Red RC » Electric

February 19, 2017

Easy A1 win for Coelho with frantic finish for 2nd

Bruno Coelho took an easy win in the opening A-Main of the TITC, the Top Qualifier able to fend off an early challenge from Jilles Groskamp to cruise home to a winning margin of over 6-seconds from Nicholas Lee. While the leader had a straight forward race the battle for second would end more spectacular fashion as Yokomo team-mates Nicolas Lee and Ronald Volker reeled in a slowing Groskamp. With a lack of race announcements creating confusion as what stage the race was at, Lee, thinking it was the last lap, would attempt a pass on Groskamp into the final corner. Hitting the Infinity driver, causing the Dutchman a body tuck, then Volker, trying to capitalise on the incident, would hit his team-mate but the impact stripped his spur gear. Unfortunately for Volker, the race still had another lap to go. With Lee thinking that the race was finished he initially stopped after his contact with Groskamp who continued but on hearing the crowd reaction continued on the lap but Groskamp would spin out allowing him to go by for second. With the incident causing Groskamp’s last lap not to count the result would initially show Volker, with a 4:59.563, third but bringing the error to the attention of race control he was given back the lap demoting Volker a lap down to fourth.

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February 19, 2017

Coelho Top Qualifier at TITC

Bruno Coelho is the Top Qualifier at the TITC after an exciting final qualifier at Infinity Addict Circuit. After taking both of yesterday’s qualifiers, Coelho was the only driver who could deny Jilles Groskamp his first overall TQ at the famous Asia race and initially it looked like the Infinity driver was about fill that void. With Coelho’s Xray coming good from the mid race, the Portuguese driver would start to close the gap and as the heat entered the final minute it was apparent Groskamp was starting to struggle. With Coelho already ahead on the timing screens, Groskamp’s would attempt to keep his dream alive running a tight line off the straight but clipping the curb flipped off the track. While all the attention was on Groskamp and Coelho, Alexander Hagberg was all the time closing on his team-mate but in the end came up 3/10ths short. With Coelho and Groskamp sharing TQ runs each it was Coelho’s time from last night’s Q5 rocket round which would secure the defending champion his second consecutive TITC TQ. With Groskamp second and Hagberg third, Nicolas Lee starts fourth as the best Yokomo ahead of Akio Sobue, whose attempt to try to take third on the grid from Hagberg didn’t materialise. World Champion Ronald Volker would complete the Top 6 on the grid, the 2014 TITC winner very critical of the track conditions drivers faced in the final qualifier.

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February 18, 2017

TITC TQ to be decided in final qualifier

Day 2 of qualifying at the TITC in Bangkok would turn out to be Bruno Coelho’s day with the Xray driver backing up his TQ run in Q4 to take the penultimate round of qualifying over team-mate Alexander Hagberg. A day that consisted of just two qualifiers, the result means it will be the morning before the Top Qualifier of the 15th running of Asia’s biggest race is decided in the sixth and final round, that set to be a shootout behind the defending champion and Day 1 dominator Jilles Groskamp. While Groskamp has three TQ runs compared to Coelho’s two, the Portuguese driver goes into the final round knowing he has the upper hand should it go to a tie break having just posted the fastest qualifying time so far. With Modified first on track in the morning for Q6, the Infinity Addict Circuit is expected to be much slower. After his bearing failure off the start of Q4, Groskamp’s day didn’t get much better with him struggling with a big drop off in pace, the Dutchman deciding not to complete the full 5-minutes. It would be Akio Sobue who would set the early TQ pace but the Infinity driver would also suffer a drop off, falling back behind the two Xrays but holding onto P3 just ahead of Ronald Volker.

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February 18, 2017

Coelho takes Q4 as Groskamp has DNF

Bruno Coelho has TQ’d the fourth round of qualifying at the TITC in Thailand however the Xray driver said it was only possible due to the fact Jilles Groskamp broke off the start line. Having dominated yesterday’s opening day of qualifying, topping all three rounds with ease, the Infinity driver would suffer a layshaft bearing failure as he left the line, his car gliding to a halt before the first corner with Groskamp saying afterwards, ‘it’s better it happen today then tomorrow’. With Groskamp out of the equation, it looked like Naoki Akiyama was on target for the TQ but with a minute to go his Yokomo would pop a front drive shaft sending the 18-year-old spinning off into retirement. This left Coelho to pick up the pieces, last year’s Top Qualifier & Champion posting his first TQ run ahead of Infinity’s Akio Sobue and a much improved Ronald Volker.

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February 17, 2017

‘A perfect day’ for Groskamp at TITC

Jilles Groskamp pulled off ‘a perfect day’ on the opening day of qualifying at the TITC in Bangkok, the Infinity driver TQ’ing all three rounds at the Infinity Addict Circuit. A race title that eludes the former World Champion, who has been runner-up on three occasions at the famous Asia event, Groskamp would end the day as he started, again being the only driver to post a 20-lap run. Improving position every run, the closest challenger in the third round would be Nicolas Lee, the Yokomo driver missing out on a 20-lap pace by just over 6/10ths of a second. One of Infinity’s latest signing to their new EP team, former TRF driver Akio Sobue would complete the Top 3, a safe run paying dividends. Unfortunately the tyre struggles that some drivers have been faced with showed no signs of abating with Bruno Coelho, Ronald Volker and Marc Rheinard all clearly struggling on the track with a lack of traction. Summing up the struggles while talking to Coelho, Volker said you know something is very wrong when you look and see ‘Marc (Rheinard), (Yukijiro) Umino and Francesco (Martini) talking together’. For Volker and Rheinard, their tyre issues will mean they drop out of the top heat for the remaining three qualifiers as reseeding is done based on the best two of today’s three rounds. While Coelho remains in the top 3, sitting 3rd overall, the defending champion is not happy with the tyre situation going as far as changing from an aluminium chassis car to a carbon chassis with ARS as he ‘needed prove to himself it was not the car’. He said the carbon car ‘was even worse’.

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February 17, 2017

Xray sign Nico Catelani

Xray have announced the signing of Italian National Stock Champion, Nico Catelani to their factory team. AMSCI and UISP champ as well as multiple ETS finalist, Nico will be attending at the Italian Nationals, the EFRA European Championships and the ETS and he had the following to say:

I am very happy and honored to be a part of the factory Xray team for the next season. The Xray development, quality and performance of their cars as well the best team support is what I have admired and now I am happy to enjoy. I will do my best to continue to improve my racing skills and results and I am more than proud for this for this opportunity. I’m looking forward to the next season with my new team!

Source: Xray [teamxray.com]

February 17, 2017

LRP welcome Alexandre Duchet

LRP have announced the signing of Alexandre Duchet to their factory team trough to 2019. The 2016 EFRA Touring Stock vice European Champion and 2016 French 1/8th E-Buggy National Champion will run the full line of LRP products in his 1/10th scale campaign that will see appearances at national and international touring car and off-road races. The former ETS Stock class A-main winner had the following to say:

I am very happy about the collaboration with LRP. It is a great chance for me and I have chosen LRP products because of their high quality and they give me a very good feeling. I am sure I can improve my racing and results even more and I thank the whole LRP team for their support and the trust in me.

Source: LRP [lrp.cc]

February 17, 2017

Groskamp again in Q2

Jilles Groskamp has backed up what he himself described as a ‘surprising’ TQ in the opening qualifier with another in the hot midday conditions at Infinity Addict Circuit. While a slower run, the Infinity driver would top the times by an even larger margin despite running his Q1 tyres for a second time while his closest rival Bruno Coelho was on a new set of tyres. Also on new tyres Nicholas Lee would complete the Top 3 despite suffering a body tuck on his opening lap but again it was a troubled round for his Yokomo team-mate Ronald Volker who ended up 19th. Suffering a glitch at the end of the 5-minutes, the World Champion said even before that he wasn’t even able to run a Top 10 pace, his second set of tyres not proving any better than his Q1 set.

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