Following the successful running of a two race Pilot Series this year, the organisers of the Euro Nitro Series are delighted to release the calendar for a full 2014 championship. The new four round championship for 1:10 & 1:8 Onroad Nitro will begin and finish in Italy, the traditional home of nitro racing, while also taking racers to rounds in Austria and Germany.
Continue reading the announcement here
Oli Meggitt and his Essex Winter Series team announce a brand new event for 2014. The inaugural International Carpet Challenge will be held over the weekend of 22nd-23rd February 2014 at the popular EWS venue in the South-East of the UK. After a record-breaking sell out year for the EWS Championship, the team have put together a special multi-day meeting to showcase the best in indoor Touring Car racing. Drawing on their experiences of organising the largest Touring Car championship in the UK, the organising team intend to bring elements of the big European races to the UK as well. The event, that has already attracted confirmed entries from European Podium finisher Elliott Harper, UK National Champion Chris Grainger, and four-time World Champion David Spashett, will run to a typical ‘big race’ format, and additionally feature a Dash For Cash event on the Saturday night. Classes will be available for 17.5 ‘Blinky’/Zero Timing, 13.5 ‘Open’ and Modified Touring Cars, as well as a special HPI Vintage Challenge class. Full details of the event, including location, hotels, rules and booking in are available here.
The third round of the Essex Winter Series took place the weekend before Christmas. Another capacity entry saw everyone wanting to take home the last win of 2013 and, hopefully, carry that momentum through into the new year. In the Muchmore Modified class, Schumacher’s Matt White drew first blood as he topped round one of qualifying from James Hart and multi-time World Champion, David Spashett, who was making his debut at the UK’s most popular indoor winter series. James fought back to take his Xray to the fastest time in round two, ahead of Kyle Branson and Matt. Kyle again demonstrated his pace with both electric as well as nitro racing, as he set the fastest time in the third qualifier, ahead of the defending EWS Pro Stock Champion Paul Pinkney. James Hart then took the decisive fourth round, to secure pole position from Kyle, Matt and Paul.
Click here to continue reading the report
While Thailand and Bangkok downtown citizens were the middle of the large protests for democracy, in its suburbs there was still RC racing going on. The Huge RC track and its manager Surikarn kept its door open to host the Ride Cup which was organised by Ride founder and proprietor Ohe-san and his staff. It was surely a good test opportunity for the upcoming TITC, and already some of the best racers like Adachi, Groskamp, Hara, Meen, Moore and Surikarn took the chance to sniff the track challenges, with around 100 drivers in various classes enjoying the cool 25°C Winter in Thailand. The track proved have very good traction, and although slightly bumpy at some areas, it was no problem to put the horsepower down to show some impressive top and cornering speeds. Though it was not such surprise to see the 3 Touring Car World Champions taking the top 3 spots, followed by the local hero and TC GP World champ Meen, the current Touring Car World Champ Jilles Groskamp presented himself with a dominant victory for Tamiya. Driving the new updated Tamiya the Team Orion factory team member left Atsushi Hara and Andy Moore behind. Meen V. came in 4th while Shinosuke Adachi completed the top 5 result.
Source: Team Orion [teamorion.com]
The 17th running of the annual LRP Touring Car Masters will take place in Rüsselsheim, Germany on the weekend of the 16th of March. The TCM is regarded as one of the most competitive touring car races worldwide and, like every year, will see the attendance of international stars from Europe, the USA and Japan. A total of 5 classes will be run including a Masters and EFRA Stock class along the national LRP-HPI-Challenge. The registration for the 2014 event starts on January 1st and more information can be found here.
The first ever TopRC Winter Electro Challenge took place with 39 competitors in attendance at the indoor race track in Trieste. Saturday started with free practise followed by a “Cash for dash” race which was won by Jan Popič (Xray) in 1/10 Stock 13.5T, Alojzij Osvald (Serpent) in 1/10 Open and Luka Školaris (Serpent) in 1/12 Open. On Sunday a 1 hour free practice was run followed by 3 rounds of qualifying that had Jan Popič taking TQ in 13.5T, Alojzij Osvald in 1/10 Open and Lovro Šušteršič (Xray) in 1/12 Open.
Click here to continue reading
The annual Fall Brawl was held at the Badlands R/C facility in Myrtle Beach, S.C. The event had nearly 300 entries, but mother nature wasn’t too friendly. The weather for practice on Friday was beautiful but Saturday and Sunday was a different story with rain off and on and much cooler temperatures. The Badlands crew worked on the track between the rain storms and got all the racing in, but had to shorten qualifying and main events. In the 1/8th Nitro Truck class TLR’s Adam Drake TQ’ed and won while he finished second in 1/8th Nitro Buggy behind Team Durango’s Ryan Lutz.
Click here to view the Buggy podium
The recent TamTam Grand Prix took place at the TamTam Gifu Branch race track in Japan. In the 20 minute final KM team drivers Fukuda and Shimazaki battled each other after the latter had to go all the way from the D-main into the A after a troubled qualification. In the end Shimazaki was able to build a comfortable lead and take the win in his last race of the year.
Source: KM [km-rc.com]
