Kaerup tops practice in Australia

Practice at the IFMAR 1:10 2WD Offroad World Championships is complete with Team Associated’s Marcus Kaerup setting the fastest time in the fourth & final round at the Hills RC Offroad track in Sydney.  With Schumacher’s Michal Orlowski the early benchmark with the fastest time after the opening two rounds, the second half of free practice would see Associated drivers come to the fore as Orlowski struggled with the latest track conditions.  In the third round it was American driver Davey Batta who set the pace ahead of team-mate Kaerup before the Dane switched that order in the final practice with both the fastest 5-minute run and 3-consecutive laps.  2.5-second off, Batta was second fastest with former double World Champion Spencer Rivkin completing the all B7 Top 3.  Over 3-laps Kouki Kato was closest to Kaerup, the Japanese driver’s 5-minute time not representative of his true pace as he missed the first lap because his Associated wasn’t switched on when the cars left pit lane.  A driver on his first ever visit to Australia, French National Champion Clement Boda wrapped up an impressive practice by posting the fastest lap of Round 4 and fourth fastest over his 3 best laps behind team-mate Davide Ongaro.

Reacting to his final free practice run Kaerup said, ‘The last one was very good, we did some changes to the car to get more steering and we tried a different tyre but for some reason it didn’t do what we thought it would do but it was faster.  The run before was also good, really consistent, just wasn’t fast enough but the changes we made definitely made the car faster now.’  Asked what front tyre he tried, Kaerup replied simply with, ‘not a pin tyre’.  Asked what it didn’t do he said, ‘I wanted more steering but I feel like the tyre we tried carried more speed instead of scrubbing but it had the same amount of steering which is pretty weird.’  Planning to make some set-up changes the team have in order to get the tyre to work better, he plans to stick with it for the first seeding round.’  Asked how the track is evolving and holding up, the 17-year-old said, ‘I think it’s pretty good right now, it has grooved up and there is a black line so there is a lot of grip.’

Multiple Japanese 1:10 National Champion Kato, who is normally representing Infinity in 1:8 Buggy but is here representing Team Associated’s Japanese distributor Team AJ, was pleased with his showing in practice on the track he described as ‘beautiful’.  Happy with his 3-lap pace but slightly embarrassed by missing the start of the run because his buggy wasn’t powered on, the newly crowned Asian Buggy Championships Champion said his car was working ‘very nice’.  In terms of front tyres, having started with a pin in Round 1, he switched to Ribs from Round 2 and says he is happy to stick with these.’

Reacting to his final two practice runs in which he laid down the 3rd fastest 3-consecutive laps Ongaro said, ‘We were always in the Top 5, Top 6, which is good for me, we just need to find some small things that help me with the power settings.’ He continued, ‘We are testing different front tyres, I was using the bar tyre in the front that one but they are all working pretty much similar so I just need to find the right confidence with one, overall I’m happy and it’s not too bad.’  Asked about the power setting, the Hobbywing sponsored driver said, ‘we are working on the brake feeling, I want more feeling but all is good’, Salton Dong going through the settings for his star Italian driver.  Summing up free practice, the reigning 4WD World Champion said, ‘right now it’s all good and hopefully it will continue or get better but I’m happy.’

Asked how he felt about his performance, recent 1:8 eBuggy World Championship finalist Boda replied, ‘pretty good, pretty good’.  He explained, ‘we tried another set-up in the last one and the car was much better so we need to try change it again to see if it is better or not for tomorrow’s qualifying.  But for now we are happy with the work we make together with Davide (Ongaro) and all the Associated team.  It’s getting better and better so we are happy for our first time in Australia.’  Running JConcepts’ Dirt Webs front tyre in the final free practice, the 20-year-old said he tried a different front tyre each round because he has no reference on how the tyres work on this track adding that France has nothing similar to this but he loves the dirt surface and layout here.  Planning to try another front in the first controlled practice, he feels the track will be most consistent in terms of conditions between the day’s final two evening time controlled practice rounds.

Here for the Pre-Worlds back in April, Batta explaining, ‘my stuff wasn’t that good at that race.  I came back home, knew what the conditions felt like, and I found the track near by me that was most similar and then just lived there for a month, and it seems to be paying dividends.’  Asked how he felt practice had gone, the 20-year-old said, ‘it’s going good now as the car is starting to come around.  I have just been breaking in tyres.’  He continued, ‘I feel like the car is easy to drive but it’s feeling a little pushy right now so I think there is some more speed in it if I just find a little bit of steering and get the car to rotate a little quicker.’  He concluded, ‘The hardest part was finding the grip so now I just gotta get the speed back.’

‘Just getting slower and slower’, that was Orlowski’s reply when asked why he wasn’t in the mix over the final two practice runs.  The Polish driver added, ‘we are trying small things but it looks like the car doesn’t work in the way the track is developing at the minute.  Some cars are going well in the team so we will just talk about the differences of the different cars and hopefully find a good lap time with my car as well.’  Asked if the car feels slower to drive or if their rivals have gotten faster he said, ‘It feels weird to drive, and inconsistent through the corners.’