Round 5 of the 2017 JBRL Nitro Series was held at Thunder Alley R/C Raceway in Beaumont, California with about 170 entries. Mugen’s Adam Drake was the top qualifier for the Expert Nitro Buggy A-main and he would take a tone-to-tone win in the 15-minute long encounter with Anthony Westergaard (Kyosho) and Austin Pannone (Team Associated) coming in 2nd and 3rd respectively.
The Tilted Worlds were held this past weekend and it was Austin Woodyard who made a clean sweep by TQing and winning all three classes he attended. In the Nitro Buggy main Austin would make a couple of mistakes but he would work his way back up to the 1st spot to take the win. The Nitro Truggy main saw Austin taking the win from tone to tone and finally in 1/8th E-Buggy he came out fastest in A1 only to suffer a big crash in A2. Coming back from P8 Austin would end the second main on the runner-up spot which was enough for him to take the overall win and with it his third title of the weekend.
Source: Serpent [serpent.com]
All the action from the exciting 45 minute Main Final at the 2017 EFRA 1/8th Offroad European Championships in Eskilstuna, Sweden. With commentary in English & Spanish from EFRA’s own Carlos Gomez.
Robert Batlle is the 2017 1:8 Offroad European Champion. Ten year after winning his first title, the Mugen driver delivered a dominant race performance at the Gröndal Ring in Sweden to claim his third & most important Euros win. Top Qualifier for the race Batlle would win his Semi to start from pole and after some early errors in the 45-minute final, returned to the front from where he pulled away from a thrilling second place battle. Having taken the early lead until a mistake, Swedish hero David Ronnefalk would duel it out with defending champion Elliott Boots and rising star Davide Ongaro. A hard fought battle, Ongaro would come out on top to claim his first Euros podium finish with 2nd. With high expectations for his home race, Ronnefalk would take some consolation from completing the podium in Eskilstuna having to work hard to stay ahead of Boots. Setting the fastest lap of the race, Boots’ quest for a third title in a row would disappear in the pits with the British driver suffering flameouts on two of his fuel stops.
Continue reading this report here or view our complete event coverage here.
This past weekend was the annual event of the oOple Invernational at the brilliant Robin Hood Raceway venue. A fantastic entry of 191 competitors across the various classes was superb to see. The format for the event was four rounds of qualifying by round by round, with the best two to count. Then followed by three leg finals for everyone. In 2WD it was very close throughout qualifying as the three star drivers were Michal Orlowski, Ben Jemison and Craig Collinson. Each of these three drivers TQ’d a round each, so it was all down to the 4th and final round of qualifying. Ben Jemison dominated this round so therfore would line up on pole position for the A-finals. Ultimately it was TQ holder Ben Jemison (Schumacher) who laid down a dominant performance in the triple A-mains to take the title from Team C’s Craig Collinson in 2nd and Schumacher’s Michal Orlowski 3rd.
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The popular 1/8th off-road Senior Race was held at the Horni Jeleni track in the Czech Republic. The organising club did its best to prepare a nice track after the Friday morning before the race was rained out. In the premier class of 1/8th Nitro Buggy it was Xray’s Jiri Benes with the TQ and win from Karel Hajek (Xray) and Jaroslav Valder (Xray) in 2nd and 3rd respectively.
Robert Batlle will lead away the 13 drivers that will battle it out in Sweden to become Champion of the 37th running of the 1:8 Offroad European Championships. The Top Qualifier won his Semi with the faster time of the two encounters with David Ronnefalk recovering from a bad start to win the other, just 1-second of a difference in their winning times after the 20-minute races. Keeping Batlle honest in the early part of the race and leading the Spaniard for a time before a costly mistake, Davide Ongaro would finish second to secure fourth on the grid. Behind Ronnefalk, reigning champion Elliott Boots having had a very comfortable lead early on over fellow Brit Darren Bloomfield would finish second with a difficult car to start his quest for a third title in a row from 3rd. Behind the Top 4, João Figueiredo will start 5th with former champion Bloomfield lining up 6th making it five different manufacturers in the top half of the grid.
Continue reading this report here or view our complete event coverage here.
Vision Racing have introduced a 3-D-printed LiPo battery brace for 18.5mm low-profile shorty packs. Specially developed for the 13.5T class where shaving weight is a must the brace and the ability to run low-profile packs also helps to shift the weight bias more forward for carpet and astro turf racing.
