where currently 36.8-seconds are the benchmark lap times. Behind Kilic, Team Associated’s Alex Bernadzik set the second fastest time with an improvement of 5/10ths on his SP1 effort. Almost half a second off his morning time, something he put down down his tyre prep, Kato would complete the Top 3 ahead of his Infinity team-mate Naoto Matsukura who was much happier with his latest effort. Fifth fastest in SP1, Sworkz’ Mattia Polito again rounded out the Top 5 of the high qualify field ahead of the race’s defending champion Davide Ongaro.

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April 28, 2025

First win for Todd at Spanish Championship opener

Mugen Seiki’s David Todd took his first National race victory as the Spanish 1:8 Nitro Buggy Championship kicked off in Albacete over the weekend. With defending Champion Juan Carlos Canas racing in Las Vegas, the current European Champion finishing on the podium at the Silverstate, reigning European B Champion Todd made the most of the opportunity to claim his first win of the highly competitive National Championship. Another driver to come through the ranks with the support of Modelix, Todd qualified P3 but winning his Semi final secured pole for the final. From the front, he pulled clear to take the win ahead of the Xray of Bryan Baldo. Todd’s team-mate Josemi Sánchez, who started P2 completed the podium ahead of Oscar Baldo’s Xray.

Image: David Todd [Facebook]

February 23, 2025

Sparbier gives new Mugen TITC Open Brushless title

Mugen Seiki can ship its upcoming new MTC-3 electric touring car as a Championship winning car after Soren Sparbier claimed the win of the Open Brushless class at the famed TITC. Experiencing his first ever time on a plane in order to make the journey to Bangkok, the German returns home with extra luggage in the form of his winning & TQ trophies having wrapped up the title in A2, a race that would prove somewhat controversial. Having secured pole position by topping two of the four qualifier at the challenging Infinity RC Addict Circuit, the 18-year-old took a very straight forward A1 win on Saturday evening. In Sunday morning’s A2 however, what was shaping up to be a great battle ended with a body tuck, yet again a great race destroyed by the modern day flimsy lightweight body shells. After leading away, setting the fastest lap in the process, Sparbier was soon under pressure from Lukas Ellerbrock, the German carrying Awesomatix’s hopes of a fifth consecutive TITC win. Ellerbrock would find a way passed to take up the lead but Sparbier wasn’t quite done and made a re-pass but contact resulted in Ellerbrock suffering a body tuck. While Sparbier initially waited, as Ellerbrock pulled off to a marshal for attention, he then resumed the lead. Taking the A2 win ahead of Fong King he would claim the victory. In A3, the lively crowd having lot of reasons to ooh & aah, the race eventually going to last year’s Open Brushless podium finisher Adam Izsay ahead of Ellerbrock, the later getting the overall runner-up spot with Izsay’s Xray completing the podium.

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February 22, 2025

Sparbier takes Open Brushless TQ at TITC

Mugen Seiki’s Soren Sparbier is the Top Qualifier in the Open Brushless class at the TITC, the German taking the fourth & final qualifier of the Bangkok race’s largest class. With the opening three rounds of qualifying producing three different winners, it was all to play for in Q4 with Sparbier, who was fastest in yesterday’s third round, leading them away in the decider. From the front, the 18-year-old would edge out a 1.4-second advantage to top the round from Q1 winner Lukas Ellerbrock and Q2 winner Olivier Bultynck P3, this the order they will line up for the finals. Runner-up last year, Xray’s Adam Iszay starts P4 the first of the A-Main being run this evening at the Infinity RC Addict track.

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February 9, 2025

Volker dominates in Czech to retake MIBO title

Ronald Volker has dominated the third edition of MIBO International, the Mugen Seiki driver sending his rivals a clear signal that the former World Champion and his new MTC3 are going to be a serious force to be reckoned with in 2025. With Schumacher’s Michal Orlowski calling the German’s performance in Czech ‘a wake up for us’, after topping all five rounds of qualifying it looked like the finals were just going to be a Sunday formality to Volker picking up his second MIBO International winners trophy. Even contact with a lapped car couldn’t help his rivals get anywhere near challenging him for the lead let alone the win. A2 however would be the first time we wouldn’t see the MTC3 top the result sheets, a pile up on another section of the track sending Adam Iszay’s Xray into Volker’s path and with a body tuck he feel down the order before pulling off. Orlowski took the leg win as a result of the chaos ahead of Patrick Gollner, the new Mugen signing further highlighting the potential of the Robert Pietsch designed car. With outside trouble managing to avoid him in A3, Volker sealed the deal with half a lap advantage over Orlowski – widely recognised as the current benchmark in touring car especially on carpet. Giving Mugen double reason to celebrate, Gollner secured the final step on the podium ahead of Yokomo’s Christopher Krapp and Xray’s Adam Iszay, the latter, like Volker, retaking the Pro Stock title he won at the inaugural MIBO International in 2023.

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February 8, 2025

Volker Top Qualifier at MIBO International

After a perfect day of driving in the Czech Republic, Mugen Seiki’s Ronald Volker is the Top Qualifier at MIBO International with one round still to go tomorrow morning. The unique event’s inaugural Champion in 2023, the German and his new MTC3 have been the class of the field with defending champion Michal Orlowski having to throw everything and sometimes more at it to try and get ahead of his rival. Having topped the seeding this morning, Volker secured the overall TQ in Q3 before going on to make it four from four in the final run of the second day’s action. With Volker leading home the Schumacher in 3 of the 4 rounds, Orlowski himself admitting after Q2 that he crashed because he was having to push so hard to try and keep up with the on form Volker. While the race for the title at the third edition of the event put on by Volker’s former Yokomo team-mate Michal Bok is very much a two horse race, this year’s event is proving a happy hunting ground for Mugen’s upcoming touring car release with Volker’s new for 2025 team-mate Patrick Gollner third in the overnight standings. Behind him the Yokomo of Christopher Krapp is holding P4 while the leading Xray challenge comes from Adam Izsay, who after being best of the rest in the morning dropped to fifth in the second half of the day.

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February 8, 2025

Volker takes charge in early MIBO qualifying

Having topped seeding at the third edition of MIBO International, Ronald Volker’s Mugen Seiki MTC3 continues to be the benchmark in the Czech Republic with the German taking the opening two rounds of qualifying. In the first of the 5 scheduled qualifiers, Volker was fastest from the Schumacher of defending champion Michal Orlowski by 8/10ths of a second with Xray’s Adam Iszay maintaining status as the third fastest driver. In a slower Q2, a mistake from Orlowski would give Volker an easier repeat TQ run, Yokomo’s Christopher Krapp his closest challenger over 3-seconds down on the 2016 World Champion. Again Iszay completed the Top 3 ahead Patrick Gollner and the recovering Orlowski.

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