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.
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Robert Batlle is Top Qualifier at the 1:8 Offroad European Championships in Sweden, the Mugen driver producing a blistering final qualifier to leave his rivals stunned and deny World Champion David Ronnefalk a home TQ. Having started out yesterday unable to match Ronnefalk and reigning champion Elliott Boots, the 2-time former champion found his rhythm on Day 2 of qualifying topping both qualifiers to claim only his second ever Euros TQ, the last one being 10 years ago when he took his first title. With a TQ run in Q3, Ronnefalk would end up second to secure pole for the second of the Semi finals in which Boots, who took Q1, will start directly behind him. Fastest in the second qualifier, Davide Ongaro ended up 3rd overall and the Italian star will follow Batlle off the line in the first of the 20-min Semi finals. Former Champion Darren Bloomfield joins them while Riccardo Berton will complete the Top 3 starting line-up for the Semi B encounter.
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Round 4 of the Finnish 1/10th Electric Buggy Nationals was held in Vantaa in sunny weather conditions. As the track wasn’t watered, the grip changed a lot during the day with the mornings offering high grip whereas the track got slipper over the day. This caught out Xray’s Joel Valander a bit as he was able to secure a round TQ in 2WD but he struggled with his driving over the day so it was Team Associated’s Karri Salmela who brought home the TQ and win with Joel in 2nd. Konsta Saarinen (Xray) would round out the top 3 result.
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Having thrown away potential TQ runs in the opening qualifiers, top seed David Ronnefalk finally delivered on his third attempt as Day 3 of the European Championship in Sweden comes to a close. Second fastest in Q1 & 2, the HB Racing driver would run the fastest time of the day in his third qualifier finishing 3-seconds up on Q2 pace setter Davide Ongaro. A further 2-seconds off, Mugen’s Robert Batlle would break into the Top 3 for the first time having thrown away competitive runs with mistakes on the last lap of both previous qualifiers. Unable to translate his strong showing in controlled practice yesterday into a competitive time in the first two qualifiers, Carlos Durães came good for the end of day run setting the 4th fastest time ahead Q1 top qualifier Elliott Boots.
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Davide Ongaro delivered a TQ run in the second round of qualifying at the Euros in Sweden, the Team Associated driver going fastest from top seed David Ronnefalk. Third fastest in the opening qualifier, the Italian would have a 1.5 second advantage over Ronnefalk, the HB Racing star again suffering costly mistakes over the 5-minutes. After almost a 5-hour wait between Q1 and the second of the day’s three qualifiers, Kyosho’s Riccardo Berton would complete the Top 3 as team-mate Elliott Boots had a tough round. The reigning champion would end up 13th fastest after ‘loads of crashes’ with the Q1 Top Qualifier putting part of his struggle down to tyres saying, ‘they worked this morning but not now’. Having opened qualifier with a P4, Mugen’s Juan Carlos Canas wouldn’t have a good Q2 getting a drive through penalty for stopping on track as he tried to allow a gap between himself and Ronnefalk at the start.
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Elliott Boots has TQ’d the opening round of qualifying at the 1:8 Offroad European Championships in Sweden. The reigning champion took the first of the five scheduled qualifiers at the Gröndal Ring from top seed David Ronnefalk, the Swede costing himself the TQ after tangling with Neil Cragg on the last lap, the final separation 2/10ths of a second. Behind the two established title contenders, Davide Ongaro would open with a P3 run ahead of fellow up & coming teenager Juan Carlos Canas. The big turn around from his pace in controlled practice yesterday would come from Darren Bloomfield, the former champion posting 5th fastest ahead of 2015 Euro B Champion Riccardo Berton.
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The 2017 Russian 1/8th Buggy National Championship was held at the RCRacer Krylo track in Moscow. Practice and qualifying would be held in hot weather conditions but the final day brought a lot of rain which left the drivers with lots of questions in regards of tyres and setup. In the Nitro class the race for the win was on between reigning Champion, Maxim Laverychev and two-times national title holder, Nikita Pomogaev. The two would battle until the checkered flag but Nikita ran out of fuel only metres before the line, allowing Maxim to take the win from Nikita 2nd and Stanislav Glebov 3rd.
