The Japanese JMRCA 1/8th Gas Off-Road Nationals were held last weekend at the Futaba Buggy track. In the main final Kenji Tsuruta, coming from 3rd on the grid, was able to take the lead in the opening lap and never looked back to take the win in the 60 minute race.
Source: Tresrey [tresrey.com]
It was a picture perfect day in sunny Florida at the Hurricane Off-road RC Track located inside Lake Park just outside of Tampa for the 3rd round of the Super Cup Championship Series. The brutal summer weather had taken its toll on the historic track and it took tons of hard work from the entire group of volunteers as the racing surface was primed for great outdoor racing. When Practice began Friday, racers searched for tire combo and setups for the changing track surface as it began to burn a groove in. At daybreak on Saturday racers filled into the park and we all were very excited about track conditions. The crew laid down Calcium on the track the night before and a small rain shower in the night wet the surface perfectly. The groove that had begun to show in practice was still there and more defined than when we left. Practice ended race morning just before 9am as the heat sheets filled with 132 entries from as far away as Tifton Ga.
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Following Ryan Lutz’s statement to leave Team Durango in favour of a new challenge Team Durango have announced a change to their strategy for the 2015 season and beyond. Instead of having a team of high-paid pro drivers, such as Ryan Lutz, Team Durango is set to re-focus on club racing which means the company will increase their community support through social media and public RC forums to grant all Team Durango drivers the best possible access to technical knowledge as a way to build a strong base of drivers that competes at local and regional race events. Doing so will not hamper vehicle development as the company will listen to racers and their demands rather than having Pro drivers leading development. Team Durango’s new race team program will be announced in the coming month with the meantime being used to improve parts support to make sure racers can get spares and options when they need them. The destiny of Team Durango’s Pro drivers such as Jörn Neumann remains in the dark for the moment with no official statement about the future their top-of-the-foodchain drivers being available but we understand that the company’s will to “dissolve [their] Pro race team” will also mean they are completely stepping away from paid drivers.
Read Team Durango’s statement in full here.
The opening round of the Mibosport Cup took place this past weekend at the Hotel-Sport in Hrotovice. The event saw a massive turn out on drivers from six different countries including the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Austria, Germany, Poland and Estonia. A total of 91 drivers attended the on-road classes with 34 drivers in Touring Car Modified, 38 in Stock LRP, 9 in Formula and 11 drivers in the 1/12th scale class. The off-road classes attracted a total of 82 drivers with 42 drivers participating in 2WD Buggy and 40 drivers in 4WD Buggy.
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US front runner, Ryan Lutz has announced that he is to leave chassis sponsor Team Durango, despite famously announcing a 10-year contract with the brand back in 2011. In the four years since, while being very competitive, Team Durango had changed ownership which also led to a change in Ryan’s contract. While evaluation his package for the next part of his racing career, Ryan came to the conclusion that he had to move on in order to have the best possible support package on his side. Ryan didn’t give any details about where he is headed next.
Click here to read Ryan’s announcement in full
The first round of the Mibosport Cup was held last weekend with around 190 entries in several electric on-road and off-road classes. In the 2WD and 4WD electric off-road category it was Martin Bayer who took the pole positions for the finals. For the finals Martin was able to conserve his performance to take the overall win from Ronald Völker in 2nd and Kaja Novotny in 3rd in the 2WD class. In 4WD Martin again came out successful, this time with Kaja Novotny in 2nd and Bartek Zambrzycki in 3rd.
Source: Xray [teamxray.com]
The CML Off Road Masters were held in France this past weekend and in the 4WD Buggy class it was Kyosho’s Elliott Boots who took the win from Xray driver Lorenzo Crolla and Team C’s Nicolas Risser. French front runner Yannick Aigoin came in 4th while UK’s Ben Jemison rounded out the top 5 result.
Source: Elliott Boots [elliott-boots.com]
Following last weekend’s EFRA AGM, the European governing body have announced the (provisional) dates for next year’s European Championships. A busy Summer season starts with 2 ‘B’ championships, while next year the 200mm nitro on-road class sees a combined A and B championship being run in Turkey. The 2 40+ titles round out the season along with the usual ‘A’ titles that are up for grabs in the Summer. New is a dedicated European Championship for the growing 1/8th E-buggy class that will be held in August at the Austrian Fehring track. Beside the introduction of the 1/8th E-buggy class, EFRA will also try and establish the 1/8th nitro GT class with the governing body trying to evaluate a sensible set of rules based on existing GT/Rally rules. Several classes also saw clarifications on existing rules with the electric classes are not allowed to run “hybrid” motors built from the parts of different manufacturers anymore. The 1/12th scale Stock class will run 13.5T motors in the future and 1/8th nitro buggies will have to use 16 percent nitro fuel from 2016 on. Full AGM details can be found here.
Click here to view the provisional race calendar
