The 1:12 World Championships, which so far has been a rather dull affair, was given a much needed injection of excitement in the second A-Main after Andy Moore won the second A-Main ahead of CRC team-mate Marc Rheinard while Leg 1 winner Naoto Matsukura finished back in 7th. The result means that now all three drivers have a chance of being crowned the 16th World Champion of the 2WD pan car class.
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There was no real surprise in the opening leg of the A-Main at the 1:12 World Championships as defending champion & Top Qualifier Naoto Matsukura dominated the race to take the win comfortably ahead of Andy Moore and Rick Hohwart despite the young Japanese star’s prototype Yokomo getting knocked around as he was lapping the mid pack three laps from the finish. Running wide at the first corner, an opportunity that the No.2 starting Associated of Ronald Volker failed to exploit, the 18-year quickly got into his rhythm to break clear of the pack. As if he needed it, that gap was further extended as the chasing pack tripped one another up on more than one occasion.
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The second round of the Greek national championship took place at the Arena Race Track. After the four qualification rounds three Shepherd drivers were placed into the A final and three into the B final. In the A final Sidiropoulos and Likaris took second and third place at the grid. After some thrilling 45 minutes the winner of the A final was Bill Likaris some three laps ahead of Sotiropoulos in second place with Christodoulou completing the podium in third place. The win brings Bill Likaris a good position for the 2012 Greek championship with Costas Sidiropoulos currently holding second place.
Source: Shepherd [team-shepherd.com]
Team CRC driver Andy Moore set a new outright fastest run time in this morning’s final qualifier for the 1:12 World Championships in the Netherlands, the sixth round turning out to be the ‘rocket’ round. Knocking 2-seconds off the previous fastest time held by defending World Champion Naoto Matsukura, the former European Champion ran 39 laps in 8:06.635 to top Q6 by just 6/10th ahead of Ronald Volker as 5 drivers finally broke past 38 laps runs something only Matsukura had achieved yesterday to secure him honour of being Top Qualifier for a third consecutive Worlds.
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Naoto Matsukura will for the third 1:12 World Championships in succession start from pole position after his rivals failed to run the magical 39-laps in the penultimate qualifier this evening in the Netherlands. With three 39-lap heats to his credit and two rounds counting towards the grid, the young Japanese star’s combined time can’t now be beaten despite one round of qualifying remaining in the morning. Like in Q4, when Rheinard was challenging Matsukura TQ pace, Q5 saw the Yokomo driver face another strong and more surprising challenge from factory Serpent driver Marc Fisher. Unfortunately for the German as the heat came up on 5-minutes his electrics overheated causing the car to shut down.
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Marc Rheinard just missed out on becoming the only driver other than defending World Champion Naoto Matsukura to complete a 39-lap run at the 1:12 World Championships in the Netherlands when he took his Speed Passion powered prototype CRC to a 38/8:00.858 run in the third round of qualifying. While Matsukura produced his third TQ run of the day with a new fastest time and outright fastest lap, all the attention is on the battle behind him which is building up between regular Touring Car rivals Rheinard, Jilles Groskamp, Ronald Volker and Alexander Hagberg.
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Team Orion have announced that German racer Torsten Müller has joined their racing team for the remainder of 2012 and beyond. The East Germany based 1/8 on-road racer, who is successfully competing in the South German Championship, has chosen the Team Orion CRF R21 Factory Team engine to power his Shepherd ride. Torsten had the following to say about his move:
I saw the results that Team Orion achieved with their 1/8 off-road and 1/10 scale touring engines and gave the R21 a try. The tests were successfully and I was impressed how powerful the R21 engine is and how stable it performs. I’m pretty happy with my decision to use Team Orion engines in my next races.
Source: Kyosho [kyosho.de]
There was no surprise in the opening round of qualifying for the 1:12 World Championships with Naoto Matsukura topping the 8-minute heat by a considerable margin from the CRC’s of Marc Rheinard and Simo Ahomiemi. Like in yesterday’s practice, the reigning World Champion was the only driver to record a 39-lap run with his Yokomo once again setting the fastest lap with a 12.203 which was near on identical to his 12.202 record set in controlled practice.
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