Radio Controlled Cars

Last weekend saw the second running of the Bittydesign contest in Barco di Bibbiano in Italy. With 180 entries, and 130 actual drivers, the race saw drivers from Spain, Czech Republic, Germany, UK, Switzerland, Austria and of course Italy, with official factory team Losi drivers like Ricki Rabitti and Darren Bloomfield present, as well as top Spanish driver Richi Gomez in attendance. With a DJ set, awesome trophy girl, free cocktail party and giveaways donated by the event sponsors, this is not your standard race. The racing saw a cool race format which is aimed at being as spectacular as possible with the top drivers having to qualify through Superpole as well as a last chance qualifier just like in US supercross. The A-main was a great race to see, with the front runners putting on an amazing show. After 45 minutes it was Bloomfield that took the win, with Rabitti in 2nd place, 20 seconds behind. Gomez took 3rd position after a race with lot of spectacular passes. Everyone agreed that the event has been a great success, and there has already been some international rumors for next year.

Source: Bitty Design [bittydesign.net]

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Following their announcement two days ago that they had signed Christer Andersson, Capricorn have finalised a contract with Danish racer Martin Christensen. Martin, who won the recent European Championship warmup race in Sweden with the LAB-C01, was one of the first development drivers for the car having raced it on its debut at the European Championships in Italy last summer. Martin will also the LAB E01 engine as well as Capricorn tires and fuel this season.

Source: Capricorn [capricornrc.com]

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Last weekend saw the EFRA Grand Prix 1/8 IC on road run at the beautiful AMCA track in Apeldoorn, The Netherlands. A relatively low attendance of drivers for a GP, but with plenty of famous names of European top drivers attending it was sure to be very close racing for everybody and a highly competitive event. TQ went to Belgium driver Ilia van Gastel ahead of Serpent team mate Michael Salven, with Rick Vrielijnck in 3rd for Mugen and Oliver Mack taking the final direct qualifying position for Shepherd in 4th. The Fastest lap time of the event was done by Belgian race Gunther van Staey, a 14.078 seconds, which he did in qualifying round 3 on Saturday afternoon.

The semi finals saw some very exciting close racing and in some cases one hundredth of a second difference in the 20 minutes sub finals results meant climbing up to the higher finals or not. Before the main final all 10 main final drivers were individually presented to the audience, by announcing their name, car brand engine, etc, and their sponsors while driving 2 or 3 laps on the track.

In the 45 minutes main final it was Ilia van Gastel who drove a very strong race from pole, resulting in a 4 lap winning margin of 2nd placed Rick Vrielijnck. Ilia only temporarily handed over the lead to Michael Salven during a tyre change halfway into the 45 minutes main final. Unfortunately after the race Michael’s fuel tank was found by technical inspection to be more than 125cc after the main final. So Ilia took a convincing win, with second place claimed by Dutch driver Rick Vrielijnck and third place going to German driver Tobias Hepp.

Main Final Result
1. Ilia van Gastel, 182 laps
2. Rick Vrielijnck, 178 laps
3. Tobias Hepp, 178 laps
4. Oliver Mack, 175 laps
5. Steven Cuypers, 174 laps
6. Clive Connolly, 173 laps
7. Gunther van Staey, 169 laps
8. John Ermen, 115 laps
9. Tom Smolderen, 79 laps
10. Michael Salven, 0 laps
Full results can be found here

Source: AMCA [amcaracing.nl]

Eoghain Events, Gas, International, News, R On Road, Racing Radio Controlled Cars

Last weekend saw the Nordic Championships take place in 1/10th 2WD and 4WD buggy at the Radøy raceway in Norway, not too far from Bergen. The race featured a really strong field with champions from Norway, Sweden and Finland in contention.2WD kicked off with a wet track making the standings a little unexpected initially, but with a drying track for the final two rounds the results really changed as PerErik Nordman came into shape with his Kyosho Ultima RB-5 SP2 and won the last two of the 4 rounds of qualifying making him the top qualifier.

Finals were quite exciting as the wind got stronger and track temperatures went up and down all through the afternoon. PerErik and Kjell-Gunnar Guttormsen battled all through A-main 1 but after a solid overtaking maneuver PerErik held a firm grip on the lead as he won the first round. A-main 2 ended with a DNF for PerErik after he crashed out and Kjell-Gunnar won the round making him a hot contender for the overall win ahead of the last round. A-main 3 saw PerErik scamper off to take the win with a solid run ahead of a fast David Ronnefalk and Ketil Petersen.

2WD podium:
1. PerErik Nordman – Kyosho/Orion
2. Kjell-Gunnar Guttormsen – Team Associated/LRP
3. Ketil Petersen – Team Associated

4WD was run on Sunday in fantastic conditions with a dry track and plenty of sunshine throughout the day. Practice showed this was a race about PerErik Nordman and 1/8th scale ace David Ronnefalk as they matched each other all through the event with quite a gap to third. Former Swedish Champion Otto Ausfelt was the only one who got close to the pace of David & PerErik’s Orion powered Kyosho Lazer ZX-5 FS2 cars.

PerErik and David split the four rounds of qualifying equally winning two rounds each, PerErik had a better time and took TQ with a margin of 0.6s ahead of David. David proved a little more consistent than PerErik through the finals as he won the race with a really strong drive in A-main 1 & 2. PerErik won the last round securing a 1-2 victory for the Swedish Kyosho team.

4WD podium:
1. David Ronnefalk – Kyosho/Orion
2. PerErik Nordman – Kyosho/Orion
3. Otto Ausfelt – Yokomo

Thanks to PerErik Nordman for the report.

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Capricorn RC have announced that front running electric touring driver Christer Andersson has signed a 2 year deal with the Italian company to run their LAB-C01 200mm has chassis. The Finnish driver will race the car this year at the World Championships in Houston, Texas, as well as the European Championships in Sweden later in the summer.

Source: Capricorn [capricornrc.com]

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