September 4, 2026

Iivonen takes opening ABC qualifier in Jakarta

Mayako’s Pekko Iivonen has TQ’d the opening qualifier at the concluding round of the 2026 Asian Buggy Championships in Jarkata, Indonesia.  The Finn took the first of the five scheduled qualifiers at West Side Raceway ahead of Top Seed Alex Bernadzik, the Team Associated driver 2.7-seconds off the TQ pace after a slow start on new tyres.  Making it three different manufacturers in the Top 3, Sparko’s new FEMCA Champion Jayden Edmunds was a similar margin off his fellow countryman Bernadzik to open with a P3 effort.  While taking the opening TQ in eBuggy ahead of Edmunds with his Team Associated, Hyunkyu Jung encountered traffic on the opening laps of his first nitro qualifier hampering his chances of a double, but it was a costly mistake on the teenager’s penultimate lap that meant the 4th fastest for Q1.  Infinity’s Jason Nugroho upheld home honours as he set the fifth fastest time ahead of the Mugen Seiki of Australian teenager Zac Foster.

Overall pleased with his opening run Iivonen said, ‘I had a couple of smaller mistakes but nothing huge.  The track is more challenging today and definitely has less grip but I was able to make some changes to the car which made it much much better and I think that should be fine for Q2 also.’  With this his second outing of the Asian Buggy Championships’ fourth season, him taking his first overall Nitro TQ earlier this year in Malaysia, Iivonen cautioned that, ‘my tyres are looking a bit worn out so hopefully they will last because I don’t have so many of them.  I will hold a new set for the last qualifier tomorrow.  They tend to wear out when you are using additive.’

Summing up his opening qualifier, Bernadzik said, ‘It started off a bit slow, I had a new set of tyres on and they took a little bit of time to come in but mid to end of the run the car was pretty good.’  Setting the fastest lap of Q1, the Australian continued, ‘I was getting close and then on the last lap I made a couple of silly errors’.  Asked about tyre wear, he replied, ‘It depends.  If I sauce them like everyone else is then the wear is starting to up come up a little bit, so it is going to be something that we are going to keep an eye on.  At the moment it is not too bad.’  On changes for Q2 he said, ‘No, we’ll just run what we’ve run, the car was good yesterday at this time of the afternoon so we’ll just trust it and drive it.’

Giving a run down on his Q1, newly crowned FEMCA Champion Edmunds said it was ‘pretty good, pretty clean, and the car was working well.’  The 20-year-old added, ‘It was lacking a little bit of grip to the other three so I am going to try and find that but the car is really easy to drive, just need to find that last little bit.’  Asked if that missing edge was in the tyres , tyre prep, or car set-up, he said, ‘I think it something in the car that I need to find.  I have been on the same sort of tyre prep, I haven’t really deviated too much, so maybe it is in that (the tyres) but I think it’s safer now to stay with what I have got and continue to work with the car.’

‘I think the pace was there to fight with Pekko for the TQ but I had some traffic and one silly mistake’, was how Jung described his run.  He elaborated by saying, ‘I had one mistake on the right side and that cost me 4-seconds.  Traffic on the first and second laps cost me 2-seconds and I would say I was mentally broken after that.’  He continued, ‘It’s OK, its only Q1 and we have four more rounds.’  On changes to his car for the second & final qualifier of today’s action, the Korean said, ‘My car definitely has the pace so we don’t need to change anything.  We will just go into Q2 and hopefully we have no problem with traffic this time.’

September 4, 2026

Bernadzik ‘Top Seed’ at Asian Buggy C/ships Finale

Team Associated’s Alex Bernadzik is the Top Seed at the season finale of the Asian Buggy Championships in Indonesia, the second round of seeding seeing no improvement in times from the leading contenders.  Fastest yesterday afternoon with a time of 1:23.448 for his 2-fastest consecutive laps, Bernadzik again topped this morning’s second round but in a slower time of 1:24.030.  The Australian reported that compared with running at the similar time yesterday in free practice when his buggy ‘felt good’, this time round it felt ‘a little soft’.  With a break before the start of qualifying here at West Side Raceway, he will wait to see how the temperatures are closers to the first of the 2 qualifying rounds on today’s schedule before making a call on whether to change stiffener up his RC8B4.2.  Again the closest challenger to Bernadzik, while a slower SP2 time team-mate Hyunkyu Jung did get the gap down to 1/10th of a second.  For the round it was Sparko’s Jayden Edmunds who was third fastest almost matching his pace of SP1 but again not an improvement he seeds 4th in the top Nitro heat.  Topping eBuggy seeding with his Cayote powered Mayako, drivers also failing to better Thursday’s time, a set-up change resulted in Pekko Iivonen’s nitro buggy having more understeer and he was fourth fastest but his SP1 time means he seeds P3.

September 3, 2026

Bernadzik tops first seeding in Indonesia

Alex Bernadzik topped the opening round of seeding at the season finale of the Asian Buggy Championships today in Indonesia, the Australian heading a 1-2 for Team Associated.  Over the 41-seconds West Side Raceway lap, he would have a 4/10ths of a second advantage over team-mate Hyunkyu Jung as each drivers best two consecutive laps were recorded.  A more technical track layout than the Championships’ previous 2024 visit to the dirt track, traffic seemed to be the biggest challenge for drivers in the randomly created seeding groups.  Completing the Top 3 for the first of the two seeding rounds, the second getting Friday’s action underway here in Jakarta, was Mayako’s Pekko Iivonen who was 7/10ths off Bernadzik’s pace.  The Sparko of Jayden Edmunds was next up, the Australia fourth fastest ahead of the Infinity of Jason Nugroho, one of the few drivers not to sauce his tyres, and the Sworkz of fellow Indonesian Adrian Wicaksono.

‘Nitro was definitely good’, was Bernadzik’s response when asked about the first seeding run.  The former Asian Buggy Championships Australia race winner added, ‘My car is really good but still lacking a little bit in mid corner but it was super easy to drive.’  His first time to Indonesia, he continued, ‘I had one mistake but that was just tangling with another car.  The actual run itself was pretty good and I don’t think I made one mistake myself.’  Still running on Hotrace’s Super Soft Sahara tyre in the dusty track conditions, asked about set-up changes for tomorrow, he replied, ‘I am just going to work on my eBuggy because Nitro is fine.  It’s more so tyres and just making sure they are right’.

Asked how he felt the first counting run of the weekend went, Jung said, ‘It wasn’t bad’.  The 16-year-old Korean continued, ‘we ran the same car (set-up) and just tried a different tyre compound.  The tyre is so important here with everyone saucing and doing something on the inserts.  I think I went out with too soft a compound for the conditions then but for tomorrow I think we need to try some other things with our tyre prep.’

Fastest in the first eBuggy seeding run Iivonen summed up his nitro effort with, ‘It was OK, I was in a slower group and there was some drivers who tried to be faster than me so I had some slight problems getting two good laps but my pace wasn’t too bad.’  The new slimmed down Finn, who just recently ran & completed his first half marathon, continued, ‘the car was slighted too soft I would say so I think compared to eBuggy, I was running the same shocks in both, I think I will go stiffer with the nitro for tomorrow.  It was actually rotating a bit better than the eBuggy and that was good but I just need some more stability in my opinion and once I get that it will be quite good.’

August 26, 2026

Asian Buggy C/ships Finale – Indonesia Track Reveal

With the season finale of the Asian Buggy Championships in Indonesia just over a week away (September 3-6), host track West Side Raceway in the capital of Jakarta has revealed its latest master piece on which racers will compete.  Set to wrap up the fourth season of the Scotty Ernst promoted championship which visited New Zealand, Malaysia, and Australia already this year, the final stop returns to Indonesia after a year’s absence.  On the first visit to the track in 2024, which is owned by well known international racer Adrian Wicaksono, it was Infinity driver Kouki Kato who took the win before going on to win the overall championship title the following season.  Red RC are excited to returning to West Side Raceway to cover all the action at the concluding round of the Asian Buggy Championships at the very impressive track.

April 26, 2026

Nguyen does double on Asian Buggy Championships debut

Young Kyosho star Phi-Long Nguyen has completed the double on his Asian Buggy Championships debut adding the main Nitro Buggy win to his eBuggy victory from earlier in the day in Malaysia.  Starting from second on the grid behind Top Qualifier Pekko Iivonen, the American would benefit from the Mayako driver running out of fuel as the second round of fuel stops approached during the 45-minute encounter.  Having built up a 12-second advantage over Nguyen and the rest of the 15 car field, a flame out during Nguyen’s first fuel stop adding to the Finn’s advantage, it looked like it was finally going to Iivonen’s big day.  A driver who has looked like he has progressed a step up in his driving every time he took the impressive LAP Paradise RC Raceway track here at the second round of the ABC, unfortunately it wasn’t going to be a case of third time lucky.  His third appearance in the Team Cayote/VP-Pro backed championship, having raced in the Philippines and Australia last season, he would run out of fuel just before the loop meaning he lost an entire lap on the field.  This gave Nguyen, who on taking the win was quick to state his rival was the faster driver in the final despite posting the fastest lap himself, a comfortable lead that he could manage and would never relinquish.  9-seconds back at the finish, Sworkz’s Caleb Noble backed up his win of the season opener in New Zealand with a second place while fellow Aussie Jayden Edmunds completed the podium.  Dropping back to fifth after his flame out, a clearly disappointed Iivonen would only be rewarded with a P4 for his otherwise impressive showing with Jared Ment and Ken NG completing the Top 6 on what has been a hugely successful debut visit to a track whose elevation has been a huge hit with racers.

Asked about his race, the winner said, ‘My tyres came in a bit too late and Pekko was already gone.  Going from JConcepts’ Double Bar to their Overdose, Nguyen explained, ‘We changed to a different tyre for the final so we would have a better car at the end of the race but they took a little bit longer than expected to come.’  Suffering a series of flame outs during his fuel stops, his father explained that on discovering his fuel gun was leaking, he borrowed a new gun for the final but unlike his own it wasn’t modified for the Kyosho tank and this was what caused the engine cuts.  Asked if he felt he could have caught Iivonen had his rival not run out of fuel, the 15-year-old said, ‘I was able to gain a bit when the tyres came in but more because he got held up in traffic.  I don’t think I could have caught him.  I also wrecked in the back when I was pushing it to try and catch up and my wing broke, not all the way but it looked funny on the track.’  While he had control of the race after Iivonen went a lap down, he said the cuts during the fuel stops meant it was still a stressful race and he was having to hold the throttle high adding ‘then I couldn’t rest which I am trying to learn to do for the 1-hour races.’  The back to back reigning FEMCA Champion, both those wins coming in Vietnam, he said he really enjoyed the track, and a race that experienced a number of rain showers throughout the schedule, he added ,’it was crazy how when it rains you just run again in half an hour to an hour.’

Asked for a run through of his final, multiple ABC race winner Noble said, ‘I’m a little bit frustrated.  I ran with them early but also made mistakes early.  Overall I drove pretty well but I just made costly mistakes that took me out of it unfortunately.’  In terms of his fuel stops he said, ‘Gauntie (his pitman) did a great job, me not so much.  I was a bit happy on the trigger and flamed out but that’s how it is.  My tyres were good.  I ran silver Dirt Web 2s and they were really good.  The car was great and I just made mistakes that cost me a shot at the win.’  As an ABC regular, this the fourth season of the championship, summing up the addition of LAP Paradise RC Raceway to the 2026 calendar, the 19-year-old, said, ‘The track was amazing and everyone involved did a great job.’  Unfortunately retiring with a diff failure while in full control of Saturday’s Nitro Truggy final, the new 2026 Sworkz signing concluded, ‘I am already looking forward to coming back stronger with my new package.’

A driver who described the track as ‘for sure the best track I have ever driven on’, adding that ‘even with the grip it’s still super fun and super rewarding’, Edmunds was pleased with his podium finish.  He explained, ‘I had two crashes coming into the pits in the stutters and two flame outs because of that, other than that the race was pretty good.’  A previous Asian Buggy Championships race winner, the 20-year-old, added, ‘I had one big mistake and a couple of incidents with traffic but the car was flawless, the tyres worked really good, and I still have plenty of tread on there.’  Running JConcepts Double Bar Golds, their hardest clay compound, he said, ‘I sort of set out for it to be a sunny for the main and then when the clouds came over it was a bit of a sacrifice but my car was super easy to drive.’  On his podium finish, he added, ‘For what the race was it was a good recovery.  It could have gone a lot worse if I started driving bad and pushing too hard and getting frustrated, but I sort of just put my head down and tried to get back into third.  Obviously Pekko was very unlucky.’  A sunny Sunday morning at LAP Paradise RC Raceway, with clouds approaching the A-Main driver’s introduction was abandoned so as to get the final underway.  A great call from Race Director Scotty Ernst as just as Nguyen crossed the line to win the first rain drops of a short but heavy shower started to fall.

Clearly feeling the low of what could have been, summing up the final Iivonen said, ‘It started out well but I just ran out of fuel at I think the 7-minute (runtime) mark.’  Asked if knew his run time was tight, the 23-year-old said, ‘I didn’t really know it was tight so it caught me quite off guard.  I mean tough luck it was barely before the line, if I could have made it over I probably could have got the lap but yeah.  The pace was really good, the car was going fast, I was probably the fastest on the track but I couldn’t make it this time.’  A driver who has been under the wing of Invisible Speed’s Joseph Quagraine, who executed a very fast first fuel stop, but was also cautioned about staying in his pit box, giving his thoughts on his driver’s performance today he said, ‘I am happy because it is a step in the right direction.  This race Pekko was fast and really consistent throughout qualifying.  He was the faster guy in both classes.  He didn’t win either class but he was the fastest and I am happy about that.’  He explained, ‘eBuggy he should have won but he started second and was faster than Phi but he was too nice and the problem is if you let the leader know that you are nice they feel safe.  That’s why certain drivers, even if they don’t win by being dirty, they show the person in front be afraid because I am fast and I am here.  That can make the leader more nervous and they are more likely to make a mistake.  So in a sense today has been a good learning experience.  He was fast but he didn’t make it happen.  You have to make it happen.’  He continued, ‘In Nitro I think he would have won actually, he had a big lead already but he just lost a lot of run time.  Tomorrow we will check but I think it’s because of how the engine was tuned.  It was tuned in a way that it was fine but too large an idle gap, too rich low end, and lean at the top end.  And then when the environment changes the engine tune changes a lot too.  So you can say it is bad luck this & that but it’s not.  Those small things that you need to prepare even better, so attention to detail.  That lap when he ran out he still had another lap so it wasn’t even like it was close.  It’s not luck, everyone says it’s back luck, it’s not luck.’  He concluded, ‘This has been a step in the right direction which is good and now Pekko needs to take one more step so I am happy overall.’

April 26, 2026

Chassis Focus – Caleb Noble (Sworkz)

Chassis – Sworkz S35-4 EVO
Engine – Ielasi Tuned Terra Evo
Fuel – VP Pro
Tyres – JConcepts Dirt Web 2 Silver
Radio – Sanwa M17S
Servos – PowerHD S35V2
Body – JConcepts P2

Notes

New to Sworkz for the 2026 season Caleb’s S35-4 EVO, photographed after its podium finish in the A-Main, was built with a TKO Bearing set and is fitted with a  Mach-1 FX Battery pack.

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