January 8, 2016

Orlowski tops 2WD practice at DHI Cup

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Michal Orlowski has topped 2WD Buggy practice at the DHI Cup, the Schumacher driver setting the fastest 3-consecutive laps at the Danish event to end up almost half a second clear of former winner Tom Cockerill.  Joakim Nicolaisen would complete the Top 3, Team Associated’s up & coming talent 3/100ths faster than defending champion David Ronnefalk.  For two time 2WD winner & unbeaten 4WD Champion Joern Neumann practice would leave the Serpent driver only 9th fastest while Xray’s 4WD World Champion Bruno Coehlo, despite laying down the fastest single lap ended up 16th.

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Qualifying and finishing third in 2WD last year in Odense, Orlowski said although he came into the event prepared for low grip it was ‘even lower’ than expected.  Initially struggling for the first three practice runs, his KF2 SE ‘sliding around’, he said a switch from 15 to 10k rear diff oil together with a shortened rear camber link ‘helped a lot’ leaving the car ‘really good’ for the fourth & final practice.  Surprised that the track layout is almost identical to that of last year, the Polish ace feels he is now in good shape for qualifying which for 2WD will take place tonight following 4WD practice.

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‘Pretty good’ was how 2014 winner, then driving for Schumacher, was how Cockerill summed up his practice.  Having not attended last year’s event, Yokomo’s lead driver this weekend as Lee Martin has nitro racing commitments, said while the traction was low for carpet it was nice adding it ‘should make for better racing’. Using the practice to bed in sets of the event’s Schumacher handout tyre, the only big change in terms of set-up was with shock oils as he tries to find more steering on what he described as an ‘understeer track’.  Describing the times of the leading drivers as ‘close’ he added ‘a lot of drivers are on a similar pace and there also making a lot of mistakes so my focus is more on my driving’.

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Nicolaisen said his B5M, which features a Swedish made laydown gearbox, has been very good from the first run on the track.  Making only very small changes over the four rounds, the Norwegian said the track time was mostly used to scrub in tyres.  Describing the layout as having ‘a good flow’, he said as he is pretty happy with the car he will focus on his driving feeling he could clean up his lines a bit.

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Making his HB team debut at the event last year, but having to race a Team C chassis in 2WD with which he TQ’d and won, Ronnefalk is now running HB’s D216.  The Swede said ‘we have done quite a lot of practice since the EOS and we now have a machined chassis rather than the rapid prototype we ran in Slovakia’.  He added ‘with not as much traction as EOS this suits the car. The speed is there. I just need to make it a little easier to drive over 5-minutes.’  Behind Ronnefalk fellow countrymen David Hassel and Niclas Mansson completed the Top 6 with Xray’s Martin Bayer 7th fastest.

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January 8, 2016

Track Focus – DHI Cup Odense

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Host Club – Odense R/C Minirace
Country – Denmark
Location – Odense
Venue – Stadium Arena Fyn
Track type – Temporary
Surface – Carpet (Onroad), Carpet & Wood (Offroad)
Direction – Anti-Clockwise (Onroad), Clockwise (Offroad)
Previous races hosted – 15  (Onroad), 4 (Offroad)

It might be the 16th running of the DHI Cup but Denmark’s most famous race is continuing its resurgence with this year’s event taking just 20-minutes to book out.  A unique event in that both onroad and offroad run simultaneously on back to back tracks, even increasing the entry limit from 300 to 320 left the organisers to have to turn away drivers.   Allocated 90 of the 160 Touring Car entries, Super Stock inparticular couldn’t cater for the large number of racers looking to travel to Odense. In Offroad, the organisers said they were surprised by the huge interest 4WD Buggy attracted this year with the class well oversubscribed.

Having had to move to a different hall in the Odense Congress Center last year due to a World Championship warm-up handball game, handball a big sport in Denmark, this year the event returns to the impressive Stadium Arena Fyn.  Getting access to such a facility comes thanks to the city of Odense. The third largest in Denmark, the city provided the funding for the building of the Arena and as part of the deal a select number of days are made available for local organisations such as the host Odense R/C Minirace club to host events.  The DHI Cup setting up home here in 2008 with Viktor Wilck marking the occasion with his first big international race win.

In terms of the onroad track, it is defending six time champion Ronald Volker who was asked to design this year’s layout.  While the construction of the track turned out a little different to the plans he submitted, the Yokomo driver said the chicane in front of the drivers stand is the tracks key feature. ‘Somewhere to make or lose time’, the German said ‘the biggest difference more than the layout’ is the carpet and the controlled LRP tyres.  With the ETS style black carpet now very common throughout Europe, the use of grey carpet gives a somewhat retro look to the track.  One significant but out of sight change to the track is steel plates that have been added under the carpet.  As with most exhibition halls, cable tunnels run the length of the hall and previously have caused issue in particularly on the straight as the bump unsettles cars.  With the plates running over the tunnels Volker said they were ‘an improvement’ and now they ‘didn’t feel too bad’.

Unbeaten in 4WD Buggy since the event took on the challenge of running adding offroad to the event in 2012, Joern Neumann was happy with the track layout.  ‘Its 95% same as last year and I won on that so the layout is OK’.  His first DHI outing with Serpent, having won last year with Durango, the German said ‘some parts are tricky but overall there is a good flow to the layout’.

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October 10, 2015

Offroad rookie Coelho is 4WD World Champion

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Bruno Coelho is the new 1:10 4WD Offroad World Champion, the Xray driver securing the sport’s top prize in Japan with a convincing victory in the second A-Main of the Yatabe Arena hosted event.  Coming into his first electric offroad Worlds as a relative unknown in the class, the Portuguese Touring Car star would become the second Rookie to triumph at the first Worlds to be run on astro turf, Spencer Rivkin winning the 2WD title at 16th running of the bi-annual IFMAR event earlier in the week.  A driver who burst onto the international scene when one year ago to the week he finished runner-up at the Touring Car Worlds in the USA, today’s result was made even sweeter by the fact that he would beat his onroad rival & reigning Touring Car champion Naoto Matsukura to the title.  With Coelho forced to sit out A3, Matsukura would take the win ahead of David Ronnefalk to finish 2nd overall with Ronnefalk completing the podium.

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A driver who has quickly amassed a worldwide fan base in onroad, thanks in part to him rocking the establishment in the Euro Touring Series and winning, Coelho is also popular for being humble, with that personality trait apparent by his somewhat underwhelming reaction to the biggest win yet of his career. Declaring himself ‘Super happy’, his team-mate Martin Bayer joking about his reaction by saying ‘yeah I won a race, its ok’, the 22-year-old was quick to highlight the effort behind his win.  ‘There was a lot of work behind this. I worked the least so a big thanks to Bayer and Juraj.  They developed the car and it really works amazing’. After a slightly controversial A1 win, when his rivals felt he shortcutted he track after a mistake while leading, the Top Qualifier said A2 ‘was all perfect’ joking ‘but A3 was boring’.  Having wanted to race the third final, he had to sit it out getting to watch the podium deciding battle from his position on the driver stand. A driver whose racing started out in 1:8 Onroad and who made his Worlds debut in Argentina in 2007 crashing out while leading his Semi Final to finish 12th overall & be crowned the Junior World Champion, Coelho said today’s victory was for his dad.  ‘I owe a big thanks to my father. He invested a lot of his life and money in me so this is for him’.  His first season as a professional driver he said he couldn’t have asked for much more in his first year in the job.  A multiple discipline driver, him recently being crown European Nitro Touring Car Champion, when asked what title he most wanted most to win next he said ‘Touring Car in China next year’.

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A driver who was widely tipped for the 4WD title, in particular after the opinion dividing decision was announced that the event would be run indoors on an artificial surface, Matsukura said his ‘qualifying cost him the title’.  Having won the Warm-up Race, the Kyosho driver said the final was always going to be a three way battle between himself, Coelho and Orlowski but missing out on securing P2 on the grid with a poor Q5 run left him always on the back foot in the finals.  The 22-year-old said he was too aggressive for the track but added ‘safe is not my style and thats why I miss the win’.  Commenting on A2 he said the race was ‘maximum shit’ after heavy contact from former 2WD World Champion Hayato Matsuzaki resulted in a broken spur gear.  With him and Ryan Maifield the only two finalist from the previous Worlds to make the A-Main, he said he was happy to finish second for a consecutive time adding next year I will win twice, referring to the 1:12 and Touring World title.  He also announced that he will make his 1:8 Offroad World Championship debut next year in Vegas as he moves into the class for the first time thanks to Kyosho.

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Claiming his first IFMAR podium finish, his previous best being 4th at the 1:8 Offroad Worlds in Argentina, Ronnefalk was very happy with 3rd.  Securing the final step on the podium with a second in the final A-Main, the HB driver said compared with 2WD earlier in the week they made a huge step forward for 4WD.  Having accepted third overall halfway through A3 he said ‘then Naoto crashed so maybe if I had been pushing a little more I could have got second overall’.  Still, being his first year with HB since a surprise switch from Kyosho the tall Swede said the result made for a great first season with his new team.

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Missing out on the podium, Michal Orlowski said ‘it wasn’t my day. I made so many crashes in the final but I am happy with 4th’.  The 14-year-old added that leaving Durango last November after they dissolved their race team no one probably expected him to be fighting for the World title but he is very proud of the Schumacher team today showing ‘the car and team are perfect’.  Commenting on A3 which he led off the grid as Coelho sat it out, he said he made a good start with the first couple of laps going well but then gave way to Matsukura rather than running close together and risking a crash but after doing that he crashed himself.  A driver well ahead of his age in terms of his maturity he said he was especially pleased that he ‘showed the world our new car is very good’.

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A driver who went into the third main with an outside chance of a podium finish after a great drive from 9th on the grid to 3rd in A2, Maifield would end up 5th and the top American, only two drivers from the powerhouse of offroad to make the final, the other being Jared Tebo.  Getting his TLR22-4 up as high as third in A3 before dropping back to 5th, he said ‘I wasn’t as fast as the others but was good getting through carnage’.  Describing himself as a ‘road block’ he said ‘eventually they got mad and pushed me out of the way’.  His first Electric World Championship’s with TLR he said, ‘I’m not happy we weren’t competitive but I’m happy to start 9th and finish 5th’.  With many feeling that the European’s would have the advantage on the astro turf track, that not proving the case as Tebo TQ’d and Maifield’s protege Rivkin took the win in 2WD, the Arizona driver said ‘it all about car set-up, if you have that you don’t have to be the best driver to be fast’.  He added with a good set-up, ‘the track is good to drive but its not good for racing’.  Saying ‘its not what I have grown up to enjoy as racing but I do think it has a time and place in racing but not at the World Championships.  Behind Maifield, making his first World Championship final, Tom Cockerill would complete the Top 6 for Yokomo on what was overall a disappointing performance for them on their home race but they can take some satisfaction from their efforts in putting on a very well organised event.

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View the complete final overall results here (PDF).

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October 10, 2015

A2 Update – Coelho is World Champion

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Bruno Coelho is the new 1:10 4WD Offroad World Champion, the Xray driver securing his first World title by backing up his A1 win with a faultless victory in A2 from Michal Orlowski.  A bad opening lap from Naoto Matsukura, the Kyosho driver making contact with the back of Orlowski’s Schumacher, would end the expected showdown between Coelho and Matsukura.  Intially dropping to fourth, the reigning Touring Car World Champion would, despite setting the fastest lap by almost 2/10ths, continue to fall back down the order, the pre-event favourite eventually pulling off with a minute thirty to run.  While Coelho controlled the race perfectly up front, it was Ryan Maifield who would be the surprise of the race, the TLR driver coming from 9th on the grid to complete the Top 3 despite his 22-4 stripping a front belt half way through the race.  1.5 seconds back HB’s David Ronnefalk would finish fourth with it all still to play for in terms of which two drivers will stand either side of Coelho on the Yatabe Arena podium.

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