Coelho continues to set pace at Yatabe Arena
Bruno Coelho continues to set the practice pace at the 1:10 Offroad World Championships in Japan, the Xray driver setting a new fastest 3-consecutive laps in the third round. Behind the Touring Car World Championship runner-up, Kyosho driver Yusuke Sugiura and Yokomo’s Lee Martin complete the Top 3 on the times despite both drivers not bettering their times from the second round.
‘Super good’ was how Coelho summed up how his first electric offroad Worlds was starting out in 4WD. Having made some changes to his LRP powered XB4, the Portuguese driver said it was now landing much better and was suffering less from traction roll on the astro turf Yatabe Arena track. The 22-year-old said with the ‘car working really well’ he now only needs to work on improving his consistency over the length of the run. Over half a seconds faster than his closest rival, Coelho has also recorded the fastest lap with a 17.184.
Former Japanese National Champion Sugiura said his Kyosho is ‘so good’ adding its ‘easy to drive but still fast’. The 19-year-old said having suffered with oversteer, a change to a harder front spring had made the car much better. For the fourth & final practice before the event moves into two rounds of controlled practice which will seed the heats for qualifying, the Warm-up Race podium finisher plans to lower his ride height.
‘Not too bad’ was how Martin summed up his performance so far although the British ace admitted a change for P3 was ‘not so good’. Feeling the change to his Muchmore powered YZ-4 was the wrong direction for the next run they will go in the opposite way with the set-up. Martin said one big problem due to the speed of the track is getting clear laps. Saying ‘a few people have the track figured our’ he said ‘Bruno is the standard for now’. A driver he battled with for victory at the EOS season opener only two weeks ago, he said Coelho and his Xray team are one step ahead at the moment but he was confident they can catch up by the end of the day.
Travis Amezcua finds himself an impressive fourth at the end of three rounds. Travelling 2-hours away to the GB Circuit yesterday where he was joined by HB’s Ty Tessmann, the Team Durango driver said having found a good set-up there he hasn’t had to change his car this morning. Only trying different preparations of the handout front Schumacher tyre, he said with the car already good he just needs to work on the consistency of getting on the power and braking so that he is doing it the same lap after lap. For his next practice Amezcua will change motor and speedo.
Fourth fastest, Jared Tebo said things were going ‘alright’ adding ‘it could be better, it could be worse’. The Kyosho driver and Warm-up Race runner-up said his Orion powered ZX6 is good but he had issues with braking in the last run. Runner a new design centre diff in P3 he said this left him with not enough brake. Having to stay on the brakes too long as a result he said this was causing him to flip as he turned in. Planning to ‘mess around with motors’ he said he still hadn’t run the car with a slipper yet.
Competing the Top 6 ahead of the Schumacher of European Champion Michal Orlowski, Naoto Matuskura said his performance so far was ‘so, so’. The warm-up Race winner is looking for more traction from his Kyosho. The reigning Touring Car and multiple 1:12 World Champion will make a number of changes for P4 and liking the track layout he is confident he can improve on his current pace.
New 2WD World Champion Spencer Rivkin finds himself only 17th, the best Associated being Neil Cragg in 14th. The 16-year-old said ‘we’re getting a little better’ adding the ‘car was more consistent that one’. Planning to gear up his Reedy motor for the next run, he said ‘we might not have the fastest car but its not a problem at this stage, its only practice’. Senior team-mate Ryan Cavalieri is currently 15th fastest.
View our full event image gallery here.
