February 2, 2024

MIBO International ’24 – Onroad track reveal

With just two weeks to go until the second edition of the MIBO International Race in the Czech Republic, the organisers have revealed the onroad track layout on which Mugen Seiki’s Ronald Volker will defend the title he won at the inaugural running of the event last year.  A two half day event that runs from February 16-18th in the Sports V Hotel venue in Hrotovice, the track features a 30 metre long straight and is 19 metres deep with the man behind the race Michal Bok creating quite a different layout to that of 2023.   With the onroad/offroad event close to its capacity entry, Volker’s main competition in Modified Touring Car is expected to come from Yokomo’s Christopher Krapp and Schumacher’s Michal Orlowski, the very much in form Polish driver making his MIBO International debut this year.

See overhead view of track layout here


February 1, 2024

Red RC TITC coverage presented by Hobbywing

Red RC is excited to announce that we are returning to the TITC in Thailand with our coverage of this legendary touring car race being presented by Hobbywing.  We first attended this Bangkok based race in 2017 and having missed its return after Covid last year, we a delighted to be able to return on this the 20th edition of the race.  On our previous visits to the Infinity Addict Circuit we covered Alexander Hagberg, Akio Sobue and Bruno Coelho attempting to defend their titles.  As the reigning Modified Champion, Coelho will be looking to join a certain Atsushi Hara as the races most winning driver with four victories.  The race that has become one of the most significant Modified Touring Car Races in World after the IFMAR ISTC World Championship and always see manufacturers & drivers bring their A-game as they look to add a TITC title.  A long time sponsor of the race, Hobbywing has a 15-year relationship with the Thailand International Touring Car Championship, to give it its full title, and this year their popular Justock ESC & motor is the handout spec combo that will power the FWD class.  Our coverage from Thailand will start on February 29th through to March 3rd when the next champions enter the TITC’s history books.

View history of TITC Champions here


January 30, 2024

Schumacher Winter Series Round 5 – Report

Chris Lovely has won the fifth & penultimate round of the Schumacher Indoor Winter Series at the Louth Radio Control Car Club in the Contact RC 17.5 stock class.  In qualifying it was outgoing champion Alex Brocklebank with his Schumacher who got out the blocks first as he topped the opening qualifier.  Chris Lovely got himself up to speed taking a close encounter in q2, q3 would have the 3rd different driver and chassis at the top as Paul Sleight and his Awesoamtix. Q4 would see another change at the top and the A final positions sorted with Daniel Burks and his Destiny taking the top spot, and after four qualifying rounds and four different round winners Daniel would take the TQ honours with the top four covered by 1.5 seconds.  Dave Sedgewick would line up 5th for the A final, and Daniel Leonard with his Awesomatix would line up 6th.

Continue reading here


January 28, 2024

Orlowski adds ETS Daun win

Having kicked off 2024 with victory at the electric touring car season opening GP3F in France last weekend, Schumacher’s Michal Orlowski has made it two from two with victory at ETS Daun in Germany.  Having dominated Round 3 of the ETS at Andernach back in September but missed Round 4 due to Florida Carpet Championship offroad commitments, Orlowski returned to the championship in dominant fashion topping all four qualifier with his prototype chassis.  The Polish ace secured the TQ ahead of the Awesomatix of Round 4 winner Lucas Urbain with Xray’s Adam Izsay putting in an impressive performance to line-up third ahead of Marc Rheinard.  In the finals, Orlowski’s form continued and he took A1 from Izsay after a mistake from Urbain dropped him down the order.  In A2, Orlowski wrapped up his third victory of the ETS season when he lead home Rheinard.  While Urbain would win A3 from Izsay and Rheinard it was later two would complete the overall Modified podium.   Orlowski will being aiming for three major touring car wins in a row when he takes on MIBO International in the Czech Republic in 3-weeks time.  In Pro Stock it was Awesomatix’ Olivier Bultynck who took the TQ and win ahead of Izsay, the Hungarian coming away with two runners-up trophies from the weekend.  Lukas Ellebrock completed the Pro Stock podium.  In a busy weekend for Izsay he would get his win in the FWD class having started from the TQ.

Image: Schumacher [Facebook]


January 26, 2024

Coelho confirmed for Sunpadow International GP

Sunpadow Batteries has confirmed that back to back Touring Car World Champion Bruno Coelho will return for the return of the SIGP International RC Onroad Grand Prix which takes place from March 20-24.  Having established itself as one of the leading annual international RC events in China and attracted many of the sport’s top drivers, the last edition in 2019 saw Coelho take the Touring Car win with his Xray.   Catering for both electric and nitro onroad, the 2024 SIGP will see racing for 1:8 GP onroad, 1:8 EP onroad, 1:10 Modified Touring Car and 1:10 Stock Touring Car and will continue to offer one of the biggest prize funds in the sport with total prize money of $20,000 on offer.  Having attended previous editions of the SIGP as well as the 2017 IFMAR Electric Offroad Championship which was also hosted at the huge double track venue, Red RC will be travelling to Xiamen to cover the return of international competition on the Sunpadow Circuit.

Source: Sunpadow [sunpadow.com]


January 24, 2024

2025 IFMAR World Championship Calendar

With all of the 2023 IFMAR World Championships producing new winners, a picture of where those drivers will defend their titles is starting to come together with 2025 a year that will also see the number of World Championship titles awarded increase from 6 to 8.  With the 2-year cycle never long coming round, already confirmed is the 1:10 Offroad World Championships which was awarded to Australia after last year’s indoor event in Arizona where David Ongaro added a first Electric World title and Tater Sontag joined the elite club of World Champions.  Another event to be confirmed during the running of the 2023 edition was the 1:8 GT World Championship.  In Australia it was announced that South America would be destination with Toni Gruber set to defend his title in Peru.  Set to be only third running of the 1:8 GT World Championships, there will be two IFMAR World Championships up for grabs as Electric moves from two years of World Cup status to a full World Championship category.  After one of the most intense finals of the year in Japan, 1:8 Onroad is going to the FAMAR Bloc with Chile expected to bid to host the sport’s original World Championship.  Wrapping up the 2023 IFMAR World Championship season in Florida, where Michal Orlowski and Max Machler took the titles, 1:12 moves to the FEMCA Bloc with China widely expected to host the 22nd running of IFMAR longest running electric World Championship.  New to the calender for 2025 will be the 1:8 Electric Offroad World Championship.  Portugal will host an IFMAR World Cup this coming April for eBuggy with the host Federation expected to apply to run the inaugural World Championship for the category one year later.

View 2024 and provisional 2025 calendar here


January 22, 2024

Double BRCA 1:12 winning weekend for Payne

The 2024 BRCA 1:12 British National Championship kicked off over the weekend with Schumacher Racing’s Ollie Payne taking the Round 1 & 2 victories at the Eastbourne Electric Car Club hosted races in East Sussex.  With almost 50 entries, Saturday’s opening round saw World Championship finalist Payne secure the TQ honours from Adam Mackman after he topped all four qualifiers.  In the single 8-minute A-Main he converted that into maximum championship points with a 6-second win over 4th place qualifier Michael Bolt after he got by Mackman who completed the podium.  Round 2 of the 6 round championship on Sunday saw a repeat performance from Payne as he again secured the TQ this time from team-mate Andy Murray.  In the final Payne managed to go even quicker than Saturday as the only driver to run 36-laps with 4th place qualifier Louis Parker coming through for second ahead of 1:12 Spec World Championship runner-up Mark Stiles who completed the Top 3.

Image: BRCA 1/12th Scale Nationals [Facebook]


January 21, 2024

Orlowski opens ’24 Touring Car season with GP3F win

The new season of international Electric Touring Car action kicked off this weekend with Schumacher Racing’s Michal Orlowski taking the first honours of 2024 with the victory at the annual GP3F race in France.  The 19th edition of the MRC Longwy promoted race that has become the big season opener in recent years, newly crowned 1:12 World Champion would secure the overall TQ from defending champion Bruno Coelho after topping 3 of the four qualifiers.  A small roll in Q3 on Saturday night, meant the Polish driver would have to wait til Sunday morning to be official declared Top Qualifier, Coelho having taken Q3.  Behind it would be Mugen Seiki’s Ronald Volker who lined up third ahead of Xray’s Alexander Hagberg and the Awesomatix of leading French challenger Lucas Urbain.  In the Mains, A1 would see Orlowski set the fastest lap en route to a winning margin of 1-second over Coelho.  Coelho would try again in A2 but his challenge was short lived as he had a roll over at the end of the straight on his third lap.  In the end Hagberg finished P2 almost a second back as Orlowski claimed the overall win.  Victory in A3 would see Coelho finish runner-up with 2020 GP3F winner Volker completing the podium for the second year running ahead of Hagberg.  In Pro-Stock, it was Tim Benson who took the TQ and win ahead of Adam Izsay and Jan Ratheisky.

Image: MRC Longwy [Facebook]