Red RC » International

July 22, 2012

Matsukura tops free practice

Defending World Champion Naoto Matsukura has got his ambitions of winning a third consecutive 1:12 title off to an encouraging start by putting his Yokomo top of the free practice time sheets both in terms of outright lap time and total laps completed over 8-minutes. Recording a fastest lap of 12.211 and 38-laps in 8:04.488 in the third of the four free practice rounds, the 18-year-old set the pace ahead of his Yokomo touring car team-mate Ronald Volker with Onpoint’s Jilles Groskamp and CRC’s Simo Ahoniemi the only other drivers to manage 38-laps of the indoor carpet track.

View our complete event coverage here.

July 22, 2012

Matsukura confident of 3rd consecutive 1:12 title

Reigning 1:12 World Champion Naoto Matsukura says he is confident of securing a third consecutive title this week as the 16th running of the IFMAR 1:12 World Championships got underway in the sleepy Dutch town of Heemstede this morning. Setting the fastest lap of the opening round of practice before contact with the boards resulted in a broken wheel bearing on his Yokomo, the young Japanese star is the pre-event favourite and should he pull off the feat will equal the achievement of legend of the sport Masami Hirosaka who had a run of success from 2000 to 2004.

View our complete event coverage here.

July 17, 2012

Chinese manufacturer Shootout report

Last week in Hong Kong, Gen Ace, Team C, Sky RC & Tenshock Motor Hosted a Chinese manufacturer Shootout in the newest indoor facilities called Lali Warehouse. This world class indoor RC track has state of the art facilities such as water sprinkler built into the ceiling, AC room for the pits and a VIP rest area. Lali Warehouse has only been open for 2 months and so this race was considered the grand opening race for them. Many drivers came from mainland China & Taiwan also made the trip to attend this race. Due to the popular 1/8th E- Buggy & 1/10 4×4 Short Course classes, the Event only focussed on these 2. With a total of just about 90 entries in only 2 classes it this one of the biggest off road races in Hong Kong since the early 90s.

Continue reading the report here

July 17, 2012

Meen Vejrak joins Team Ride

Thailand based Ride have announced that Meen Vejrak, 2012 TITC Winner, has joined their Team from the start of this month. The multi discipline top international driver will use Ride Tires, bodyshells and the complete range of Ride Accessories.

Source: Ride [rc-ride.co.jp]

July 15, 2012

Joern Neumann defends 4wd European title

Jörn Neumann defended his 4wd 1/10th off road European Championship title after taking a perfect score in qualifying and winning the opening two legs of the A main for the overall win in this years event held in Fehring, Austria. Jörn was chased all the way by his Austrian Team Durango team mate, Hupo Hönigl, who took second overall for a Team Durango 1-2. TLR driver Darren Bloomfield completed the podium in 3rd.

Source: Durango [team-durango.com] / Image: RC Devil [rcdevil.gr]

July 12, 2012

Wouter Wynen wins 2012 Belgian GP

The Belgian GP is held each year in early July at the beautiful outdoor astro track in Kampanhout, Belgium. Club manager Willy Heremans and his crew always put on a relaxed, fun, yet competitive race. The track is inside a park and the GP is presented the same weekend as a big festival, so there is plenty of food and Saturday night features lots of loud music well into the night. Privateer Wouter Wynen TQed the first three rounds of qualifying to take pole position for the triple-A mains. 2WD qualifying and mains were held on Saturday, July 7th, with 4WD the following day. Wynen took Q-1 by just 0.06 seconds over U.K.’s Grant Williams, and put in the only 12-lap run of Q-2. In Q-3 it was Kim Nielsen’s Durango chasing about a second behind Wouter’s X-6 Sq.

Continue reading the report here

July 12, 2012

Lee Martin retains 2wd buggy European title

Lee Martin has retained his EFRA European 1/10th 2wd buggy title in Fehring in the south of Austria. Raced on what is normally a 1/8th scale track, and who will host next months 1/8th EFRA European Championships, Lee took his Speed Passion powered Tamiya chassis to the top qualifier spot ahead of recently crowned Swedish National Champion David Ronnefalk (Kyosho) with multiple European Champion Hupo Honigl (Durango) third. The first A-main was one by Lee ahead of fellow Brit Neil Cragg (Associated) with Hupo taking the 3rd spot. Leg two of the mains would see Lee make a mistake allowing the young Swede Ronnefalk to take a very close win in front of Worlds podium finisher Joern Neumann (Durango) in 2nd with Lee Martin recovering to 3rd setting up a title showdown for the 3rd and final A-main leg. Lee Martin would keep his calm in this decisive main and claim the win and overall title ahead of Ronnefalk in 2nd, who claimed the overall runner up spot and junior title, while Neil Cragg would finish 3rd claiming the final overall podium spot. Now the racers change their focus to the 4wd class with practice today followed by qualifying on Friday and Saturday morning with the finals being held on Saturday afternoon.

Image: RC Devil [rcdevil.gr]

July 10, 2012

Kevin Pignotti wins Race2theWorlds contest

Kevin Pignotti from Italy has won the first Race2theWorlds contest. With over 1000 racers and gamers involved in this contest, the R2tW has become the single biggest R/C event ever. Kevin Pignotti is now preparing himself for to collect his big prize, the ultimate once-in-a-lifetime opportunity: to join the IFMAR 2012 World Championship Electrics 1:10 in the Netherlands on the 25th of July. The 16 year old said ‘it’s like a dream coming true’ and he hopes to do well at the 2012 IFMAR Worlds. For sure, it is going to be very interesting to see how well this young talent (without any prior experience in electric racing) is going to perform on World class level amidst the best of the best in R/C racing.

Continue reading the announcement here