Rheinard cruises to easy Leg 1 victory

Marc Rheinard has moved one step closer to defending his World Championship title with an easy win in the first of the three A-Mains here in Germany.  The Top Qualifier led from start to finish to head home his young Tamiya team-mate Elliot Harper with Kyosho’s Christopher Krapp completing the Top 3.

Rheinard’s race was made all the more easier when fellow TRF driver Jilles Groskamp spun out in the second corner delaying the chasing pack.  The German said the race was easy ‘when the field crash behind you’ but said there was a serious lack of traction and feels this is partly due to the 24-minute gap between the B and A final.  IFMAR race director Frans Heinsbroek has taken onboard the drivers comments and has issued a new timetable for the remaining two Legs that reduces the gap to 14-minutes.  Chasing his third title in the only the 6th running of the ISTC World Championship, Rheinard just hopes the second Leg is as easy.

The star of the last World Championship in which he finished an excellent 5th overall, Harper was very happy with his run to second.  The British teenager, who started seventh on the grid with his Speed Passion powered Tamiya, he just kept the run clean and stayed out trouble and this paid dividends.

Staying just in front of Harper on the grid, Krapp was very happy with third.  The German found himself 9th after the first lap following contact but got lucky as others ahead of him made mistakes.  Competing in his first Worlds A-Main the very personable teenager said he was very nervous but with Leg 1 out of the way and a good result to his credit he said he should be more relaxed for the next encounter.

The man most expected to challenge Rheinard for the win was Groskamp but the Dutch driver had a terrible race.  Getting out of shape on lap one, he set about a recovery drive but on trying to pass Hayato Matsuzaki the Yokomo driver clashed with him.  Clearly very annoyed with the Japanese racer the TRF driver retired on lap 8 having just recorded the fastest lap of the race.  Afterward he said his Orion powered TRF416 was badly damaged and it was going to be hard to come back from this but he will give it his best shot.

Paul Lemieux looked strong in the opening leg but trying to chase down Rheinard he caught curb on lap 16.  Running in second spot the American was running faster laps than the Champion and in an attempt to further reduce the gap he tried to tighen up his lines but just after setting his fastest lap of the race he rolled over a curb but the car landed awkwardly and he crossed the track marker losing over 4.5 seconds as he tried to get back on the track. In the end he ended where he started, finishing in fifth position.

Lemieux’s Xray team-mate Alexander Hagberg finished a very disappointing 6th. The Swede was very annoyed at getting a Stop & Go penalty after getting caught up in an incident between two other drivers.  Best of the Yokomo’s was Matsuzaki in 7th followed by team-mates Yannic Pruemper and pre-event favourite Ronald Völker.

Result A-Main Leg 1
1. Marc Rheinard (Tamiya TRF416) – 23/5:00.121
2. Elliott Harper (Tamiya TRF416) – 23/5:03.661
3. Christopher Krapp (Kyosho TF6) – 23/5:06.076
4. Viktor Wilck (Tamiya TRF416) – 23/5:07.421
5. Paul Lemieux (Xray T3) – 23/5:07.716
6. Alexander Hagberg (Xray T3) – 23/5:08.427
7. Hayato Matsuzaki (Yokomo BD5) – 23/5:11.285
8. Yannic Pruemper (Yokomo BD5) – 23/5:11.548
9. Ronald Völker (Yokomo BD5) – 23/5:11.837
10.Jilles Groskamp (Tamiya TRF416) – 7/1:42.230

View our event image gallery here.