Chassis – Team Associated RC8e B4.1
ESC – Hobbywing XR8 Pro G3
Motor – Hobbywing Xerun G3 1900KV
Battery – EZ Power 6300mAh Shortie Packs
Tires – JConcepts Arina
Radio/Servo – Futaba 10PX / OZ RC McBride Series
Body – Xtreme Aria
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Chassis – WIRC SBXE-3
ESC – Hobbywing XR8 Pro G2S
Motor – Hobbywing Xerun 4268 G3 2200KV
Battery – Protek 6400mAh Shortie Packs
Tires – JConcepts Falcon
Radio/Servo – KO Propo Hara Edition / Power HD GTS-6
Body – JConcepts S15
Notes – We photographed Kasey’s SBXE-3 just after it had just won A3 to secure an overall podium, hence the extra extra layer of dirt it is sporting in the images. Also Kasey highlighted it is fitted with a Hyperspeed Lab carbon wing button.
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He may have got off to a slow start in eBuggy, but Kyle McBride came away with the win at the opening round of the Cayote backed Asian Buggy Championships in Pukekohe, New Zealand. After two exciting A-Main encounters on Saturday, it was a three way battle for the overall win going into A3 on Sunday – McBride having won A1, Top Qualifier Logan Toia winning A2, and a second place in A1 putting Caleb Noble in contention. With Toia leading them away, he and McBride would tangle on the opening lap causing chaos in the chasing pack. Starting from the 3rd spot, it was WIRC’s Kasey Dawson who came through that the best to lead at the end of the first lap. From there the top seed & Q1 winner managed to see off the challenge of Mayako’s Jayden Edmunds to take the win with McBride crossing the line in third. Overall with his A1 win and second in A2 it was McBride’s victory ahead of Toia, who pulled off in A3 in frustration of the driving standards, while an over the moon Dawson completed the podium at his home track.
Summing up A3, McBride described it as ‘extremely hectic’ adding, ‘it was a crazy start, everyone was going for it. I think I got into the back of someone then had to wait and then I got cleaned out after that and then yeah, I don’t know what was happening, it was a crazy run.’ The Australian continued, ‘about half way through I got to settle down a little bit, everyone sort of got in their places, and I ran smooth race from there and I got a third place.’ Asked if he was aware of what was going on in the overall in terms of points he explained, ‘I knew as long as I beat Logan and Caleb I was sweet. They were ahead after the start and all the carnage, then I think Logan crashed, same with Caleb, and yeah I just ran clean from there. As soon as I got in front of them I was like alright just calm down and finish the race.’ On the overall result he said, ‘I’m pretty happy with the win. I pretty much never run eBuggy only at big events so I haven’t run it in a long time. It was a bit of a learning curve coming back into it. Considering how my qualifying went, which was pretty average, it was a pretty good improvement and we got it figured out in the end.’
Asked about the hectic start to A3, Toia said, ‘I don’t really have much to say about it. I’m quite angry about it so yeah, the car was good but I got driven over the top of’. On his second place overall, the 17-year-old said, ‘I’m happy, I definitely wanted more but that’s the way racing goes. I’ll go again in nitro.’
One of the happiest drivers of the weekend, asked about the deciding A-Main, Dawson said, ‘She was a hectic start with pile up in the top right hand corner that I did end up getting stuck into. I tried to go round and got taken out as well, and then somehow we got to the apex and I’d muscled my way past and got to the lead. We towed around for a couple of laps and I started to get a gap but everyone started crashing so I had a huge lead there at one point until Jayden (Edmunds) slowly reeled me in. After that I just tried to keep my lines tidy and drive good and managed to do that. Jayden caught right up to me right at the end and I tell you what I was rattled.’ He continued, ‘I knew before the race that if I won it would put me on the podium no matter what happened anyone else. Top Seed, a TQ run and then a Main win wasn’t on my bingo card for this event. I was hoping for Top 5 in both classes and a podium was a very far cry. Dreams do come true’. Admitting to tearing up on the drivers stand after winning A3, he said, ‘I put some much time, effort and money into this, for me but also the Rouge RC boys to give them something back is a great feeling. All the time Ben Young puts in with me especially on practice days its great to thank them for that with this result.’
eBuggy at the Asian Buggy Championships season opener produced two exciting A-Main encounters on Saturday that resulted in Kyle McBride and Logan Toia taking a win apiece to send the decider into Sunday’s A3 in New Zealand. With HB Racing’s Toia securing the TQ, the Kiwi’s stint at the front was short lived in A1 as a first lap mistake dropped him right to the back of the field. Up front it seemed for a time that no one wanted to lead the 10-minute encounter with Kasey Dawson, Jayden Edmunds, Caleb Noble and Kyle McBride all throwing away the lead when they got a chance at the front. As the race reached half distance things settled down with McBride hitting the front again but this time the Aussie stayed there for the win ahead of Noble who saw off a number of challenges from Toia as he made an impressive recovery drive. In A2, second place qualifier McBride got by Toia on lap 1 but quickly gave it back before Noble took a turn at the front for 4-laps. Chased down by McBride, the Australians would come together resulting in both getting stuck in the piping. As they got marshalled, Toia went back to the front and despite McBride’s best efforts stayed there for the win with Noble third – the Tekno driver clearly not impressed by McBride’s driving. With his second in A1, Noble still however has a chance at the overall win in A3.
Summing up A1, Toia said, ‘I had mistake on lap 1 and then I got caught up with Kyle again in the whoops, that was just unlucky, wrong time, wrong place. I was dead last on the second lap and clawed my way back to third, my last lap pass was awesome. Clearly delighted and at the same relieved after his A2 win he described the race as ‘phenomenal’. The 17-year-old continued, ‘racing with Kyle and Caleb and all those guys is awesome fun. I was nervous which I don’t get that often and trying to keep it all together for 6-minutes felt very long. It’s all to play for tomorrow. I have a 1 and a 3, Kyle has a 1 and a 2 and then Caleb has a 2 and a 3. On the amount of driver errors in particular in A1, Toia said, ‘you can just make small mistakes and it will push you all the way over to the pipe, there are so many off cambers you just slide if you are anyway off the apex.’
Summing up his A1 win McBride said, ‘I had a super clean run, I had one little mistake at the start but got back in the lead and it was pretty much like flawless from there, no mistakes. The car felt amazing, I did my fastest lap I think probably of the weekend for myself in eBuggy.’ Having taken the final eBuggy qualifier in the morning, asked what the turn around in performance today was after a so so day in the category yesterday, he replied, ‘I changed a couple of settings in my ESC which made the car a little bit easier to drive and gave it that feel closer to my nitro buggy. We were testing stuff in electric yesterday, so using that as a bit of a test class because nitro is my main focus, but I think today I am getting more confidence and for sure the with the rough conditions dialling back the ESC made a big different. Some suspension stuff we found in Q3 with Nitro we just put the exact same on electric and that was it.’ On A2 he said, ‘that was a lot more complex, my car was good but I think the track was a lot dustier, I would have to double check but my lap time was almost half a second slower so going probably have to look at that tomorrow because my car felt more skittish and skatey in the back. I probably could have snatched the win but I crashed to much and yeah Logan ran a great race.’
Chassis – HB Racing E8RS
ESC – Hobbywing XR8 Pro G3
Motor – Hobbywing Xerun 4268 G3 2200KV
Battery – GensAce Redline 2.0 6300mAh
Tires – JConcepts Falcon
Radio/Servos – Sanwa M17S / Sanwa PGS-XB II
Body – JConcepts P2
Notes – Logan’s eBuggy is fitted with TRC Valve Pistons and Hyperspeed Lab carbon parts.
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With a new title sponsor in Cayote, the third season of the Asian Buggy Championships officially got underway today in New Zealand with Tekno’s Caleb Noble and WIRC’s Kasey Dawson topping seeding at the Counties RC Car Club track which once again plays host to the first stop on the championship’s 4 round calendar. Winner of the third round of the ABC in Australian last year, Caleb would set the fastest 2-consecutive laps in Nitro Buggy ahead of Kyle McBride and the Sworkz of Jayden Jamieson while a strong end to the day netted Mayako Youth Mentoring Program driver Dylan Toia P4. In eBuggy, local star Dawson had the advantage over Caleb thanks to his effort in the first of the two seeding rounds. Noble topped the second encounter but that effort was 2/10th slower overall. Behind them the older of the Toia brothers, Logan completed the eBuggy Top 3 as drivers now get ready for 3 rounds of qualifying in Pukekohe tomorrow.
Asked to sum up his seeding performance, on nitro buggy Noble said, ‘the car has been pretty good. I had a bit of an average run in the second round but the first run was really good. The car was still good for the second seeding, I just didn’t drive great.’ Explaining his SP2 effort he said, ‘I got pushed down the driver stand to the whole other end so it was a bit of a struggle as I was seeing things different but it’s alright. The main thing is the car was good.’ Asked about this year’s track layout, the 18-year-old replied, ‘it’s very fun but it’s getting challenging with all the holes and bumps. I’m enjoying it.’ On tyre choice, he has been on 3-different treads since getting here which he has since narrowed down to two opting to run TZO500 in soft compound during the day and supersofts in the morning. Trying TZO’s 200 in final seeding he said while they were good, the 500 were a little easier to drive.’ Transferring set-up and tyre choice from his nitro to eBuggy, he said in electric his best run was in the second round when the track was slower so he’s confident he has two good cars for qualifying.
A podium finisher here last year, despite coming up short on one of his fuel stops, McBride said his biggest challenge today was a lack of sleep. Only getting in at 2am this morning after his flight from Australia, the World Championship finalist said he doesn’t function great on 4-hours sleep. Describing himself as ‘driving a bit crazy’ in the last run of the day due to the lack of sleep, they ‘changed a couple of things over the day and overall the cars feel pretty good and they are moving in the right direction.’ Asked his thoughts on the track layout, he replied, ‘It’s good. At first glance I didn’t think it was going to be too technical but it’s super easy to overdrive and it’s starting to be more rough now so that’s going to factored in as well obviously. When you get it right it extremely fun to drive.’ Running a pair of unsponsored Team Associated buggies, he said he has probably only run the nitro buggy twice before this weekend and today is his first outing with the eBuggy. As a former factory AE driver he said while a lot has changed since then a lot of it is pretty similar to what he drove with just updated parts. He added, ‘I felt pretty comfortable pretty quickly’. On eBuggy he said, ‘this morning I had to get the feel for the electric again because I haven’t driven it for a while, I’m just getting in the groove.’
Completing the Nitro Top 3 in nitro seeding, Jamieson feels he is in the ball park going into Friday’s qualifying. He said trying the TZO500 tyre for the first time in supersoft in the second round of seeding had made his Sworkz ‘very easy to drive’. Running the tyre option first on his eBuggy together with a few set-up changes, the Kiwi said together with that set-up plus further small tweaks to mainly the rear end resulted in ‘a huge improvement’ in the nitro buggy’s performance. On the track build, the 24-year-old said, ‘I’m enjoying it, it’s a pretty basic layout but I know it gets quite bumpy and rough. It’s not bumpy obviously yet, it’s got a little bit of ruts here and there but nothing like I am used too here. It will evolve.’ On his consistency for qualifying he said, ‘that last run I did a complete run and did 10-laps which is quite good around here. It felt comfortable and easy to drive.’ Fourth in both classes at the Asian Buggy Championship last year, a fuel gun issue causing him to flameout a number of times in the nitro final costing him a podium finish, Jamieson said he is expecting more of himself this year.
Summing up his day, 11-year-old Dylan Toia said, ‘It was a bit of struggle at the start of the day but then towards the end we got it working. That last seeding round I strung two laps together and that put me Top 4 going into qualifying.’ Asked what he had struggled with he explained, ‘the car just wasn’t locked in in the rear really so we text JQ for some advice and he said to put his DNC rear end on and we went to that and it was definitely way better, more locked in, overall way more grip.’ Looking forward to qualifying, 3 of the 4 rounds making up tomorrow’s schedule, he said, ‘I have high expectations of myself going into tomorrow but we’ll see what tomorrow brings us’. On tyre choice he said, ‘it’s more compound than tyre choice, most tyres work here so it a matter of which compound to use.’
Another member of the Mayako Youth Mentoring Program, Jayden Edmunds would finish P5 in Nitro and Electric. Asked how his day had went, he said, ‘The first round of nitro buggy was good and my 5-minute pace was consistent but I struggled a bit in the second one. I tried a few things and I don’t think it worked so now we know what to do for tomorrow.’ On electric he said, ‘it’s been tough but we’ve been making improvements every run’. Asked what he struggling with the 19-year-old said, ‘just with finding pace and being comfortable with the car. I focused more on getting my nitro right and now that that’s decent I am starting to switch the focus to getting the EP on pace as well.’ Enjoying working with JQ, Edmunds said the Finn has been busy on WhatsApp helping him with getting up to speed. On the track the Aussie said, ‘it’s pretty fun, it’s not too technical a layout but with the bumps coming through that makes it technical. It’s only going to get harder.’
Topping eBuggy seeding Dawson, 2025 his first full season with the WIRC Buggy thanks to support from Rouge RC and also his first year on JConcepts tyres, said, ‘The whole day with the eBuggy has been really good. We were battling with compounds as we are still learning to understand the JConcepts. I have been on greens which are supersofts and I have been going to blue which is soft. I have been liking the greens more but I have been hesitant based on the temperature as to not nuke the supersofts but in the second seeding I ran blues and I sacrificed half second a lap but first seeding round was good enough.’ On nitro buggy, the 19-year-old said he didn’t have outright lap speed so he took out some rear toe which he said ‘overwhelmed it’. For Q1 he will put the toe back and adjust the front instead to try to give it some more there instead of releasing the rear. He added, ‘The cars are the same but I can’t set them up the same, the eBuggy set-up just doesn’t suit the nitro. So there is still a little bit of work to be done.’