Red RC » International

March 1, 2024

Coelho holds overnight TQ in Bangkok

With Day 1 of qualifying at the 20th edition of the TITC complete it is Bruno Coelho who holds the overnight TQ in Bangkok. The Xray driver would take both rounds of qualifying on today’s schedule helped by top seed Ronald Volker having a 360 spin while on TQ pace run in Q2. The second of the four qualifiers would be a repeat of the opening round in terms of the Top 3 with Alexander Hagberg 3rd fastest having been the pace setter for a time during the 5-minute run. After an early mistake and a bad set-up choice in Q1, Naoto Matsukura would get a P4 on his second attempt ahead of Souta Goto driving the new Tamiya TRF421 which is making its race debut here. With many of the leading drivers having moments it was the Xray of Shin Sawada who was running in the second fastest along with Goto who completed the Top 6.

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March 1, 2024

Coelho takes opening qualifier at TITC

Bruno Coelho has kicked off the defence of his TITC title in the best way possible by TQ’ing the opening round of qualifying at the iconic Bangkok race. Second behind Ronald Volker in the single seeding round yesterday evening, the Xray driver reversed the order in the first of the four qualifiers by topping the round by 7/10th over the Mugen driver. Held just after midday local time on a very hot track, behind the Top 2 there was a considerable gap. The third fastest time was set by Alexander Hagberg who was closely followed by Marc Rheinard and Akio Sobue, the Top 5 all previous winners of what is widely regarded as the most difficult race in the world. Making it five different manufacturers in the Top 6, Xpress team driver Yugo Nagashima put in the sixth fastest time.

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February 29, 2024

Volker top seed at TITC

Ronald Volker is the top seed going into qualifying at the TITC, the Mugen Seiki driver fastest over 3-laps from defending Champion Bruno Coelho. With just a single round of seeding practice determining the heats for the four rounds of qualifying, most drivers completed the minimum laps possible needed to secure a place in the top while also saving tyres. Running in the second fastest practice heat due to his B-Final appearance at last year’s event, Volker took two goes at setting a time. It was his second 3-consecutive laps that counted with him fastest by 16/100th of a second over Coelho, the Xray driver making just one attempt to post a time. One of the few drivers to run the entire 5-minutes along with team-mate Akio Sobue, Axon’s Hayato Ishioka set the third fastest time with 2-time TITC winner Sobue ending up 7th. Infinity’s Naoto Matsukura posted the fourth fastest time ahead of the Awesomatix pairing of Lucas Urbain and Marc Rheinard.

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February 29, 2024

Bruno Coelho – ‘Completely different race to any other. It’s one of the best in the World’

Red RC attended its first TITC in 2017. It was always a bucket list event but it was the meaning of the win on the Sunday that really endorsed for us that this is one of the greatest touring car races. The emotion of the win was powerful and that winner was Bruno Coelho who gave us the headline for our final report that read, ‘Coelho takes TITC with ‘hardest win’ of career’. Seven years on and catching up with Bruno before he took his flight to the Thai capital to defend his title, the World Champion still rates the race as ‘one of the best in the World’ adding it is ‘a completely different race to any other’. Chasing a record equaling fourth win that would put him on par with TITC Master Atsushi Hara, a driver widely acknowledged for putting the race on the world stage, as we will find out Bruno isn’t driven by records but very much being the best on the day. He knows this is one race where ever detail is critical be successful at ‘one of the most challenging races’ in the world while on the flip side offers ‘one of the best race atmosphere’ you can experience.

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February 28, 2024

Atsushi Hara – TITC is ‘toughest race in the World’ and ‘most difficult to win’

Every sport has its legends and for me personally the greatest of all is Atsushi Hara. Before I knew I would ever work in the RC Industry and well before a thing called ‘social media’ would consume our daily lives, there was one driver dominating the track. You couldn’t open an RC Magazine without Hara featuring as a race winner or in an ad for the brands he represented. For our younger generation of followers I should explain that an RC magazine was a thing made of paper pages that had kit reviews and reports & photographs (that you can’t zoom in on) from major RC races a few months after they happened. He was an influencer before influencers were a thing. Hara was a truly global star and was the only racer I found myself slightly star struck on first meeting him at the DHI Cup in 2008. It was also Hara who many attribute to putting the TITC on the World stage and on my bucket list of races to attend and to this day, as we approach the 20th running, he is still the Master of it. As the most winning driver in its history, Hara is the ultimate authority to be able to label this iconic race the ‘toughest race in the World’ and one he believes is the ‘most difficult to win’.

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February 28, 2024

SNOR’24 by PicNic – Announcement

The opening round of the SNOR (Serial Nacional de OffRoad RC de México) National Series takes place in Guadalajara, Mexico, on March 8-10 with the host club PicNic Royal Club unveiling the track that awaits racer. Wanting to kick off the four round 1:8 Offroad series with one of the most impressive tracks ever built in Mexico, the club brought in US track builder Anthony Westergaard of Factory Tracks to create it. As well as national racers the event has attracted a number of international race who will make the trip to Guadalajara city to race on the sugared track.

Source: SNOR RC México [Facebook]

February 28, 2024

Lutz confirmed for Philippine Masters debut

With the best electric touring car drivers in Asia this week for the legendary TITC in Bangkok, its offroad equivalent, the Philippine Masters, has confirmed Kyosho’s Ryan Lutz will make the trip to Manila for the April 18-21 event. Having established itself as Asia’s biggest annual 1:8 Offroad race, this is the 12th edition and will be Lutz’s debut appearance at the Philippine Masters which is famed for its truly unique vibe that lives up to the nations tourism tagline ‘It’s More Fun in the Philippines’. This year the race will count as the second round of the Asian Buggy Championships with Lutz the current standings leader having won the season opener in New Zealand recently. Commenting on the news Lutz said, “After a fantastic first round in New Zealand I am blessed to continue the journey to round two in Manila, Philippines at the Philippine Masters ‘24. Edward Sio has been after me for so many years to attend and finally, the schedule allows this year. I can’t wait to battle it out on what has always looked like one of the most amazing R/C tracks on the planet. And I have heard nothing but amazing things about the track, facility, and the Philippines themselves from everyone who knows I’m coming. I’m excited for the adventure to start!”

Source: Asian Buggy Championships [Facebook]

February 27, 2024

Lucas Urbain – ‘Hiring Marc pi$$€d me off’

While racers are not known for always agreeing, one thing all the professional team drivers do agree on is that the TITC is the most difficult race in the world! After the World Championships, this annual Bangkok based race has become the most significant electric touring car title drivers can secure. Racing at the TITC you are putting yourself on a World class stage with the best in the business with the additional unique element of every driver having had the opportunity to complete days of pre race practice, something that eats into your excuses when the race doesn’t go your way. So for these reasons it might not be the first race of choice at which to make your international race debut as the newest member of the full time professional driver ranks but that is exactly what Lucas Urbain will do later this week. At the age of 34, Urbain will tell you himself that the opportunity to become a full time professional racer ‘came out of the blue’ adding ‘the idea was never a topic we talked about’. An announcement on February 2nd however from Awesomatix changed all that and now this popular French racer switches from a decade of working in signalling with the French railway network to living every young RC racers dream of travelling the world racing and getting paid for the privilege. Lucas’ journey to becoming a ‘Pro’ is an interesting one that started in 2000 when a certain Adrien Bertin came to his home town of Longwy and gave a demo with a 1:8 Nitro Onroad car. That was the moment Lucas was ‘blown away’ by radio controlled cars and with his parents getting him his first RC car from a local hobby shop for Christmas that year, the seed was sown for his 24-year long road to obtaining the job description of Pro RC Racer.

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