January 3, 2024

Hobbywing announce Lee in dual role

One of Asia’s top international touring car racers Nicolas Lee has been announced in a dual driver/manager roll with World Champion electronics manufacturer Hobbywing.  Coming off the back of a season in which all four electric World Championship title winners used it products, the Chinese manufacturer announced the Singapore driver as their RC Car Team Manager for the Southeast Asia region.  An ISTC World Championship Finalist and TITC podium finisher, the factory Team Yokomo driver will also switch back to Hobbywing products in his BD12 after a 5-year stint racing with Dash RC electronics.

Source: Hobbywing [hobbywing.com]


January 3, 2024

VP Pro 1:8 Pre-cut Polycarbonate Wing

VP Pro has released a new pre-cut Polycarbonate Rear Wing for 1:8 Buggy use.  Made from 1.5mm thick clear polycarbonate and pre-cut for convenient use, it features a ribbed design to reinforce the wing and help it to retain its shape.  Light weight, the new WN-012 wing comes as a set of 2 per bag.

View more images here


January 3, 2024

Euro Buggy Masters/Euros Warm-up – Announcement

The organisers of the annual Euro Buggy Masters in Sweden have announced that the indoor event will double up this year as the Warm-up Race for the EFRA 1:10 Offroad European Championships.  A club based in the south of the country, Furulund RC Klubb has secured use of a massive almost 4000 seater indoor sport hall in the city of Malmo for the 2024 edition of the EBM.  Taking place from February 23-25, the track will be built using completely new EOS carpet to create a bespoke track layout giving all drivers the same track time and opportunity for a close and fair racing.  Last held in November 2022 when Michal Orlwski took the 4WD win and Jessica Pålsson took the 2WD honours, the race moves to the start of the season this year on February 23-25 as the club hosts the European Championships from September 23-28.

Source: Furulund RCK [frck.se]


January 2, 2024

Zanchettin joins Xray

Xray has announced that multiple Italian National Champion Alex Zanchettin is joining its team and will race their XB8 platform.  Zanchettin had previously raced for the Mayako team signing for them at the beginning of 2022 but in 2023 made an appearance as part of the ongoing Infinity Offroad project when he joined lead driver Riccardo Berton for The Italian Race during the Summer.  Commenting on the Xray announcement Zanchettin said, “I’m so proud to join such prestigious and ambitious brand like Xray.  I always looked up to Xray for dedication to work and for their winning attitude and I’m sure that hard work and their top quality products will be the key to achieve our common goals. Can’t wait to see you all at the track again”.

Source: Xray [teamxray.com]


January 2, 2024

RUDDOG RR36X Touring Car Asphalt Tyres

RUDDOG Racing has added to its 1:10 Touring Car tyre range with the introduction of RR36X asphalt tyres.  Developed in close collaboration with the RUDDOG Racing Team, these premium performance tyres are specially designed for asphalt tracks and guarantee impressive performance that remains consistent over multiple runs. With superior grip and durability, they are sold as a pack of four pre-glued tyres.

Source: Ruddog [ruddog.eu]


January 2, 2024

Sparko Racing announces Cavalieri for 2024

1:8 Offroad newcomer Sparko Racing has announced that Ryan Cavalieri is to run their buggies in 2024.  After a brief 12-month stint with the Italian brand WIRC Racing for his 1:8 programme, the multiple Electric Offroad World Champion joins the Taiwanese brand who look to expand internationally and in particular in the US, a key market for 1:8 Offroad.  On social media Sparko Racing said, ‘We are proud to announce World Champion, Ryan Cavalieri has joined Sparko racing team! Ryan will be racing the Sparko F8 and F8e buggy at USA national races and international events as well.  With his wealth of experience and achievements, it will be help in product evolution and brand expansion in USA and across the world!’  Just before Christmas, Cavalieri confirmed he would be continuing with Schumacher for another year as his main 1:10 Offroad programme.

Source: Sparko Racing [Facebook] 


January 2, 2024

2024 EFRA Homologated Motor Lists

EFRA, the governing body for RC racing in Europe, has just published updated Homologated Motor lists for 2024 for all electric racing categories.  Competitors looking to compete at Europrean Championship and EFRA GP events in 1:12, 1:10 Touring Cars and 1:10 Offroad classes can only use Brushless Motors that are included on the 2024 EFRA Homologation Lists, a procedure that began in 2016.  When a motor (or rotor) has been approved and included on the relative list, the manufacturer must not change the technical specification, visual appearance or description.  Any changes require a new part number and the motor (or rotor) will have to be resubmitted for approval.  Drivers are also not allowed to make any changes to the motor, something that happened in Pro Stock at the 2022 European Championships when two driver’s motors were ‘found not to comply with the submitted samples to the EFRA Spec Homologation Lists’ promoting Olivier Bultynck to Champion.  Homologation has caused a number of manufacturers issues recently with team drivers having to switch motors or batteries at recent World Championships as their sponsors’ where not IFMAR approved.  ROAR, the North American governing body, has had a number of high profile cases where motors where randomly purchased and tested and found to not meet the specification of the original submitted motor that was approved for its sanctioned events.  A standard many independent races run by, the offending motors had their motors removed from the approved list.  View the full EFRA Motor Homologation lists here.

Source: EFRA [efra.ws]


January 2, 2024

Ielasi Tuned cylinder extractor

After its hugely successful World Championship winning season last year, Ielasi Tuned kicks off 2024 with the release of its new cylinder extractor.  Presenting a CAD image of the product concept last May, the Italian company have spent the time since getting the product perfected with Daniele Ielasi knowing a thing or two about rebuilding engines and having extracted one or two liners in his time as an engine tuner!  Since 2022 Ielasi Tuned have by technical choice started using a ‘tight fit’ cylinder for their engines which has proven to be a very important step for reliability.  A side effect of this is unfortunately that not all customers find it easy to be able to carry out the classic maintenance on their engine as it was very difficult to be able to remove the cylinder from the crankcase.  This is precisely the reason they came up with the idea for creating this extractor.  It is made entirely of steel with a ‘spring steel collet which makes it reliable and long-lasting and is sold in its own dedicated carry case.  Available from the 15th of January, you can watch a presentation video here.

Source: Ielasi Tuned [ielasituned.com]