Boots sets early pace at 1:8 Offroad Euros

Elliott Boots has set the early pace on the opening day of the 1:8 Offroad European Championships at Sand am Main in Germany.  The Kyosho driver set the fastest time both in terms of overall time and single fastest lap in the second of two opening 5-minute practice runs.  Behind the British driver it was 2013 podium finisher Martin Bayer who was second fastest around the unique hill side track, the Xray driver only 1 second off on the completion of 9-laps.

A damp start to proceedings at the 34th running of the championships, Boots said while happy to lay down a good early pace he is just playing the waiting game in terms of the track coming up to expected racing conditions after yesterday’s rain.  Starting the event with the same set-up he ran during the Warm-up Race back in May he was happy with how the his Reds Racing powered MP9 ran.  Describing the track surface as now being smoother than it was at the Warm-up, he said when the track does come in he expects he might have to adjust his set-up for that but for now he doesn’t want to go changing the buggy for fear of getting lost with the set-up.  Starting out the day on X4 compound Pro-Line LockDown with the sun breaking through the clouds for the second practice he switched to X3 which worked out well.

Bayer said both his runs went ‘pretty smooth’.  Finishing 5th when the championships were previously held at the Sand am Main track, the Czech driver racing for Team Losi Racing at the 2011 event, he said he was pleased with how his XB8 ran adding they have a really good base set-up for the buggy. Only making a tyre change between runs he like his rivals said he was ‘waiting to see what the track will bring’ before making any set-up changes adding he expects it to be totally different by the end of the day when drivers will complete untimed practice with an extended 9-minute run.

Team-mate Renaud Savoya, who saw his run of 3 back to back titles come to an end here in 2011, is very confident coming into this year’s event.  Despite having only had 3-weeks to get to grips with Xray’s new XB8 platform the ‘Shark’ was runner-up in France last year after a thrilling end to the race, a result he ‘was not expecting’ but having now had a competitive 12-months with the buggy  they now ‘have a very different way of thinking’ and he is positive about his chances.  With a number of prototype parts available to him, the French ace has opted so far to run only the higher shock towers as he had the opportunity to run these in pre-event testing and so far he is ‘pretty happy’ with how it has run.  Feeling the track was a little more slippery second time round, he has started out with Sweep’s Revolt and over the remaining two practices plans to back to back compare them against the Micro Contacts tyre.

Reigning Champion David Ronnefalk was pleased with his early practice pace despite having some issues with his position on the drivers stand.  Running the first practice in the 12 position (far left) on the drivers stand he said from there it was very hard to see the whoops section but moving to the 3 position for his next run he said his view of the entire track was ‘much better’.  Winner of the warm-up race,  the Kyosho driver said he ran an unchanged set-up for both runs only changing from Super Soft to Soft compound AKA Catapult tyres.  He said the change made the car easier to drive and the plan is to wait for the traction to come up before making any changes to the warm-up set-up he is running on his Orion powered MP9.

Reigning World Champion Robert Batlle, who having just joined Mugen won his second European title here three years ago, said the second run was ‘much better now, at least for me the grip came up’.  The Mugen driver said while he expects the track to change a lot over the day, declaring tomorrow will be the real start of the event, with his MBX7 as a ‘little over active’ in the second practice he will make a shock adjustment moving to a lower position on the towers. All in all the Spaniard said it was a solid start to the event but added he hoped the weather wouldn’t make for a week of guess work in terms of car set-up.

2012 Champion Darren Bloomfield showed good pace in the second of the practices taking his Agama to the 4th fastest time.  Having made a surprise departure from Team Losi Racing at the end of last season, the British said he is looking to slow down his buggy a little for the third practice.  Having gelled well with his new British based team, he said they have found a really good base set-up for the buggy which works no matter what the type of track it is and now they need to just make little tweaks.  Admitting that the class has changed a lot over recent years with tyres playing an increasingly more critical role in getting the most from a buggy, he said he will switch to a harder compound Beta Freeride tyre for the third practice which he said while it will make the buggy slower it should make it more consistent to drive and therefore faster of the full duration of the run.  Between the first two practice he said while they tried to keep pace with the track it actually passed them out when the sun came out as he went down a little in his shock oil and stuck with the same Super Soft compound tyre in order to get a direct comparison on the shock change.

In other news Team Durango are nervously awaiting news from their star Joern Neumann on whether he will able to compete in the event.  The German is in hospital with a rather serious lip infection and is trying to get doctors to release him so he can race.  His mechanic and Durango designer Gerd Strange is already set-up and ready to go racing but said based on the latest news from his driver it will be tomorrow before he knows if his drivers will be released.

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