Front running US driver Max Flurer has joined Team Serpent USA. The former Associated driver joins the company’s offroad team to race and support the expanding Serpent car line-up. Max joins the recently announced Mike Truhe, Matt Schreffler and the car’s designer Billy Easton to make a pretty solid team.
Source: Serpent [serpent.com]
JConcepts, together with many fine sponsors and race tracks, have organized a first of its kind, a true Indoor National Series. The first 3 years combined attracted over 3000 entries. 2014 is scheduled as a 5 race series across the United States, drivers now have the opportunity to showcase their abilities on a national and regional level. Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall nationals make up the seasonal events at fixed locations while the finals will serve as the end of the year bash for the awards and series championship. The series will be awarded based on points participation in 3 out of the 5 events.
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The weekend of January 4 saw the running of the Maine State Championship at Maximus RC. The weather was cold outside, but nice and warm inside for racers from all over New England. X Factory sent Team driver John Cravotta up from Massachusetts, and he did not disappoint, winning both buggy and SC. In mod buggy it was all X-6 cubed as Cravotta TQed both round of qualifying, setting a blistering 17 laps 5:08 on the small Maine track. John checked out in the A main with a tone-to-tone dash, improving his qualifying time by a second.
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At the end of December, Florida’s top 10th scale racers descended upon Shiverville Raceway for the final round of JConcepts Super Cup Series Fall session. Most classes were still up for grabs as some classes were in a tie for the title of Champion. Racers arrived to the track in High Springs Florida early on Friday to work on setups. On Saturday everyone was at the track by daylight for the last hours of practice before racing began at 9:30am. Racers had to adapt to a more “old school” track condition with a loamy surface as sunlight was in short supply and moisture was plentiful.
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This past weekend was the second round of the season for the Top Notch Winter Series. Averaging about 200 entries at each event, the TNS is continuing to grow and be very successful. Round number two was held at Coyote Hobbies in sunny Victorville, CA. With just under 300 entries and 33 heats this would be a very competitive and fun day of racing. Team Associated/Reedy’s Kevin Motter and his B4.2 Factory Team with Centro conversion were on point in the first round of 2WD Modified Buggy qualifying. He set the early TQ and the time to beat. As the first round went exceptionally well for the young driver, the second round brought a a couple bobbles and Motter lost the overall TQ. Starting from second on the grid, Motter had his work cut out for him.
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The final round of the Malaysian National Championship was held on the 29th December at the newly open 3 Stone Park Onroad track in Glenmarie, Shah Alam. The title would be decided in the final round between 2 Team Serpent drivers, Jessel Leong and Nick Chong, who were only separated by 1 point. Kimie driving a Capricorn still had a mathematical chance of winning the title, needing both the Serpent drivers to falter and to take a podium result himself. After completion of the qualifying heats another Serpent driver,Fluke took the TQ with his 977.
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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.
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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]
