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June 5, 2009

Pietsch & Groskamp set pace in Turkey

Official timed practice has ended on the second day of the Bumod Grand Prix with Robert Pietsch and Jilles Groskamp topping the time sheets here in Turkey. Over the seven 30 minutes session each driver had today Mugen’s Pietsch showed he has the edge over his rivals setting a best lap time of 17.216 which is .185 up on second fastest man Patrick Shaefer who inturn is just 4/1000ths up on Michael Salven. In 1:10 things are closer with only 7/100th seperating Groskamp, who posted a 19.617, from Dirk Wischewski.

Check out our full event coverage here.

June 5, 2009

Sunny start to Day 2 of Bumod GP

After rain dampened the opening day of the Bumod Grand Prix, competitors woke up this morning to glorious sunshine for the second official practice day here in Bursa, Turkey. With two 30 minute sessions under their belts the drivers can now get down to some productive testing. In 1:10, Dutch international electric touring car star Jilles Groskamp is setting the early pace with his prototype Serpent 7XX running as he predicted last night some 19 second laps. The 2008 Worlds Top Qualifier, who said traction is still quite low, has started to play around with different set-ups with the car responding postively to the changes.

Check out our full event coverage here.

June 5, 2009

Carmine Raiola wins 1/8th Euro ‘B’ title

Last week saw the European ‘B’ Championships for 1/8th scale track, take place in Cassino, Italy. Mostly good weather greeted the drivers, along with a challenging track, and after qualifying it was local Mugen racer Carmine Raiola that took the top spot followed by veternan German driver Oliver Mack, with Stefano Pregnolato and Mattia Rinaldi claiming the final direct qualifying positions. The 45 minute main final was brought forward in the schedule due to the expected bad weather and this was a good decision as rain started to fall heavily shortly after the prize ceremony. In the race Raiola was never challenged and despite pitting earlier than his close competitors, no tire stop and skilled driving meant he could open up a one lap gap in front of Oliver Mack at the end, with Massimo Vadala, who had a race long battle with Stefano Pregnolato, taking 3rd.

Click here for photos of the track

June 4, 2009

Rain calls end to Day 1 in Turkey

The flood lights have been turned on at Bumod but unfortunately the pits are empty after the rain returned to Bursa bringing to an end the opening day of Turkey’s inaugural international nitro event. With the track wet the drivers have called it a day and made their way to what has to be the most plush r/c restaurant in the world, for dinner compliments of the race organisers. Drivers did however manage to get some partially dry running on the track, with two corners falling to develop a dry line.

Check out our full event coverage here.

June 4, 2009

Team Cortina win PR Team Challenge race

Last Sunday, Barceloneta RC Speedway in Puerto Rico played host to the 1st Team Challenge race that saw ten teams of three racers taking part. Following 3 rounds of qualifiers, Mugen Driver Andy Báez set the pace with a 14 laps TQ. Each team member would race 40 minutes and afterwards all laps from each team were added up to get the Team Challenge Champions. Team Cortina who were racing Serpent chassis’ took the win, while Team Mugen, who won two of the 3 races, came in second by 6 laps with Team Kyosho finishing in third, 17 laps behind 2nd position.

Thanks to Zobeida Ocasio for the report.

June 1, 2009

F1 RCGP Round 5 report

The 5th round of the F1RCGP Championship was held recently at Pit In Stadium in Chiba. This round attracted Masayuki Mimura (former 1/8 GP national champion) from Hot Bodies with the brand new HPI Formula 10.The track being used was designed by RC legend Masami Hirosaka and father Masaaki. With no exceptions just as in round 1 and 3 the race started under heavy rain condition and drivers started to try different tires like glue spreaded sponge tires, rubber tires and tamiya tube tires. Apparently most of the drivers got experience from the previous round as most of the cars ran pretty well under rain condition and the biggest issue seemed to be how to avoid water getting into your radio. The first casualty was David Tse running in the F1 class who was in a different league on a 17lap pace but stopped in lap10 with radio failure. All the heats finished under rain condition and Yoshitsugu Takahashi took pole position for the F1 class, while for F1GP class championship leader Hiroshi Kamibayashi (Alex Racing) led the first round with a 19 laps record and eventually took the pole position.

Continue reading the report

June 1, 2009

Andrea Pirani wins Lostallo Open GP

Lostallo, Switzerland, hosts of this years 1/8th scale World Championships, recently ran an Open GP in preparation for the WC. While entry was low, a lot of top quality drivers were present, which featured 6 rounds of qualifying and a final of 60 minutes, just like the Worlds. Qualifying went the way of Alberto Picco, 4 seconds ahead of Andrea Pirani, Andrea Cristiani and Oliver Mack a further 8 seconds back in 4th, current World Champion Lamberto Collari could only manage 12th. The final went the way of Pirani, who took home the win by 2 laps from Oliver Mack in 2nd, Andrea Cristiani in 3rd and Mattia Pesenti in 4th, with pole man Picco hitting problems before retiring close to the end of the race.

Thanks to Mattia Pesenti for the report.

June 1, 2009

Richard Hicklin wins BRCA 1/8th Rd3

The 3rd Round of the BRCA national series was held at the Wombwell circuit, near Barnsley, South Yorkshire. The weather forecast for the weekend was for clear blue sky and hot summer temperatures which made sure that the damp tires where never a consideration for once. During Saturday practice it was Mark Green again setting the pace from a close chasing pack of Andy North (Mugen), Neil Diver (Volex), Richard Hicklin, Tim Wood and Pete Hastings (Serpent). With time restrictions due to the local residents enforcement policy, it made practice less than usual and ensured a busy track throughout the day. It was however apparent that the track at the end of the straight was starting to break up over the bump and it was therefore decided by the committee to form a chicane to slow the cars down. This was to become a further challenge to the drivers with regards to learning how quick to go through it, further set up refinement to allow the car to quickly change direction and gear ratio changes due to the main straight becoming considerably smaller.

Continue reading the report