June 30, 2015

Paolo Bottignol takes Vedano Club Championship Rd4

Round four of the popular Vedano Club Championship was held in Vedano, Monza. High ambient temperatures of up to 33 degree Celsius and more than 65 degree track temperature gave the drivers a hard time as the GRP tyres used tend to make for heavy understeering in these conditions. At the end of the unusual race format, that saw two qualifying rounds and four final legs with the times combined, Paolo Bottignol came out fastest to take the day’s win.

Source: MD Racing [facebook.com]

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June 30, 2015

Roberto Molle wins Expert class at Italian GT Champs

The Italian UISP 1/8th GT Championship was held at the Quarto Il Cavallino track and in the Expert class Roberto Molle, starting from pole position, would take the win from teammate Enrico Crescenzi. Roberto Catanzani would round out the podium in 3rd place for an all-BMT podium.

Source: BMT [bmt-team.com]

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June 29, 2015

Mark Gilliland wins at Ulster GP

The inaugural Ulster GP was held at the UMCC track in Ballymoney, Northern Ireland. Drivers travelled from all over Ireland and further afield to compete. Ballymoney is a compact technical track and the UMCC had done a superb job of preparing the venue including sugar watering the asphalt for the first time. Saturday practice was held in superb conditions and with track temperatures soaring the track was surprisingly fast. Sunday the track conditions were less than optimum and in the first A-main Andrew Smith (Xray) brought home a leg win. The second final saw a start to finish win for Mark Gilliland (Xray) and going into the third and final A-main three drivers, Mark Gilliland, Andrew Smith and Alan Bickerstaff (Team Associated) all had a chance of winning. The track had almost fully dried and grip was up to standard. The pace was hot at the front and despite close attention Mark came out the winner with a very quick 25 lapper off a standing start. Andrew Smith finished in 2nd while Alan Bickerstaff rounded out the top 3 result.

Source: Xray [teamxray.com]

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June 29, 2015

Baggen & Sanza win at BeNeLux Nitro Challenge Rd2

The second round of the BeNeLux Nitro Challenge, a 3-race series for 1/8th and 1/10th nitro on-road cars, was held last weekend at the track of Model Race Genk. Overall a total of 41 drivers competed the 1-day race in very nice weather conditions and a friendly atmosphere. In the 1/8th class it was Tobias Hepp (Mugen) who took the pole position, ahead of first round winner John Ermen (ARC).

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June 26, 2015

Nitro-West-Masters Rd2 – Report

Round two of the 6-event Nitro-West-Masters 2015 was recently held in Haltern. It was the third race meeting on the 234 meter track since its comeback in 2012 following a break of a couple of years. The track, located  on the site of a driving training centre, is well-known for the nice atmosphere in the paddock with lots of tents and for its small but high rostrum. A total of 51 drivers attended the race that held some extremely close decisions in three of four classes. In the 1/8th Open class Serpent racer Ralf Vahrenkamp took the TQ ahead of Uwe Baldes (Mugen) and Andreas Goebel in his first race with ARC. In the 39 minutes finale Baldes was able to move into the front spot but while leading his Mugen suffered a gearbox issue which forced the reigning champion to retire. So it was Vahrenkamp who was back in the lead again and who brought home the victory after 120 laps. Only eight seconds behind old-boy Reinhard Zick (Mugen) crossed the finish line. Much closer was the battle for the third spot on the podium which went to Matthias Guenther (Shepherd) who completed 117 laps only 7/10th of a second ahead of Martin Figge (Motonica). Also Thomas Kroeger (Serpent) did 117 laps but he ended the race another two and a half seconds down on Figge.

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June 24, 2015

Nitro Series Espanolas Rd1 – Report

The opening round of the Nitro Series Espanilas, a new championship based on the Euro Nitro Series format, was held at the VillaReal track, home of the 2008 European Touring Car Championships. The event, that was run in a single 200mm class, saw some novelties for a Spanish race such as a control tyre, made by Matrix, and a qualifying points system among other news; such as a car chase challenge called Desafio. The race attracted a good amount of drivers including local talent and internationally experienced drivers such as 2014 200mm Spanish Champion and Euros runner-up Edu Escandon, former Champion Jonhy Pastor and former Spanish Touring Car Champ Juan Hidalgo. The TQ honours were taken by Edu who also set the fastest lap and new track record with his Novarossi-powered KM car, followed by Jonhy Pastor (Mugen/Novarossi), Juan Hidalgo (Mugen/Novarossi) and David Cuesta (Mugen/Novarossi). Following the qualifying the “Desafio Challenge” was held and it was Ruben Marco (Shepherd/Picco) who came in 1st after a faultless drive.

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June 24, 2015

Toni Gruber doubles at East German IC Track regionals

Round 3 of the East German division Nitro On-road regionals was held in Plauen with a pretty low turnout of drivers. In 1/8th On-road class 1 Toni Gruber took the win from Michael Kammer, coming from the 2 spot on the grid while in the 1/10th 200mm Touring category Toni took the TQ and also the win in the 30 minute final from Knud Ecke in 2nd and Franz Stark in 3rd.

Click here to view the 200mm class podium

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June 24, 2015

Elias takes South American Nitro On-road Champs

Brazilian frontrunner Flavio Elias has taken the 2015 South American 1/8th Nitro On-road Championship title in Americana. Already in practise he showed a good performance and clocked fast lap times but in the first two of the five qualifying rounds Flavio had to retire early but with the fastest times in the remaining three rounds he secured himself the pole position and direct qualifying spot for the 45 minute main final. In the early stages of the final Flavio had some difficult laps and he dropped back to 8th position but once he found his groove he was able to climb up the order step by step. In Lap 63 Flavio took over the lead from Sebastian Recio and increased the gap constantly. After 45 minutes he crossed the finishing line in 1st place, some 3 laps in front of Sebastian Recio in 2nd place. The podium was completed by Kazuo Ohara in 3rd position.

Source: Shepherd [team-shepherd.com]

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