29.01.2014 6 comments Video: 1 available
report by Donald Stark (VRC race reporter)
2014 Season 1, Round 2 @ Padova
Pro Class Modified 4wd Short Course
After the dust settled from the 1/8th scale world championships at Padova, the track was still in good shape and ready to host round two of the Short Course series. Anytime Martin “the Wizard” Wollanka shows up, the competition has to be read to go. The first round of qualifying would prove this point as Martin piloted his car to a seven second win over Nicholas “Lunchbox” Loriot and the rest of the field. Loriot would however strike back in the second qualifier, grabbing the TQ spot for this event. Now the field was set.
The starting order was as follows:
1. Nicolas Loriot
2. Antoine Rossetti
3. Martin Wollanka
4. Barnabás Tóth
5. Eben Coetzee
6. Billy Caley
7. Francis Wathlet
8... read more
27.01.2014 3 comments Video: 1 available
report by Donald Stark (VRC race reporter)
We are just getting started, 2014 has many new surprises, great competition and new racers coming to contest for world series titles.
Pro class A Main Event
The Horn Sounds, “and were off to the races” Kirby Backemeyer dropped the hammer right off the start and propelled his Proline Topped Team Associated SC10 the front of the pack. It was however short lived as Jerome dJay Delcourt began to smooth out and check out. Antoine “Frosty” Rosetti, an early favorite found the pressure to be too much as he performed a perfect lid slide down the back side of the concrete turn table. And this is just the first half of the first lap. First place was set but second through seventh was a battle Royall. Kirby was sitting pretty in second place, they say slow and steady wins the race but slow and steady is in the “S” main this is the A-Main baby and you need to find the fine line between fast and dis... read more
21.01.2014 10 comments Video: 1 available
PRO Class
Former IFMAR World Champion and Team Associated works driver Neil Cragg from the UK has taken top honors at the first race of Season 1 at Psycho Nitro Blast '12. The 20 minute long final saw Neil coming out on top after a fierce battle with David Barcena from Spain and Barnabas Toth from Hungary. These 3 racers changed the lead several times, and only in the last 2 laps Cragg managed to drive away and to win with 2 seconds margin on the finish line. Hiromu Fujii from Japan and Dan Marson from Canada had close race together, but after 3 mistakes in the last 3 laps Fujii had to let Marson by to finish 5th.
A-Main PRO
1 Neil Cragg GB 29 20:12.480
2 David Barcena ES 29 20:14.854
3 Barnabás Tóth HU 29 20:17.874
4 Dan Marson CA 29 20:39.054
5 Hiromu Fujii JP 29 20:41.200
6 Patrick Auvinet FR 28 20:04.849
7 Matthew Stacey CA 28 20:05.718
8 Ivan Kuyda RU 28 20:18.774
9 Nicolas Loriot FR DNS
10 Dean Steenmans ZA DNS
Check out the video with our new race commentator Brian Tow... read more
20.01.2014 7 comments Video: 1 available
Report on the 2013 1:8 nitro Sportscar World Championships at Heemstede, the Netherlands.
PRO class
17 Year old Team Associated team driver Kevin Pignotti (Italy) has been the star in the 2013 VRC Worlds with winning all 3 World Championships he participated in. The last one was the 1:8 nitro on-road Worlds at Heemstede which he won by a devastating 6 lap advantage over his 9 rivals. Kevin drove the perfect race, with just 1 tire change and without requiring a turn marshal even once in the 60 minute long A-Main final, quite incredible! Kevin recorded his fastest lap in lap 11, 13.292 sec. His race average, excluding the pit stops for refueling and the tire stop was 13.599. An incredible pace to score a faultless 258 lap victory.
Kevin Pignotti taking the lead and never looked back, Toth and Duthie... read more
16.01.2014 10 comments Video: 1 available
Report by Donald Stark (VRC race reporter)
2013 VRC WORLDS 1:8 NITRO BUGGY
December 18th 2013 marked the beginning of the 1/8th scale nitro buggy in VRC. The long awaited release caused an influx of members into the Virtual RC Racing community which was reflected in the number of entries at the inaugural Virtual RC World Championship. Over 1000 drivers registered for the event and 896 actually contested for the championship.
Throughout the week much attention was placed on set ups, since this is a brand new class there are certain things that were making life difficult for drivers. The first issue that had to be considers was fuel consumption and tuning. During the ten minute qualifier some drivers found they had to pit 6 minutes into the race. With a little tuning and carful use of the throttle it was possible to make 10 – 11 minutes before pitting. Then ... read more
03.01.2014 1 comment Video: 1 available
Italian super talent Kevin Pignotti has added a second VRC World Championship to a very successful 2013 season. Not only did he win the Italian 1:10 ISTC championship in 2013, earning him a factory drive for Team Associated in 2014, he already won the 1:10 nitro 200mm VRC Worlds 2 weeks earlier as well and just last week the 1:8 nitro sportscar VRC Worlds title at Heemstede. Full report to follow, but you can already start enjoying the A-Main Pro final at the Heemstede Indoor track commented by Mike Garrison of LiveRC.
03.01.2014 14 comments Video: 1 available
Report by Donald Stark (VRC race reporter)
The Track
This year the race will be held at the site of the 2013 2wd and 4wd Buggy World Championship track in Chico California. The track is a sugar coated clay base with mad grip. The release date was set for the day the event would start. As it drew closer to that day the anticipation mounted. Drivers began to grumble about the late release and VRC ended up releasing the track a week early leaving plenty of time for set up and practice. This was a great decision based on the difficulty level of the track. Traction was good, on a scale from one to ten I would rate it a 7. The 14 turns and 10 jumps left drivers scratching their heads in wonder. It was apparent that turning faster lap times would require a perfect setup, jet fighter reflexes, patience’s of a saint and a little bit of luck. The fast line seemed to lead to an off camber jump out of every turn and this gave the short course t... read more
