Boots is eBuggy World Championship Top Seed
Sworkz’s Elliott Boots is the Top Seed at the first ever IFMAR 1:8 Offroad World Championship, the British driver set to carry the No.1 sticker on his buggy in the top heat as qualifying gets underway in Portugal tomorrow. The former Nitro Buggy Worlds Top Qualifier claimed the Top Seeding ahead of Michal Orlowski after he bettered the Schumacher team driver’s first round time by 6/10ths of a second. Fresh from winning the European Championship title in 1:10 Electric Touring Car for the very first time over the weekend, Orlowski couldn’t better his opening time ending up fifth fastest for the second round. Behind Boots it would be the Xray of David Ronnefalk who set the second fastest time to end seeding in P3 ahead of team-mate Dakotah Phend. Completing the Top 3 times for CP2, Team Associated’s Marcus Kaerup completed Day 2 of the championship in P5 ahead of the Sworkz of Juan Carlos Canas. Reigning back to back Nitro Buggy World Champion & back to back European eBuggy Champion Davide Ongaro ends practice seeding P8 behind Mayako’s Pekko Iivonen.
Reacting to topping seeding, Boots said, ‘It was good in the end. We made a few little changes throughout the day. We’ve kind of been there or thereabouts and it was just finding that time of between half a second and 8/10ths over 3-laps really and then I think we found even more on the overall time so that was really good.’ Asked about his set-up and if he made any significant changes the multiple European Champion and reigning British Champion replied, ‘Not really, I mean we kind of drifted back to our original kind of set-up. We’ve done like the usual try some stuff and then go back to what we know so I am glad we have done that going into qualifying. The car was fast, some places it was a bit edgy but I was watching a lot of cars and I think the track changes depending on the sun. Other than that I’m very very happy. We found a bit of pace so I’ve got time that I can back off the car and still have good pace.’
On his performance Orlowski explained, ‘We tried something since we already had one good round and I thought maybe we could find some more speed but the car became really edgy so we are just going to go back’. Asked what the change was, the 2023 European eBuggy Champion said, ‘I tried different rims and they made the car really difficult so we will go back to the one we know works well and it should be good.’ He added, ‘In the morning we have an 8-minute practice so maybe we can try something in that but also it would be nice to have a good run just for confidence going into qualifying.’
Summing up CP2 Ronnefalk said, ‘I struggled a lot at the start of that one. I changed a few things on the car and it drove really different to the run before and I guess I didn’t realise that I had to drive different so I crashed a couple of times.’ Securing the 2025 Nitro Buggy European Championship title for the fourth time earlier this month at the Barcelos track, he continued, ‘I reset and drove a lot better towards the end and was able to ticked off 5,6 laps.’ Asked if once he adapted his driving to the set-up if he liked it, the Swede said, ‘I definitely liked some of it. I think now I had a different kind of issue, I was missing a little bit of rotation in the middle of the corners so when I was on power it was pushy on the exit.’ He concluded, ‘A little more mid corner rotation for tomorrow and I think we’ll be good.’
So far the only driver taking the challenge to the Europeans, on his CP2 performance Phend said, ‘Not as good but I learnt which was the important part. I went a little bit too hard on the tyre but now I know with this weather where I need to be at tyre wise so that’s good.’ The American continued, ‘I think I kind of know now a little bit car wise a couple of things I need to do from the team and things they tried so we’re going to make some small changes to the car for tomorrow and we will be in a good position.’ Looking to qualifying he said, ‘I feel it is a little bit different the 5-minute qualifiers versus a 10-minute qualifier, you kind of have to have that intensity right away and be on pace really quickly. Keeping that in I’ll keep an eye on that in the practice in the morning and how quickly we get out of the gate compared to the others and go from there.’
‘It wasn’t eating the ground this time’, a reference to his CP1 ride height error, Kaerup was pleased with his second effort. Also changing shock oil to make it softer, he said ‘it was better’ adding ‘we may even go softer but the package is working really good and I am pretty satisfied so we don’t want to make too many changes.’ On his approach for the first of the five rounds of qualifying he said, ‘we’ve tried different compounds (of tyres) and I am pretty sure we can push it out of the gate so we have a good chance for a Top 3 tomorrow or TQ, but it is going to take a hell of a lot of concentration.’ The 17-year-old explained, ‘the track is easy but it is hard to go fast without crashing.’
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