Red RC » R Off Road

April 8, 2023

Bermudez Top Qualifier at Montpellier GP Brushless

Young French talent Rémy Bermudez will lead away the A-Mains at the Montpellier Brushless GP tomorrow after the Xray driver won the SuperPole battle from Marco Baruffolo to be declared Top Qualifier at the inaugural running of the event. With the Nitro edition of the Montpellier Grand Prix holding the long standing honours of being the event to kickstart the annual outdoor buggy racing season in Europe, the first electric edition has attracted a strong international field with the Infinity of Italy’s Riccardo Berton topping the ranking after the four rounds of qualifying. Topping Q2 & 3 he was followed the Tekno of fellow countryman Baruffolo, fastest in Q4, with Bermudez ending up third overall having topped the opening qualifier. Two time European eBuggy Champion David Ronnefalk would take his Mayako to P4. In Superpole Bermudez would be the only driver to record a 33-second lap topping the battle from Baruffolo. The A-Mains will be run over four legs with each driver’s best three to count.

Image: Circuit du MBM [Facebook]

April 3, 2023

Phend & Fuller double at 2023 Psycho Nitro Blast

Dakotah Phend was the big winner of the Psycho Nitro Blast over the weekend, the TLR driver taking the top prize in both Nitro and Electric Buggy. The 16th running of PNB, the Tennessee indoor event attracted 767 entries meaning just two rounds of qualifying with Phend topping both Nitro rounds from Spencer Rivkin to secure the overall TQ. Third in both qualifiers Brandon Rose secured 3rd ahead of Ryan Maifield and Jared Tebo. In eBuggy, Rivkin and Phend took one round each but on tie break it was the Team Associated driver who was the Top Qualifier with defending champion Mason Fuller 3rd from Ryan Lutz. In the single 10-minute eBuggy final, Phend found his way to the front after four laps after both he and Rivkin lost position early on. In the end Phend would finish 2.8-seconds clear of Rivkin with the Tekno of 10th place qualifier Seth VanDalen coming through for third. Concluding the 2023 Psycho Nitro Blast, the 45-minute Nitro Final saw Phend capitalise on his TQ to take the win by 10-seconds from Fuller and Rose with Maifield 4th. Fuller would do the double in Truggy, the HB Racing driver taking the Nitro win from the TQ ahead of Phend and in eTruggy he lead a Fuller 1-2 from Kaden who had taken the overall TQ.

Image: JConcepts [Facebook]

April 3, 2023

Horne does double at Pro-line April Fools Classic

The 34th Annual Pro-line April Fools Classic took place over the weekend with Aydin Horne the big winner in Utah. In 2WD Buggy, the Team Associated driver secured TQ honours after topping the final 2 of the four qualifiers, his Q4 pace giving him the tie breaker over Schumacher’s Broc Champlin. Domnic Paccione secured P3 with the second fastest time for both Q3 & 4. In 4WD Buggy it would be Champlin who secured pole for the triple finals after he also set the pace in the third & fourth rounds. Horne opened quali with a TQ run while team-mate Dustin Evans topped Q2 but had to settle for 4th on the grid behind Kevin Gillespie. In the 4WD finals, second place starter Horne would get the better of Champlin to take A1 and repeating that again in A2 wrapped up an earlier overall win. Following Champlin home in A3 for a P2 finish, Evans would complete the podium line-up ahead of Xray’s Ty Tessmann. In the 2WD finals, Horne won A1 while Champlin retired and Evans came through from P5 for second. Taking A2 ahead of Horne, Champlin forced play to the last final of the event however Horne duly took A3 to complete the April Fools Classic double.

Image: Team Associated [Facebook]

March 30, 2023

IFMAR World Cup 1:8 Electric Buggy – Announcement

IFMAR has announced details of the first ever World Cup for 1:8 Electric Buggy. While 1:8 nitro has enjoyed World Championship status since 1986, the World Cup will be the first step for the electric category to become a World Championship category in 2025. The World Cup event will take place on September 22-24 and be hosted by the Club ACDB “OS BEIROES” at their 310m track in Guarda, Portugal. The track previously hosted the 2010 EFRA European 1:8 Nitro Buggy Championship when Reno Savoya took the third of his European titles. While taking place only one week after the 1:10 Offroad World Championships at Hobby Action in the USA, the 1:8 Electric Buggy World Cup is still expected to be well supported by the industry given the growing future importance of the category. View Stage 1 report here.

Source: IFMAR [imfar.org]

March 28, 2023

Ceseña wins 2023 Mexican Offroad Nationals opener

Last weekend, the first round of the Mexican 1:8 Off Road National Championship was held in the beautiful city of Los Cabos, BCS where Mayako driver Jose “Tito” Ceseña took the win. Drivers from all over Mexico and the US showed up for the opening round of the 2023 season. In qualifying it was Luis Gudiño who was the Top Qualifier topping 2 of the 3 rounds with Ceseña topping Q2. Qualifying directly into the Semi Finals HobbyShop.MX’s star driver Ceseña faced some electrical gremlins that forced him to retire from the race. This meant that the Last Chance Qualifier Race was the only way to make it to the A Main. Ceseña led from start to finish and secured the last spot in the 60-minute-long main final. Starting 13th on the grid, the Mayako driver was able to push forward his Energy Fuel powered car to the top 3 by lap 7. Here is where the real battle started with Sworkz team drivers Diego Marroquin and Gudiño. Strategy played a huge role during the race too. Mayako Mexico Team Manager Daniel Ornelas, performed lighting fast pits stops with Tito’s wife Dani, that helped close the gap to the lead drivers. Ceseña continued to push placing fast lap after fast lap. After 65 laps Ceseña was able to dispose of both Sworkz Mexico drivers to secure the first win of the season for the Mayako/HobbyShop.MX team. Marroquin and Mark Morrow completed the podium. Next round will be held in Guadalajara at the new Huecos Track in May.

Report: Juan Herrero

March 27, 2023

Kobbevik wins Springcup 2023 Rnd 3 at Stoa Raceway

The third round of the 5 round Springcup 2023 in Arendal, Norway, took place over the weekend with Daniel Kobbevik taking his second win of the championship having won the previous round. Issues in Q1 and Q3 the factory Schumacher driver started from 4th on the grid in the A-mains but it took just one lap for Kobbevik to take his LRP powered Schumacher LD2 to the front for the rest of the final with A2 and repeat of A1. With the overall win decided it was up to the rest of the field to fight for the two last places on podium in A3, and it was a thriller with 4 drivers, Daniel Tonnesen, Halvor Gran, Bastian Andreassen and Mats Isaksen, in contention for second place. Unfortunately Tonnesen was out early with some electronic problems, Bastian also made a mistake in the start, and that gave Halvor the chance to go away, they were almost on the same speed all the time, but Bastian started to catch up in the end, but a small mistake handed the control over to Halvor and he could secure the second place. That gave Bastian Andreassen the third place on podium.

Continue reading report here

March 21, 2023

Tebo announces ‘2023 will be last year as a ‘professional driver’

Jared Tebo has announced that 2023 will be his last year racing as a professional driver. One of the true stars of the sport enjoying a very lengthy reign as as one of the best offroad racers in the world, the American has said 2023 will be his ‘farewell tour’. The now 36 year old arrived on the RC scene at the age of 13 and since then has lived the ultimate dream of any young kid starting out in racing. Making the ‘tough decision’, he said he is ‘fully content’ with his racing career and feels that he has nothing else ‘left to prove’ but mentally he is not enjoying the mindset needed to race competitively at the elite level. Having had the opportunity to work with Jared for over half of his racing career, the first time being when he was Top Qualifier at the 2010 IFMAR 1:8 Offroad World Championship in Thailand, Red RC congratulations Jared on his racing achievements and would like to say thank you for all the racing entertainment over the years. We look forward to working with him in his future journey in the industry.

Read Jared’s full announcement here

March 20, 2023

Lot wins opening round of French eBuggy Nationals

Jordan Lot won the opening round of the French National eBuggy Championship over the weekend, the Sworkz driver taking victory from the Kyosho of Reno Savoya. The season opener was hosted at the Modélisme Agathois where Remy Bermudez took his Xray to TQ honours ahead of Savoya, both drivers posted a TQ run each from the three rounds however it was young Bermudez who had the faster time to become Top Qualifier while Lot lined up 3rd. In the finals, starting from 4th it was Noha Ben Mohamed who took the opening encounter from Bermudez. In A2 it was the ‘Shark’ Savoya who got the win from Lot, but the latter reversed that result in the third leg to secure the overall win with his Corsatec powered RC S35-4e. Ben Mohamed completed the podium for Xray behind Savoya.

Image: Jordan Lot [Facebook]