April 15, 2024

Ishikawa joins Yokomo

Yokomo has officially announced that young Japanese talent and reigning Stock Touring Car Japanese National Champion Mahiro Ishikawa has joined its Racing Factory team.  A former IRIS driver, the 14-year-old will campaign the Japanese manufacturer’s new MS1.0 that is due for general release at the end of this month.  A race winner in TC1 class of the popular & competitive Japanese based Speed King Tour, Ishikawa has stepped up to the top level TC0 class making his debut for Team Yokomo at the recent 2024 season opener held at Super RC Omiya indoor tarmac track in Saitama.

Source: Yokomo [teamyokomo.com]


April 14, 2024

Orlowski takes back European 1:12 title

Schumacher’s Michal Orlowski has taken back his 1:12 EFRA European Championship title in Sicily, Italy.  Having lost his 2022 title to 8-time Champion Alexander Hagberg last year in Great Britain, the reigning World Champion put in a pretty dominant performance at the Paradise RC Arena securing the TQ ahead of team-mate Ollie Payne as Hagberg’s Xray lined up third for his title defence.  Winning A1 by a convincing margin over former World & European Champion Marc Rheinard, Orlowski wrapped up the title with another win in A2, this time over Hagberg.  With A3 a battle for the other two podium placings, it initially looked like Hagberg would finish runner-up ahead of Rheinard as he crossed the line first but an earlier incident in the race with Payne was reviewed with race officials handing Hagerg 5-second penalty that promoted Rheinard to the A3 win and demoted the Swede to third on the overall podium.  In 1:12 Spec, Simon Lauter secured the TQ with his Awesomatix from Payne and Jan Ratheisky.  In the finals, Ratheisky’s Xray took the first 8-minute encounter.  Lauter was able to convert his pole position into a win in A2 but it was then Payne who won the decider.  In the end, Lauter got the title on tie break from Payne with Ratheisky completing the podium.

View 1:12 Spec podium here


April 12, 2024

1:28 Marka Euro Cup – Report

The inaugural 1:28 Marka Euro Cup took place last weekend in Cluses, France, with 15-year-old Samuel Verdan among the main winners over the five categories.  Organised by the MZCS Club with support from Marka Racing, 91 drivers from 15 nationalities created a 180 strong Mini Z entry for the 3-day event that featured National and World Champions for a very high level of competition.  The RCP track layout was popular with drivers, a lap covering 77 meters and its 18 meter long straight allowing racers to gain a good top speed.  While French teenager Verdan won the Pro-Stock title, it was another French winner in Open 4×4 with Thomas Robin taking victory, while in Open 4×2 top honours went to Portugal’s José Pequito.  Austrian Philipp Stadler would do a double with victory in Stock and F1.

View more images here


April 10, 2024

2024 IFMAR Large Scale World C/ship – Stage 1 Report

The organisers of this year’s IFMAR Large Scale World Championship which is set to take place in Sydney, Australia from October 21-27, has just published the Stage 1 Report for the event (link here).  Having organised & executed an excellent 1:8 GT World Championship last year at its John Grant International Raceway, New South Wales Radio Control Racing Car Club are the hosts of the 12th running of the World Championship for 1:5 scale Touring Car.  The third time the track has welcomed the World’s best drivers having hosted the 2001 1:8 Onroad WC, together with the host country’s governing body Remote Control Racing Australia (RCRA), the club is seeking expression of interest from all international and Australian racers to better understand the expected attendance at the event.  Racers interested in attending – or who perhaps have already decided they are definitely attending are being asked to please complete the form (link here) to assist with host planning.  The previous Large Scale World Championship took place at Steel City RC Raceway in Fontana, USA, in 2022 where Germany’s Markus Feldmann became the categories first ever repeat winner driving for Mecatech.  Having travelled to Sydney last year to cover our first ever 1:8 GT Worlds, Red RC intends to return to this great city to report on our first ever Large Scale race.

Source: NSWRCRCC [nswrcrcc.org.au]


April 9, 2024

Guerra & Giorgio win at FORGASS finale

The fifth & final round of the Florida Onroad Gas State Series was held at Greg Esser’s Nuggets Ranch Raceway in Arcadia, Florida where it was reigning series Champion Jerry Guerra who took the 200mm Sedan win while Gianni Giorgio took the victory in 1:8.  Having raced only twice since retiring 8-years old, José Castellanos made an impressive return to action securing the TQ by 1.1 seconds with his Infinity and showing no signs of rust as he prepares for the 200mm IFMAR World Championships in Costa Rica later this year.  Behind, it would be Guerra who secured 2nd with David Larry completing the Top 3 after the four rounds of qualifying.  In the half hour final, Guerra who will also travel to the World Championships made a strong start managing to get by Castellanos at the second corner and once his Infinity IF15 was in front was able to eek out a gap crossing the finish half a lap up on Castellanos who would post the fastest lap of the race.  Peter Breton, who started from P5, would  complete the podium with his Shepherd.  In 1:8, Giorgio completed a clean sweep by taking the TQ and a comfortable win in the final over Alex Esser.

Image: Jerry Guerra


April 9, 2024

Chinese Champion Lao joins Yokomo

With the impending release of its new MS1.0 1:10 Electric Touring Car at the end of this month, Yokomo has announced that Chinese Onroad Champion Alfred Lao has joined its factory team.  The 20-year-old, is set to represent the Japanese manufacturer with the new MS1.0 in his race programme that will focus on the South East Asia region with his home country also set to host the FEMCA 1:10 Electric Touring Car Championship later this year.

Source: Yokomo [teamyokomo.com]


April 8, 2024

Hebert & Hagberg win at Canadian Onroad Nationals

Keven Hebert and Xray team-mate Alexander Hagberg took the main wins at this year’s Canadian Onroad Nationals which took place over the weekend at Rose City Speedway in Ontario.   In Touring Car, reigning Champion Hebert would secure the TQ with the fastest time in the fourth & final round of qualifying.  Behind the Awesomatix of Douglas Shewfelt secured second with his Q3 time ahead of international visitor Alexander Hagberg.  In 1:12 qualifying it was the Swede who claimed the TQ from Shewfelt with Hebert lining up P3 for his title defence.  With the 13th edition of the event attracting a very healthy 349 entries, in the single A-Main encounters it was Hebert who took the Mod Touring Car win by 2.4-seconds over Shewfelt and Hagberg while the former 1:12 World Champion converted his TQ into a 1-lap winning margin over the 8-minutes from Hebert with Shewfelt completing the podium.

Image: Keven Hebert [Facebook]


April 2, 2024

British 1:8 Onroad Champion Wood joins Blitz

Body shell producer Blitz has announced multiple British 1:8 Onroad Champion Tim Wood is to officially use their bodies as part of his 2024 programme with Shepherd Micro Racing.  Having clinched the 2023 BRCA British National title for an 8th time in 2023 using Blitz’s Spider body, Wood now joins the Taiwan company’s team driver line-up and will have use of the Spider, Speed and TS040 bodies to help him with the defence of his title.  Running over the 7 rounds and visiting four different tracks across the UK, the 2024 championship kicks of in two weeks time at Cotswold where Wood clinched the title last September.

Source: Team Titan [team-titan.com.tw]