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May 7, 2024

Giaimo wins Italian GT Championship Round 2

Schepis Model driver Rosario Giaimo took the win at the second round of the AMSCI Italian 1:8 GT Nationals held at the 2024 EFRA 1:8 GT European Championships host Naxos World track in Sicily over the weekend. Having won the season opener in March at Mini Autodromo Stradivari, Capricorn’s Alessio Mazzeo carried that form in qualifying securing the TQ for the 45-minute final ahead of Serpent’s Gabriele Paloschi. After the Semi finals the Raptor of Loris Luise would line up third with Giaimo lining up P6 just behind Genius Racing’s defending Champion Alex D’angelo. In the final Mazzeo would encounter problems at the start allowing Paloschi to lead until he suffered a flame out. It was then the turn of D’Angelo to lead until the 27-minute mark when a mistake ended his race. At the end it was Giaimo who lead home the field with a 2-lap advantage over the recovering Mazzeo and Paloschi. In the Electric GT it was Serpent’s Natanaele Senesi who took the win from Filippo Beretta and Round 1 winner Mazzeo.

Image: Rosario Giaimo [Facebook]

May 6, 2024

Canas wins Silver State Indoor Championships

Sworkz Juan Carlos Canas took the big win at the 2024 Silver State Indoor Championships, the Spanish driver winning Pro Nitro Buggy ahead of the Tekno of Truggy Champion Ryan Maifield and TLR’s Dakotah Phend. Once again attracting a massive 1100+ entries, qualifying for the Las Vegas event would see Maifield secure the TQ honours after the completion of the 3 rounds ahead of Team Associated’s Spencer Rivkin with Canas third and Phend P4. In the 45-minute final, Rivkin enjoyed a few laps a the front early on before Maifield took charge but 10-minutes in costly mistakes dropped him back. With Canas taking the lead, pit stops giving Phend the lead for a few laps before everything settled down, once in front the European Champion edged out a lead eventually finishing with over 12-seconds on Maifield. Phend would complete the podium a further 5-seconds back. Having won the event a year earlier, Marco Barufollo would finish 5th at South Point Casino and Hotel behind Seth VanDalen. In Truggy, Maifield made the class his own taking the TQ and win from Mason Fuller and Phend, the Top 3 finishing in the same order as they started. In eBuggy, Top Qualifier Fuller won followed home by Maifield and Canas.

Image: TheDirt Racing [Facebook]

April 26, 2024

2024 Philippine Masters Chassis Focus Index

Last weekend Red RC made our third trip to Manila for the world class offroad event that is the Philippine Masters. Famed as being Asia’s biggest annual 1:8 Offroad race, the Circulo Verde track is renowned for its difficulty and 3D style build with this year’s 12 edition of the race using a new method to seal the surface. This resulted in minimal tyre wear even over the 1-hour Main final in which Team Associated’s Davide Ongaro recovered from an early flame out to take his fourth win in the capital city. The first time Sparko was officially represented at the race, a great driver by Ryan Pavidis netted the American runner-up spot. Great to see the legendary Atsushi Hara back racing at the the front end. It was great to once again do a chassis focus with him, Sworkz hooking him up for the event, and it great to see the former World Champion enjoying his racing so much once again. Attracting 205 entries from 16-nations, we got the chance to photograph buggies from 9 drivers representing 7 different manufacturers as well as the TQ & winning Sworks truggy of Bulgaria visitor Plamen Petrov we will have compiled into our latest Chassis Focus Index.

View Chassis Focus Index here

April 25, 2024

Connolly wins Irish 1:8 GT National opener

The opening round of the Irish National GT Championship took place in the beautiful St Anne’s Track located in the centre of Dublin last weekend where Genius Racing’s Clive Connolly took the win. Hosted by ORCA Ireland, in qualifying it was Connolly taking TQ honours followed by Graeme Lougheed, the top 2 automatically into the Main Final leaving the rest to battle in the Semi Finals for the remaining final positions. The 30min Main was a close affair with battles throughout the field. Jason Noonan and Graeme Lougheed both driving Genius cars would fight for 18 minutes until finally Graeme would retire with a technical failure allowing Bruno Barbosa driving a strong race with his OS powered Xray to move up a position. Out in front it was multiple Irish Champion Connolly driving his Mantis Tuned powered GTC8.23 on SP Rubber that would take the victory with a trouble free run from start to finish.

Image: ORCA Ireland [Facebook]

April 21, 2024

Early flameout forces Ongaro to work hard for PM24 win

Team Associated’s Davide Ongaro was forced to work a little harder than expected for his latest Philippine Masters win, the reigning World Champion suffering an early flame out that handed Atsushi Hara a lead he would hold for almost half of the 1-hour final. With the crowd fully behind the legend that is Hara, when pitted for fuel at the 38-minute mark Ongaro would take back up the race lead where he would stay to the finish. The attention then turned to a battle between Hara and Ryan Pavidis, the American getting by the former World Champion in the final 3-minutes having been last of the 15 car field after the opening lap. Not far behind Joern Nuemann would finish as he started, P4. Having made it an Associated 1-2 in qualifying Alex Bernadzik’s race came undone around 37-minutes in with a flame just as he was called to fuel the next lap, the Australian eventually finishing 6th. The second round of the Asian Buggy Championships, Round 1 winner Ryan Lutz suffered similar fate earlier in the race and records a P7 on his first trip to Manila.

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April 20, 2024

Ongaro TQs Philippine Masters as AE line-up 1-2

Davide Ongaro is the Top Qualifier at the Philippine Masters with Alex Bernadzik making it a 1-2 for Team Associated at the conclusion of the four round of qualifying. As the defending Champion of Asia’s biggest annual 1:8 Offroad, it was a slow start to qualifying for Ongaro but finding his way in the penultimate round he went even stronger in the final round for another TQ run. This time it was ahead of Bernadzik to secure the overall TQ honours. Having made a dream start to his Philippine Masters debut by topping the opening qualifier on Friday, Bernadzik will line-up in between two of the greats of the sport, multiple World Champions Ongaro and Atsushi Hara. Hara is enjoying a great resurgence in form this weekend, the Japanese driver reliving his racing youth in Manila. Delighted with his P3 starting position, he is most excited for the opportunity to run the 1-hour final tomorrow at the Circulo Verde track. Another of the race’s rookies this year, Joern Neumann TQ’d the 2nd qualifier this morning but issues in the following two means he will start P4 right ahead of Ryan Lutz who makes it five difference countries represented at the front end of the grid, this year’s race having drivers attend from 16 different countries.

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April 20, 2024

Ongaro comes good in Q3

Davide Ongaro finally came good at the Philippine Masters with the Team Associated driver topping the third & penultimate round of qualifying in Manila after a rocky start to the 12th edition to the race. A crash with a turned over car in Q1 and his wheels struggling with the Asian heat in Q2, a new set of wheels for Round 3 seemed to put the double World Champion’s quest for another win in the capital city back on track. Ongaro would post the fastest qualifying time so far heading home the Sparko of Ryan Pavidis with Ryan Lutz completing the Top 3. Having TQ’d the opening qualifier and backed that up with a P2 in the second round, Alex Bernadzik would struggle on his third attempt coming away with a P4 ahead of top local Dino Jacinto. After topping Q2, Joern Neumann would suffer a flame out in the final half minute but afterwards the German admitted he was struggling with the hotter conditions. After two impressive Top 3 runs, Atsushi Hara said his chances of continuing that form ended on the first lap after he opened the heat with a series of first lap mistakes.

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April 20, 2024

Neumann takes Q2 at Philippine Masters

Day 2 of qualifying at the Philippine Masters kicked off with another of this year’s event rookies posting a TQ run as Sworkz’ Joern Neumann topped the second of the four qualifiers from Q1 pace setter Alex Bernadzik. Having seen his Q1 run derailed when he collected another buggy that was on its roof and dropping him back to a P6, the German would have a similar scare in Q2 as he came upon a broken buggy towards the end of the qualifier but this time he got round it without much delay. At the finish he had 1.7-seconds from a very quick Bernadzik who put in a strong recovery drive following his copybook mistake to the one he survived at the end of his Q1 run yesterday to hang on to the TQ. Backing up his P2 from yesterday, Atsushi Hara would complete the Top 3 followed by defending Philippine Masters Champion Davide Ongaro, the double World Champion still yet to find his rhythm here in Manila. The two Ryan’s completed the Top 6, Lutz finishing ahead of Pavidis.

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