Red RC » R On Road

November 8, 2019

Oliver Havranek takes double Czech Touring titles

The final round of Czech Electric On-road Nationals was held in Jedovnice recently. Pre-event favourite, Oliver Havranek was able to top qualify both the Touring Modified and Touring Stock classes and after some awesome battles with Matej Sulc in the Modified category, he would also bring home the wins in both classes. With these results Oliver was able to grab the back-to-back titles, leaving behind Matej Sulc and Karel Kratochvol (all Xray) in 2nd and 3rd respectively in the overall standing.

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November 8, 2019

2019/20 Essex Winter Series Rd2 – Report

The second round of the 2019/2020 Essex Winter Series took place this weekend at the popular indoor venue in the south-east of the UK. Elliott Harper, who had taken the TQ and overall win at the opening round of the series last month, set the initial pace in the Modified class as he topped Q1. However, he was pushed hard by Chris Grainger, who finished just four tenths of a second behind. Chris’s Team Associated team mate Matthew White took third in the round, a second and a half back on Chris, with Harley Eldridge and Kyle Branson rounding out the top five. The second round saw the top two positions unchanged, but Elliott managed to open up a two second gap this time. Harley moved her Yokomo into third place, with the Capricorns of Stefan Chodzynski and Kyle fourth and fifth. The third qualifier had Elliott as the first driver to break into the 22 lap bracket, securing pole position with his Xray. Again, Chris was second, with Kyle besting Stefan and Harley this time. Elliott made it a clean sweep of qualifying in Q4, finishing up ahead of Harley, Matthew, Kyle and Stefan.

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November 6, 2019

Lex Fulgencio wins at Asphalt Wars Rd2

Round 2 of the Asphalt Wars series was held in San Jose, California last weekend. Lex Tyler was able to TQ and win Modified Touring over Kyle Colbert, Jeff Auxier and Aaron Lewis. Kyle showed a solid pace in Q1 and Q2 but with a couple mistakes, Lex beat his TQ earning an extra lap 26/5:10 to Colbert’s 25/5:01. In the main Lex took the lead from tone to tone leaving the rest of the field battling for 2nd and 3rd.

Source: Xray [teamxray.com]

November 4, 2019

Takahata crowned World Champion as Matsukura denied once again

‘To finish first, first you must finish’ was a phrase that rang true at today’s 1:8 Onroad World Championships in California as a rather sedate Main was turned on it’s head with 12-minutes to go with Mugen’s Shoki Takahata eventually crowned the new World Champion. The 1-hour encounter started out with Top Qualifier Dario Balestri leading from Infinity team-mate Naoto Matsukura but during his second fuel stop defending Champion Balestri would collect a badly released Greiner, the impact braking the body on the Italian’s car and ending his quest for 2 in a row. This allowed Matsukura to take control of the race. Having shown the world the class of driver he is when he led in France on his nitro debut two years ago before a flat battery denied him the title, everything looked perfect for the reigning 1:10 Nitro World Champion to make history and hold both titles consecutively but it wasn’t to be. With just two fuel stops separating him from winning, a rear pulley stripped and once again there was heartbreak for the Japanese driver and his mechanic Masayuki Miura, his race was done. Graduating to the lead it was another 1:10 World Champion who looked on target to finally match Adrien Bertin’s record as the only double champion in nitro onroad. Having found himself almost a lap down at the start following contact at the on the first lap and then receiving a stop & go for his bad release in the pits, Dominic Greiner was out front. Counting down the minutes he then hit trouble with just a little over 5-minutes left on the clock – the watching crowd in disbelief at the unfolding drama. Always within sight of the lead, Takahata was now the fourth different race leader, well clear of now second placed Takaaki Shimo. The manufacturer’s sole representative in the final, to the chants of ‘Mugen’ the 25-year-old crossed the loop to take a very popular first World title, while Balestri salvaged the final step on the podium behind the bridesmaid of nitro racing, Shimo.

Continue reading this report here or view our complete event coverage here.

November 4, 2019

2019 Masters of Foam – Report

The annual Masters of Foam race was held at the Racing Arena Limburg this past weekend, attracting nearly 90 entries for the 1/12th scale Modified, Stock 13.5T and Stock 17.5T classes. In the fastest class of the weekend, Modified, it was Roche driver Ollie Payne with the overall TQ some six seconds in front of Project Godspeed’s Markus Mobers while Roche driver Jacques Libar came in 3rd. The opening two A-mains saw Ollie walking away with pretty dominant wins for an early overall victory as Markus Mobers and Jacques Libar ended the day in 2nd and 3rd respectively. Destiny’s Vesa Yli and Tim Altmann (KaTi) rounded out the top 5.

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November 3, 2019

Xray Racing Series Germany Rd1 – Report

The opening round of the Xray Racing Series Germany was held at the MAC Adenau club recently. Located near the legendary Nürburgring the track would host the event for the sixth time with the weekend having kicked off on Saturday. Sunday morning saw the so-called “Sunday drivers” practice for those joining the meeting only on race day, to make up for the alleged backlog of practice. After the drivers’ briefing, race director and timekeeper Uwe Baldes sent the participants into the three heats, with the best run to be counted by lap and time. The drivers were divided into the classes Touring Car FWD 17.5T, Touring Car Stock 13.5T and 1/12 GT 17.5T. In the Touring Car Stock class, the positions were hotly contested. With 27 laps in 5:02,042, the pole position went to Xray driver Joerg Baldes in front of his brand teammates Marc Stuebben and Tobias Hoefflin.

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November 2, 2019

Stunning drive puts Kurzbuch in final after start-line flameout

A stunning drive has put former Champion Simon Kurzbuch in the 1:8 Onroad World Championship Final in California. Suffering an engine flame out on the grid, the pole sitter for the second of the Semi Finals missed the start and had to be returned to the pits to be restarted as the rest of the field got underway and the general feeling of the stunned onlookers was the Swiss ace’s event was done. Kurzbuch however defied the odds, driving at 110% he started to put himself back in contention for a bump up spot as the crowd watch on in awe. Setting the fastest lap of the race he crossed the line in 3rd position to ensure he gets another chance to do battle with his great rival and reigning champion Dario Balestri. Up front in the Semi Odd, Jesse Davis made the race his own, leading home fellow Australian Jeff Hamon to secure both drivers their first 1:8 Worlds Final start. In the first of the Semi Finals, Dominic Greiner led from start to finish despite struggling with his engine with Shoki Takahata a close second and Toni Gruber third. Unfortunately for Lamberto Collari he fell just three minutes short of making the Main Final on the 10th Anniversary of his last World title after he suffered an engine flame out. With the second Semi the faster the finals, the two drivers to book their place in the main event at the 22nd running of IFMAR Worlds would be Takaaki Shimo and Carmine Raiola.

Continue reading this report here or view our complete event coverage here.

November 2, 2019

Salven calls time on WC career

Michael Salven has called time on his World Championship racing career, one of nitro onroad racing’s best known figures made the announcement that having made his World Championship debut in California in 1987, that the 22nd running of the IFMAR 1:8 Worlds here in Fontana, California was the right time to take a step back from racing. The 58 year-old German, who has enjoyed all of his professional career with Serpent, a company which was instrumental in the early development of the class, Salven bowed out of the Worlds competition here this morning at Steel City RC Speedway when he failed to finish the 1/16th finals. Asked about his decision, he said, ‘The Pro guys turn up with everything sorted. I turned up here with three engines that still needed to be run in and it turned out none of them are very good. I will still race, I probably have a few more Euros in me, but its important I race because as the designer of our cars I need to know what’s going on’.

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