February 13, 2023

Schumacher Winter Series Rnd 6 – Report

Round 6 of the Schumacher Indoor Winter Series presented by the Louth Radio Control Car Club would conclude the series over the past weekend.  With a strong number of entrants it would turn out to be a frantic day of racing.  Chris lovely would sow up qualifying taking all four rounds with his Xray x4 23, with Series Champion Alex Brocklebank locking out 2nd with his Schumacher Mi8.  The fight for third included six drivers all with scores that could put them in the prime position.  In the end Matthew Cook with his Mugen chassis would have two 3rd round scores, behind him two more Schumacher Mi8’s of Daniel Burks and Joseph Cocking.  Daniel Leonard would place his Awesomatix into 6th ahead of Peter Craig with his Schumacher.

Continue reading report here


February 13, 2023

2023 Philippine Masters track build revealed

The organisers of the Philippine Masters have after much hard work revealed the new Circulo Verde Race Track which will host one of Asia’s most high profile 1:8 Offroad events from April 27-30th.  After a two year break due to Covid, 2023 will be 11th running of the event and 5-weeks of very hot work has resulted in the creation of this impressive sculpted track on the site which is located in the centre of the country’s capital Manila.  This year will see reigning back to back World Champion Davide Ongaro and former World Champion Robert Batlle return to the Philippine Masters and lead the capacity 120 entries under the watchful eye of Race Director Scotty Ernst.

View more track images here


February 12, 2023

Hagberg wins penultimate round of EWS

Alexander Hagberg has won the fourth & penultimate round of the Essex Winter Series.  The Swede continued Xray’s winning streak in the popular indoor British based series as he became the third different winner of the current season on a guest appearance at the Deanes Sports Centre.  In qualifying it was Xray team-mate Harley Eldridge who got out of the blocks first as she topped the opening qualifier.  Hagberg got up to speed by Q2 to take control, and secured pole position.  In the Final, Alexander had a unchallenged lights-to-flag win, whilst behind some close racing led to some side-by-side action, allowing Schumacher’s Chris Grainger to take second from reigning champion, & winner of the previous two rounds.

Continue reading & more podium photos here


February 12, 2023

Ongaro dominates Montpellier GP

Davide Ongaro has opened the 2023 1:8 Offroad season proper in Europe with a dominant performance at the Montpellier GP in France.  The Italian secured the overall TQ on Saturday and kicked off Sunday’s finals action with a win of his 20-minute Semi Final over Juan Carlos Canas that secured pole for the Main event.  Winner of the other Semi Final, Elliot Boots would line up third on the grid behind his Sworkz team-mate Canas but they would be no match for the World Champion over the 1-hour decider.  Setting the fastest lap of the final, the Team Associated driver would go on to lap the entire field at Circuit du MBM.  Boots managed to get the better of Canas to finish half a lap up on the Spaniard as they lined up either side of Ongaro on the podium.  Finishing fourth would be Infinity’s Riccardo Berton, the Italian have a lap over new Mayako signing Robert Batlle in fifth.

Image: RCMag [Facebook]


February 12, 2023

Orlowski wins 2023 Charity Race

Michal Orlowski has won this year’s ‘Charity Race’, the 2023 edition of the Italian race marking the 12th running of the annual event that has raised thousands of euros for local charities.  Racing at the RC Landia indoor carpet track in Scandiano, the Schumacher driver took the TQ from team-mate Mattia Collina, both drivers notching up two TQ runs each from the four rounds of qualifying but with his Q2 pace the fastest time recorded it was Orlowki who would line up on pole position.  In the finals, the Polish driver completed a clean sweep of wins while behind Collina and Luca Romagnoli had a close battle for P2.  In the end it would be a Schumacher 1-2 with Collina getting the tie breaker to secure second with Romagnoli’s Xray completing the podium ahead of Germany’s Marco Kaufmann.

Image: Michal Orlowski [Facebook]


February 11, 2023

Ongaro Top Qualifier at Montpellier GP

The European 1:8 Offroad season kicks off this weekend with the traditional running of the Montpellier GP in France where Davide Ongaro is the Top Qualifier.  The World Champion took the top spot in qualifier with TQ runs in Q2 and Q3 after the Team Associated driver opened proceedings with a P5.  The opening qualifier would be topped by Sworkz’ Elliot Boots, the multiple European Champion backing that up with 3rd in the final round to secure 2nd overall.  Boots’ team-mate & former Montpellier GP Champion Juan Carlos Canas ended qualifying third overall thanks to being 2nd fastest in Q1 and 3rd fastest in Q2.  Kyosho’s Joao Figueiredo was next up ahead of Infinity’s Riccardo Berton with HB Racing’s Thomas Musso, who leads the French charge, completing the Top 6.

Image: File Image


February 6, 2023

JConcepts Winter Indoor Nats wins for Horne & Phend

The JConcepts Winter Indoor Nationals travelled to San Diego over the weekend and it was Team Associated’s Aydin Horne and TLR’s Dakotah Phend who took the big wins at SDRC Raceway.  The first stop of 5 events on the INS13 calendar, in 2WD Buggy it was Horne who took the TQ ahead of Phend and Tekno’s Ryan Maifield, the later running Team Associated chassis’ at the event. Qualifying opened with Tom Rinderknecht topping Q1 from Maifield but P4 & 5 in the next two rounds left the Xray driver fourth on the grid.  In 4WD, Phend topped the first and third round qualifiers to take TQ honours ahead of Associated’s Spencer Rivkin who was second fastest ahead of Horne in all three runs.  Again Rinderknecht would post a TQ run setting the pace in Q2 but like in 2WD he would start the 4WD A-Main from 4th.  In the finals the Top 3 would lined up on the podium as how they qualified.  2WD went down to A3, which was duly won by Rivkin from 6th on the grid giving him 4th overall.  In 4WD, Phend tied things up early with wins in A1 & 2 leaving Rivkin to win A3 from Horne who completed the overall podium.

View 4WD Buggy Podium here


February 5, 2023

Coelho & Rheinard win Snowbirds

Bruno Coelho and Marc Rheinard are the two big winners of this year’s Snowbird Nationals.  In Modified Touring Car, defending Champion Coelho took the overall TQ for Xray from the Awesomatix of Rheinard with Alexander Hagberg lining up 3rd.  With just a single A-Main to decide the winner of the 29th running of the iconic American race, World Champion Coelho would hold off his German rival taking the win by 2/10th of a second.  A further 1.6 seconds back, Hagberg made it an all European podium line-up.  Top American finisher would be ROAR National Champion Sam Isaacs in fourth.  In the 1:12 GTP Modified it was Rheinard who was Top Qualifier.  The reigning 1:12 World Champion lead the 8-minutes from start to finish posting the fastest lap in the process.  Behind former World Champion Hagberg came through from 5th on the grid to finish 2nd ahead of 2nd and 3rd place qualifiers Donny Lia and Iaascs.

View 1:12 Podium here