Maxy’s fuel have announced the signing of Paul Lemieux to their team. Regarded as one of the top drivers in the World and a main finalist in many World Championships events to date, the multiple National Champion is aiming for the World title this year when the event takes place in Houston during the summer, having come so close in Portugal in 2008.
Source: Maxy’s Fuel [maxysfuel.com]
RB have announced the signing of 16 year old Portuguese rising star Ricardo Monteiro to their team. Placing 3rd in the junior ranking at last year’s Euros in Austria, he finished 2nd in the Portuguese Cup behind Miguel Matias and 4th in the Portuguese Nationals in 2009. Ricardo, who also just switched to Losi will attend all the important races in Portugal as well as the Euro A and B, the former taking place in his home country this year.
Source: RB [rbproducts.com]
CML have welcomed Phil Sleigh to the Associated team for 2010. The former X-Factory driver brings with him a wealth of experience having been racing at national level for many years. The last couple of years have seen Phil move up a level and take his first national victory. Phil will be driving the Associated B4 & B44 cars with Novak Electronics and had this to say about the deal:
Joining the CML team to run for Team Associated is an awesome opportunity. Both the B4 & B44 are proven race winning chassis’ and I hope to use this to produce consistently high National results in both 2WD & 4WD. The team have already been great with set-up help and I’m sure I’ll be taking advantage of the vast AE experience within the team through-out the year. I’ll be running both the Novak Ballistic motors and the soon to be available new Kinetic speedos and from early running the Novak equipment provides excellent power and smooth delivery. I have also taken the chance to switch to running Savox servos, which have become a very popular, affordable and high performance option used by many top racers.
Phil’s racing plans for 2010 include all off-road Nationals, the Euros in Vienna and competing in the Mid-West Regionals.
Source: CML [cmldistribution.co.uk]
Byron Fuels have announced that Tamiya driver Ryan Lutz has agreed a deal to use Byron Race Gen2 fuel this season. Marc Jensen of Byron Fuels notes, “We are very pleased to have Ryan join the Byron Race Team. He fits our description of a factory representative perfectly. Not only does Ryan bring the highest level of competition to our team, but he is an ideal company spokesperson, willing to help others at the track”. Ryan is extremely excited to be part of the Byron Team and had the following to say:
I know Byron Race Gen2 is going to give me the performance necessary to consistently put me on top of the podium!
Source: Byron Fuels [byronfuels.com]
More Italian driver news as it has been confirmed that on-form Losi team driver Riccardo Rabitti has joined Picco for 2010. Having raced the last few seasons with Sirio power, Riccardo had enjoyed considerable success having taking back to back Italian National titles in 2008 and 2009 and making the European Championship final in 2009 and 2007. Riccardo will be utilizing the company’s latest Evo4 buggy engine in his Losi 8ight as he aims to defend his National title and prepare for the 2010 Worlds in Pattaya.
Source: Picco [teampicco.com]
Top Italian buggy racer Fabrizio Teghesi has confirmed his switch to O.S. Speed for 2010. The Kyosho driver will run the current World Champion engines, having already run with the Japanese motor for 3 years from 2005 to 2008, taking the National runner up spot in 2007. Following 2 successful years with Novarossi, Fabrizio wanted to thank them for their support.
Source: Fabrizio Teghesi [fabrizioteghesi.com]
RB have confirmed that front running French driver Julien Lattanzio has signed a two year deal to run their engines. The former Kyosho/Novarossi driver needed only one test session to convince him of his choice power plant for 2010. This decision was also helped by the brand’s 2009 results which made Julien very confident in the performance and reliability of the French tuned engines.
Source: RB [rbproducts.com]
From this February Twister Tires USA is no more. Having spent the last 2.5 years working with supplier ATS in building a loyal following, the company name will change to ATS America, with the company carrying the full line of ATS products into the US. In an equally big announcement, ATS have announced that with the help of DJ Apolaro they were able to sign Multiple Worlds Finalists and USA National Champion Paul Lemieux. “Paul is a perfect fit for us, as he is a well respected racer both on and off the track and we want to maintain that close ‘family type’ relationship we have with the racers. We are working on entering the electric market aggressively in the coming seasons and who better to test and help create the best products for the customers than Paul Lemieux”. Paul had the following to say about the deal:
With my new sponsorship package for 2010, I was faced with the ever so important decision of what tires to race this season and beyond. After weighing my options I decided to team up with friend and fellow top racer DJ Apolaro at Team Twister/ATS tires. With the amount of racing and development that ATS has done, I know that this will be a great decision for me and hopefully ATS in return.
This is a year of change for the Xray team driver having recently switched from long time sponsor Trinity/Team Epic to Thunder Power RC and now from Jaco to ATS.
Source: ATS America
