Greiner is Top Seed in Thailand
Dominic Greiner is the top seed for qualifying at the 1:10 Nitro World Championship in Thailand. The Capricorn posting the fastest time of the day in the fourth & final round of seeding practice. Ending yesterday’s controlled practice at the top of the time sheets, the German found himself only P9 as the seeding got underway this morning at the challenging RC Addict track. Improving to fourth in the second round, he would make his mark on the second half of the day topping the remaining two rounds with his fastest 3-consecutive laps of the day in Round 2 giving him the tie-breaker over Tadahiko Sahashi. Fastest in the opening two rounds, Sahashi lost his edge as the track traction came up, his best 3-laps on his final attempt being 6/10th off that of Greiner. The most consistent driver of the day, Jilles Groskamp completed the day with the 3rd fastest time and that is where he is seeded for qualifying thanks to his second fastest times in the earlier three runs. Posting P4 runs in the final two rounds, Mugen’s Shoki Takahata will carry the No.4 in the top heat while a strong final round for Dario Balestri lifted him from 11th to 5th in the final ranking. An impressive performance from Milan Holthuis sees the young Dutch driver in the top heat as the 6th seed just ahead of reigning champion Naoto Matsukura.
Summing up his performance in the final practice, his closest rival Dario Balestri being 4/10ths off over the 3-laps, Greiner said, ‘It was like yesterday’s last run, again the car had too little steering but it was still fast and super easy to drive’. Having changed his car after the final controlled practice in search of more steering that resulted in a car with too much steering in the first seeding run of this morning. Based on this experience, the former World Champion intends to leave the car unchanged saying, ‘this set-up is good for the first qualifier’. With the focus now turning to 7-minute runs for qualifying, Greiner believes he has the consistency. With a fuel stop required, he added that choosing the right time to refuel so as to have a clear pit lane would be an important aspect of the qualifying.
Sahashi said for the final practice his car was ‘a little bit difficult’ to drive. Describing the track as ‘high bit’, he said he had to ‘drive so careful not to flip’. Finding the morning conditions suiting his car better, the former 1:8 World Champion is confident he will have a good car for Q1, three rounds of qualifying on the timetable for Day 1 of qualifying.
‘It was close with the other guys but my tyres came in later than the others. I need to work on getting the (handout) tyres more broken in before the start’, said Groskamp about the final practice. With drivers getting a 4-minute warm-up before the start of their qualifiers, he continued, ‘The pace is good and the car doesn’t flip. I drove together with Dominic and we have the same speed. The car and me are consistent, so let’s see what happens tomorrow’.
Being one of a number of drivers to flip off the track during the final seeding round, Takahata replied, ‘so, so’ when asked if he felt ready for qualifying. The reigning 1:8 World Champion said his MTX-7 is ‘working good’ but admitted it was ‘also easy to flip’. Feeling the track is the biggest and totally uncontrollable factor here in Bangkok he hopes to be able to use the experience he gained throughout practice to adapt the car to the conditions.
‘Finally and just in time’, was the reaction of a relieved looking Balestri after posting the second fastest time in the concluding round of practice. He continued, ‘I tried everything and found something’. Asked what was the biggest thing he improved on the car, he said it was having the right sway bar set-up for the conditions. ‘The track changes every run. It is not easy to drive here as you are fighting the limits always. It is the most difficult conditions I have experienced’.
Having opened the day with an impressive P3 but then dropped well down the other in Rounds 2 & 3 before coming back with a P7 in the last one, Holthuis explained his mid day slump. ‘In the second one a screw came out in the gearbox so I have no warm-up and in the third one I had an issue with the engine which is OK now. The last one there was no problems so I was able to get another good run’. Asked his approach for qualifying, he said, ‘Just drive steady because a lot of people flip, myself included, I flipped twice on the last one. It is all about being consistent’.
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