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October 21, 2024

Ongaro retains Italian title with perfect campaign

Continuing his winning form, Davide Ongaro has retained his AMSCI Italian 1:8 Nitro Buggy National Champion title with victory at the third & final round of the championship at the Buggylandia track. On a winning run having won the annual Reds GP the weekend before and Spain’s premiere offroad event Buggyland the weekend before that, the 3-time World Champion would kick off the rain effected season finale by taking his Team Associated to the TQ honours. Winner of the opening two rounds of the National Championship, Ongaro would complete the trio by going on to win the 45-minute final, which ended under floodlights, ahead of the Sworkz of Mattia Polito with WIRC’s Marco Baruffolo completing the race podium ahead of Riccardo Berton.

Image: Davide Ongaro [Facebook]

October 9, 2024

Thunder Alley RC Raceway announces closure

It was the venue of the first ever ROAR 1:8 Offroad National Championships Red RC would attend and we still have great memories of being blown away on arriving at Thunder Alley RC Raceway in 2011, but unfortunately this well known track has just announced that it is to close permanently at the end of 2024. Reporting on a Jared Tebo TQ and Ryan 1-2 result that year, Cavalieri taking the win ahead of then Associated team-mate Maifield, the world famous track has played host to many great races since with the news a big blown to the hotspot of Offroad racing that is Southern California. On its Facebook page together with images of its latest track build, the track posted, ‘Here is your last and final layout at the world famous Thunder Alley RC Raceway for the 21st annual Proline Nitro Explosion! With a heavy heart Im still not sure if I have the best words for this but unfortunately due to circumstances mostly beyond our control as of January 1st, Thunder Alley Rc Raceway will be permanently closing and the park will be repurposing the facility. With that being said, we still have the rest of the year and a few great events such as our Easy Money Race and our annual Toy Drive as well as a few more club races that we will be scheduling to enjoy the track we love so much! We will need your continued support threw this time as even closing is a costly process. Currently we are looking at another property, but this will be a long process to get things up and going. If anyone has any other leads or connections to any other locations please reach out. We are beyond grateful for the friend and family we have made over the last 20+years and the support from the Rc community world wide.’

View images from 2011 Nationals at Thunder Alley here

October 8, 2024

Beretta & D’Angelo win at Modeltek Trophy

Mini Autodromo Stradivari in Cremona, Northern Italy, played host to the Modeltek Trophy last weekend where Filippo Beretta and Alex D’Angelo took the 1:8 GT wins. In 1:8 Nitro GT, qualifying would see Genius Racing’s Beretta secure the TQ as the Italian topped two of the three rounds. Fastest in Q2 France’s Bernard-Alain Arnaldi made it a Genius 1-2 on the grid. In the half hour final, Beretta would deliver the win posting the fastest lap of the race but having come from P7 on the grid with new Capricorn signing & World Championship Top Qualifier D’Angelo would finish just 1-second back. Newly crowned European Champion Natanaele Senesi took his Senesi Motorsport S21 GT to the final podium step. In 1:8 Electric GT, it was Arnaldi who secured the TQ from Senesi and D’Angelo with the later coming through to win the opening two encounters for the overall victory. Winning A3 Arnaldi took the runner-up spot ahead of Senesi.

Image: Alex D’Angelo [Facebook]

October 8, 2024

2025 Euro Large Scale Series (ELS) – Announcement

The organisers of the Euro Large Scale Series has announced the two venues for the 2025 ELS with iconic tracks Fiorano in Italy and Mini Circuit “Ville de Luxembourg” in Luxembourg the two new locations for next year. This year the ELS saw Bologna in Italy and Lostallo in Switzerland host the series with Mecatech’s 2024 EFRA European Champion Emanuele D’Amico taking victory at Round 1 and MCD Racing’s Dario Veseli the Round 2 victor. With categories for Open Pro, Open Gentleman, Sport and F1, the dates for both races are still to be finalised with the ELS organisers waiting for the publication of the EFRA race calendar.

View aerial track images here

October 7, 2024

Ongaro doubles again at Buggyland

Team Associated’s Davide Ongaro has won the 11th edition of the Buggyland, the newly crowed 3-in-a-row World Champion repeating the victory double he achieved last year at the Spanish race. The Madrid based event would kick off with Tekno’s World Championship finalist Joao Figueredo topping Nitro Buggy seeding ahead of Ongaro. With three rounds of qualifying it would be another World Championship final who took Q1, Mugen Seiki’s Berkan Kilic fastest from his brother Burak with Figueredo third. Q2 & 3 however Ongaro lay down the form for the rest of the event with the fastest times ahead of the Berkan. In the 16 buggy grid 1-hour final that order was maintained with Ongaro taking a comfortable win by 15-seconds over Berkan with the Sworkz of 2021 Buggland double winner Juan Carlos Canas coming from P5 on the grid to complete the podium. In eBuggy, the result was a repeat of Nitro with Ongaro taking the TQ and win while Canas and Berkan Kilic switch order on the podium with Canas the runner up.

Image: Mauro Ongaro [Facebook]

October 6, 2024

Balestri wins ENS Leno, Kurzbuch takes title

Dario Balestri has won the Euro Nitro Series Season Finale in Leno but it is Simon Kurzbuch who comes away from Italy with the 2024 title. The fourth & final round of the championship would see World & newly crowned European Champion Balestri take his Infinity to the overall TQ as he topped two of the 4 qualifiers. Fastest in the opening qualifier, it was the Mugen Seiki of ENS Ettlingen Round 1 winner Kurzbuch who secured P2 ahead of Infinity’s Thomas Lorenzi and Serpent’s Andrea Catanzani. With the original timetable effected by rain, the Main final would be reduced to a 30-minute encounter with Balestri setting the fastest lap en route to becoming the fourth different winner of the season, 2023 Champion Toni Gruber the Round 3 winner and Lars Hoppe the victor at Round 2. 10-seconds behind Balestri, Lorenzi would come home in second in a repeat result of the Italian Nationals held at the same track earlier this year. Finishing just ahead of fellow Swiss racer Kurzbuch, ARC’s Silvio Hachler completed the podium but P4 was enough for Kuzbuch to take the title by 1-point ahead of Infinity’s Teemu Leino, the Finn’s championship tally made up of three podium finishes in the first three races. In 1:10, having secured the TQ it would be a sudden & cruel finish to British National Champion Alex Thurston’s first ENS outing of 2024. Leading the race from Champion elect Melvin Diekmann, just after half way point as he came up on traffic a car spun in front of him and with nowhere to go the impact broke Thurston’s car putting an immediate end to his race. Shortly after title contender Jilles Groskamp would also go out of the race, leaving Diekmann’s Capricorn to take it ahead of Milan Holthuis for his third win of the season to successfully defend his title.

Image: ENS [Facebook]

October 3, 2024

Takara & Coelho win Brazilian AARC Cup titles – Report

Last weekend marked the third & final round of the AARC Cup of ABC in Santo André, Brazil, with two categories, 1:10 Nitro 200mm and 1:8 GT Nitro, still wide open in terms of the championship titles. The 1:10 Nitro 200mm battle was between points leader, Issao Takara (Mugen/OS Speed/Ulti/Nitromax) with 96 points, followed by Alexandre Kimura (KM Racing/OS Engines/Matrix/Nitromax) with 84 points, and João Dulac (Capricorn/OS Speed/Hot Race/MK Fuel), also with 84 points. Im qualifying it was Dulac who secured the TQ after two rounds of qualifying however after 30 minutes of a very competitive race it was the KM Racing of Alexandre Kimura who took the win ahead of Takara with the later securing the overall championship.

Continue reading here

October 2, 2024

2024 Asian Buggy C/ships Indonesia Chassis Focus Index

Last weekend Indonesia played host to the season finale of the 4-round Asian Buggy Championships. The all natural dirt West Side Raceway track, which is owned by very competent racer Adrian Wicaksono, would prove challenging but a big hit with racers, the event bringing drivers from 12 different countries to the capital of Jakarta. While Kouki Kato took the win for Infinity, overall it was the Sworkz of Australian Christian Wolhuter who became the inaugural Champion of the 2024 season. Rewarded for his efforts in hosting the race with a podium finish, WicaksonoIt’s Team Associated made it three different manufacturers in the Top 3 at the end of the 1-hour final. Attracting over 130 entries, we got the chance to photograph 8 buggies from 5 different manufacturers including the Xray of promising 12-year-old Indonesian talent Yansen Wijaya, who, like a certain 3-in-row World Champion, races using a Sanwa stick radio. In case you missed any of the Chassis Focus’ during our coverage of the race, we have compiled them all in our latest Chassis Focus index.

View Chassis Focus Index here