Clanfield Round 4 Race Report

size=200]Clanfield Winter Series Round 4 Sponsored by [color=#BF0000]
RC SURE-START[/color][/size]


Some of the racer's

With a great turn out of 38 drivers! and with some big names making a appearance, Jon Hazlewood and Nemo clan with newly signed Brennan Ralls. Losi driver richard barton, Tommy Chung and Xray driver Reece Sawyer. We all knew the day would be tough. And with the track, having taken some light abuse the saturday before and with the winter weather. It was clear, the track was not in fantastic condition and was going to favour the smooth and calm driver's.
Practice got underway the rostrum was rammed full of driver's wanting to try out tyre choice, and make any last minute setup changes and so on. Myself I decided to do a few laps to bed in some new clutch shoes and bearing's. To then find my throttle servo died! Perfect, so franticaly replaced it with a backup servo and I was ready. Qualifying was originally going to be 5 rounds best 4 but, after 1 heat the committee decided to reduce that down to 4 due to time. So with 4 and 3 to count, it was game on. Q1 for heat 4 included myself and Jon W and Ben Elliot. Q1 Went Ben's way with a very solid 8 lapper followed by Jon with his new Wagamma with a 8 lapper and then myself 3rd with a poor 7 lapper. I was overdriving the car, and in these tricky conditions makes you pay for it!

[B]Q1 Heat 4:
Ben Elliot
Jon W
Myself

Q1 Heat 5:
Richard Barton
John Hazlewood
Reece Sawyer

Q2 Heat 4:
Ben Elliot
Grant Fribbens
Ian Dudman

Q2 Heat 5:
Richard Barton
Jordan Hart
Brennan Ralls
[/B]
Myself I decided to risk not coming in for a top up, and then stupidly flipped on my roof, and then cut and decided to retire for this heat. Jon W found that a stone had wedged between his flywheel stopping his car dead.

[B]Q3 Heat 4:
Ben Elliot
Jon Wolfe
Myself

Q3 Heat 5:
Tommy Chung
John Hazlewood
Richard Barton

Q4 Heat 4:
Jon Wolfe
Myself-James Kerr
Ben Elliot
[/B]
I was one for FTQ until stupidly thinking I had finished and slowing down to let other's through.. throwing that away! :evil:

[B]Q4 Heat 5:
Tommy Chung
John Hazlewood
Jordan Hart
[/B]
With all of the qualifying out of the way the final positions were as follows:

[b]Truggy A:[/b]
1.Mark Bryne
2.James Tatlow
3.John Clarke
4.Adam Bailey
5.Paul Berkinshaw
6.Simon Hunter-DNS

[b]Buggy C:[/b]
1.Stuart Parnell
2.Jamie Armitage
3.Carlton Williams
4.Paul Langley
5.steve carter
6.Mark Holt
7.Ellis Dove
8.Brian Burgess
9.Dave O'Dwyer
10.Phil Bennett
11.John Dear
12.Will Bogie-DNS

[b]Buggy B:[/b]
1.Damian Tigwell
2.Wesley Robinson
3.Francois Nerriere
4.Mark Thomas
5.Marc Jacka
6.Les Taylor
7.Ian Dudman
8.Carlton Williams
9.Stuart Parnell
10.John Bennett
11.Neil Beagley
12.Jon Legg-DNS
13.Jamie Armitage-DNS

Now for the Buggy A Final:

FINAL POSITIONS:
1.Richard Barton
30/20m 13.22
40.44
38.61 (27)

2.Tommy Chung
30/20m 28.07
40.94
37.92 (16)

3.Jon Wolfe
29/20m 1.33
41.43
38.15 (9)

4.Damian Tigwell
29/20m 21.67
42.13
40.39 (5)

5.James Kerr
28/20m 9.38
43.19
38.07 (18)

6.Ben Elliott
28/20m 28.74
43.88
39.88 (7)

7.Jordan Hart
28/20m 37.46
44.20
40.23 (27)

8.Wesley Robinson
27/20m 14.87
45.00
41.11 (21)

9.Grant Fribbens
27/20m 16.00
45.04
40.90 (7)

10.Francois Nerriere
26/20m 0.99
46.19
40.65 (4)

11.Jon Hazlewood
26/20m 31.87
47.38
38.26 (15)

12.Reece Sawyer
21/15m 10.13
43.34
38.74 (20)

13.Brennan Ralls
1/ 56.62
56.62
(0)
19.074

The A final I heard was a great one-being in it is hard to say what happened apart from my view haha Tommy and Richard were battling it out most of the time, with Jon W on there tail having a fantastic race with his new Agama A8. My start went from great to dreadful, getting into about 4th by turn 2 then over the 2nd jumps out of the bombhole. Landing onto of Bren then caused delays, then unfortunately catching someone else in turn 3 set me back by half a lap already. And then the next few laps, trying to drive to hard. Which was not making things any easier for myself, getting lapped fairly soon by the top car's meant it was very tricky to work out who was lapping me, and who im racing and who I need to stay clear of. After a few laps, I had done the good thing and let the leaders come through. Then nailed it slowly crawling my way back through the field. Then eventually taken 5th from 13th with a very strong field I felt I did well. Just a shame the start went so badly. It was a pleasure to be driving in a race with a strong field of driver's and cant wait to see the number's like sunday back at Clanfield RC for good!

A big well done to Jon W for driving a great race taking 3rd spot behind Tommy Chung and Richard Barton. Unfortunately there were a few people struggling with there setups and elecs throughout the day. With bren having a old servo let go on him during practice. Its great to see some big names back, and look forward to seeing them again. A big thank you to the Clanfield Committee and everyone that raced and helped on sunday! Was a cracking days racing and hopefully again!

Thanks too:
Rob Rasey-For THE Humor laugh1
Mark B -Pit Biatch :D


Full results here:
[url]http://www.clanfieldrc.co.uk/results.html[/url]
Pictures:
[url]http://www.clanfieldrc.co.uk/forum/viewforum.php?f=22[/url]
[url]WWW.RCSURESTART.CO.UK[/url]

See you guys next time!

Titchfield (1/10th) 9th Jan 2011

This was my 1st visits back to Torch since it's revamp, and can honestly say its for the better! track is better longer and the new astro is great too. I was a liitle worried turning up to the new track and layout. And to make it worse, a new-To me DEX410R. I had tried it once on twice on the grass to make sure I had everything setup.

WWW.KIFOPAINT.COM

I rocked up with my freshly painted rango tango shell and custom hoody-making sure I was racing half decent before revealing it to the world lol

Anyway! we got into the swing of things by 9:30.. and started getting ready for Q1. After sorting out my membership and changing PT number's I was ready to go. Being in the same heat as Tony Rc and Dave.. I knew it would get interesting. From Q1 the car felt fantastic, being used to 1/8th nitro I love the idea of diffs and so on. And with the low CG the car handles a dream, and surprisingly similar to 1/8th scale.
After a solid Q1 coming in 2nd after Stephen Brown. Which I was very happy with! considering the 3 mins of runtime on the car beforehand to try and get used to the track. Q2 went the same way finishing in 2nd and Q3 I was able to get in 7 laps before, trying to take a too fine of a line. And managing to break a solder joint, but luckily I was able to solder that back up pronto. Q4 Ended the same as Q1 and Q2 with me in 2nd.
Which put me into a solid 2nd place In the 4WD A Final:

4WD A:
1.Stephen Brown
2.James Kerr (Me)-My Secret starting setup!

3.Dan Brown
4.Dave O'brien
5.Mark Andrews
6.Lee Davies
7.Mike Scott

4WD B:
1.Tony Scott
2.Richard Parkes

3.Martin Brown

4.Neil Randall

5.Ian Brawn

6.Ai Lecomte

The A 4WD final started fairly standard, with me clipping the pipe on the apex and think dropping back into 3rd, but then getting back into 2nd in a few turns. From then on Stephen kept up a fast pace and led from start to finish. With myself driving pretty well, making a few silly mistakes here and there. But eventually bringing it home in 2nd with Dan following closely behind. The rango tango, felt fantastic all day and making a few very minute setup changes to the car. I want to get used to it before making and larger setup changes and getting lost, felt my tyre choice was good. With Dave bottling it last minute and going back to Pink BB's ;)

Want to say a big thanks first of all to all the member's down titchfield, who have all done a fantastic job on the new track and surrounding area. It's changed for the better that is for sure, once another jump or 2 is added. I can see some very high turnout's coming! 

Big thanks to John C for letting me steal some pit space, Tony Rc for the banter and humour or destroying his servo saver! and Dave.. for using me as a test dummy!

I cant wait to get back there and to see you guys soon!

James Kerr

Thanks to my sponsors:

RC Sure-Start

Kifopaint

Pics Courtesy of John Clarke!

UKEM Endurance Master's Sure Start Team

(Apologies in advance for poor spelling/Grammar)

Well, UKEM started at 7am on the 16th-Saturday. I was picked up on route by One of my fellow Team Mate's Grant F which we then headed over to John B's house.. and then after over to Mark B's. Once we had collected all of the RC Sure-Start team, we headed off to Stoke for the start of a very exciting but long weekend. After numerous stops along the way, for fuel we arrived at the stoke track at around 1ish. Which we arrived to music blasting out of the PA system, we decided to promptly get our wristbands. And get onto the track for some testing and tweaking and to learn the track layout.
We all had a good 20 minutes on the TX with our chosen weapon of choice AE RC8-Urghh Against my religion but I have to say the car handles fantastically.. as much as it hurts me to say it!:D . Which Kindly Mark supplied, and with some help from Rob R- AE team driver, we seemed to have a very good setup from the get go. We then decided to stop at 4ish, then we chatted and all agreed to stick to the same setup and work out which tyres to run in the morning.

We gave the car a quick clean, and checked it over to be ready for the sunday mayhem, we then spent a good 30 minutes setting up the tent, which me and Marky B were going to be risking our lives sleeping in -1 conditions. After some laughs we eventually got it setup, and the gazebo done we hooked up rx packs and the likes to charge them ready.
 We later on decided to go out, to try find somewhere to eat and thankfully avoided the 80's club (Reflex) and found a great little Thai restaurant. Which we eat our own body weight in rice and food, and a few drinks later we headed to the shops to grab a few beers to have back at the track.
Which we then drank and then later on decided to hit the sack, and try to get a earlyish night ready for the big day. We all owoke at around 7ish to the noise of arriving cars. After checking finger's and toes for movement.. we got a cup of coffee and everything ready on the table for the 1st challenge-the Le Mans start and engine fitting. At 9:50 AM Myself and other teams lined up for the Le Mans start which I grabbed the engine and fuel, ran to grant who then sprinted off towards the gazebo-Launching his phone onto the floor=(Dead phone).. and threw the engine at Mark. Who was ready and waiting with the Clutch assembly and tools. All the teams had just 10 minutes to put on the clutch assembly and fit there engine before any engines were allowed to be started. We had it all ready 3 mins before, we plonked on our trusty Sure-Start and ran over to the pits ready to go. The buzzer sounded-ENGINE'S GO GO.. Our tight Hyper .21 Burst into life instantly.. whilst hearing other non Pre Heated engine's struggling for life. We leaned the engine up ontop a tad and got it on the track. We ran that same tune for the 1st hr or so keeping a slow but steady pace. Which kept us in 2nd for a good 40 mins. Until we had a few plugs go-Dont think they were very suited.. we then slowly leaned it up a tad and kept slowly upping the pace all day. We kept in a solid-7-9th all day. Our strategy was, mark racing 30 mins-grant swaps over-30 mins. Then grant comes in, we swap rx pack+ swith to wheel and then I would go out 30 mins then john then he comes in swap rx+ tx then mark ect.
We all drove a very good pace, and tried to keep small mistakes to a bar minimum which kept us chugging out solid laps and having only 1 or 2 small time delays..  The hours passed fast and we still had a fast but not a full race tune, which we decided to keep it the same till the end. As we knew, teams would lean up the top for more speed but in turn creating a higher chance of flame out's or issues. Then finally on the 5hr 30 mark, John B had the last 30 mins to bring the car back in 1 piece-Which thankfully he did just that. And we came away with a very respectable 8th position. Just behind, some very good teams-HPI-Hobao-Xray.. we were the 1st of the Non big sponsored teams.. which is a fantastic achievement.. for some non national club racer's.

Each one of us had a fantastic day, and will be talked about for many years to come. We all worked well together and it all seemed to go very smoothly. Im not sure we could have done much better, the engine ran a dream from the very 1st turn over thanks to the Sure-Start. And was great to see so many teams, using the Sure-Start's throughout the day! Racing finished at 4pm and presentation was at 4:20 to give teams a chance to clean up the car's for any pictures. And to hand out the winning prizes and raffles prizes too. We then said our thanks to the UKEM crew and headed back to our gazebo.. and had the horrible packing everything back up and the 4hrs+ drive back down to the south. For me, it has been one of if not the best event I have raced at so far.. it was fun, exciting, and most of all for a great cause!  I do hope we will be back next year, for a bigger and even better UK ENDURANCE MASTER'S!

A massive thanks to all of the UKEM Crew and CML and everyone else involved who made the event so special!

And to my fellow teamates:
John bennett, Mark Byrne, Grant Fribbens-Who made it such a great weekend.. and worked together flawlessly..  :clap:


James Kerr

Thanks to my sponsors:
RC Sure-Start
Kifopaint

Clanfield Round 1 Race Report

Clanfield Winter Series Round 1 Race report

Round 1 of the Clanfield RC Winter Series toke place on October 24th.
The morning, started off very brisk. There was a light frost which meant the track was slightly damper than usual. Which considering the rain, the track had seen the day/evening before. Is a testament on how fast the track dries up, and with the sun slowly coming over the brow of the hills. It was looking like it was going to be a great days racing. Everyone got signed in and then were able to have 30 minutes practice, from 9:30-10am then qualifying would commence.
Most people, atleast did a few laps on the track to work out what tyres could be the hot ticket. And to blow any old cobwebs out of the driving  :)
I used my Rc Sure-Start to preheat my O.S. Before practice to get it up to temp.. and save time and effort, I then went out on some used M2 Caliber's which were ok, and were not clogging up to badly so decided to run these for the time being. Qualifying started at 10am on the Dot. With few number's due to Clashing meeting's and weather, there was only enough for 2 heats. Which was fine, as it gave driver's a chance to get more stick time in. We did 5 rounds in total with 3 to count-If im not mistaken, 2 rounds then 10 minute break and so on.
Once all of the rounds had been finished, we decided to have 30 minutes break for lunch. And to change receiver batterie's and any other setup changes. There were x2 20 minute finals B, had 4 truggy driver's in with the B Buggy chaps. Then the A Final
I decided to go for Some lightly used M2 Caliber's left over from Proline, and did a small setup change to front shock's. I had left my setup from the last time I race at clanfield and was spot on.
The A final started, with a very clean start from the most part from the driver's.. and it was I think a very sensible race by all. And some very good driver Ettique, which is always good to see people let by the lapping car. And, some interesting fuel stops, with low number's marshalls had to become Pit men too-Resulted in some interesting pitting  :P
The final then finished 20 minutes later I drove a very solid race taking the win with a laps lead, and was slowly working my way through the field again. The final results are:

1.Myself-James Kerr
2.Les Taylor
3.Carlton Williams
4.James Tatlow
5.Chris Spencer-Smith
6.John Bennett
7.Stuart Parnell

It was great to see, alot of smiles throughout the day. And the track to be driving very well. Considering the bad press its been getting recently, Im very sure that everyone that turned up today. Had a great days racing and had over 55mins+ or actual racing. Which is a added bonus, specially for people travelling a fair distance. We all managed to chip in and get some small track work done taking back any on growing grass onto the track. Which with everyone helping takes very little time or effort. And we were all packed up and finished by 3:30 which meant everyone got on there way before the sunday night traffic started to hit. I hope everyone enjoyed themselves today. It was a very fun and relaxed meeting, and we hope to have the track in ever better condition and thing's smartened up.
We are arranging some work parties before the next meeting which is the 21st November. So please come down and lend a hand if you have a spare few hours!

Once again, a big thanks to Tony Bolwell for all his hardwork over the years! And to see him participate more on the racing side and having fun. And to John Bennett for helping run race control today. And everyone else that made today very very enjoyable.

Thanks again

James Kerr

Clanfield Winter Series Rnd 1 Race Report

Sunday the 21st November 2010

Clanfield Winter Series Round 1
Sponsored by:
RC Sure-Start

It was a cold November morning and the first round of the new Clanfield RC Winter Series, Clanfield has gone through some drastic changes with a new committee taking over the running of the club so I was keen to see what changes were instore for this first meeting. The racer's were greeted with a very warm welcome from the newly formed Committee. Going over a few points, and to take into account everything takes time to change. They have allready done a fantastic job tidying up the facilities and working on improving the track condition.

It was decided we were going to do 4 rounds of Quali with 3 to count. With 15 mins between the rounds and 30 mins finals! brilliant as I love a good long final!
We all then, got our engines pre heated and onto the track for a few mins practice. To get adjusted to the conditions, and work out any setup ideas to try or just to try to keep your fingers moving from the cold.
Q1 was a good run, people were still getting back into the groove and trying to get into that Rhythm we all need to find. We got quail 1 done and had a leisurely 15 mins break until the start of round 2.

We got through all of the 4 rounds of qualifying in good time, but keeping a relaxed feeling to the day. So after all of qualifying. The order was:

A Buggies
1. Jon Wolfe
2. Brennan Ralls
3. James Kerr
4. Grant Fribberns
5. Les Taylor
6. Tony Scott
7. John Bennett
8. Paul Langley
9. John Dear

A Truggies
1. Mark Byrne
2. James Tatlow
3. John Clarke
4. Adam Bailey
5. Andrew Chapman
6. Paul Berkinshaw
7. Richard Hobbs


Each of the two finals were going to be 30 minutes long, which I like the idea. As the more runtime we all get the better personally. The B final, was very (Interesting) to say the least with some good battles, between all the racers. But unfortunately the starting 8 were then weeded down to three they were dropping like flies! With James Tatlow, trying to set a new 2wd Truggy trend. Which thankfully didn't catch on.

After the carnage it eventually boiling down to last man standing and three remaining running, John Clarke gave a very consistent drive from 3rd to take the win after James Tatlow and Mark Byrne had issues, followed by Adam Bailey.

The A final was a corker with a slightly interesting start with the speaker's not being heard. It was a bit of a bun fight into turn 1 and 2 with me unfortunately getting a bit squirmy and then being clipped into the pipe setting me back to 2nd from last by the second corner. Brennan Ralls was then in P1 charging along  trying to avoid the nearby chasers with Jon Wolfe Hot on his tails and pushed hard. The 7 min mark came up and the pitstops started playing a big roll.

Throughout the race it was very close between Jon Wolf &  Bren Ralls and Myself which then at the 15 minute mark I think Bren Ralls not sure on the reason, but whilst in the mist of testing. Overlooked tyres, and unfortunately didn't help and put him a lap down- on myself and Jon W. For the entire last 15 minutes we must have been within 5 seconds of each other w ith us both fighting very hard it was neck and neck and the lead was swapping every other lap until the 2nd till last lap where I manage to slide pack an upside down Jon Wolf after the doubles and get a 5 second lead which saw me through to a win for the first round.

RESULTS!

A FINAL
1 James Kerr     45/30m 25.48 XRAY 808 O.S.
2 Jon Wolfe           45/30m 27.87 XRAY 808 Nova Rossi
3 Brennan Ralls   44/30m 33.96 XRAY 808 O.S.
4 Grant Fribbens   41/30m 3.21 Team Losi RB
5 Tony Scott           41/30m 34.59 Team Losi RB
6 Les Taylor           39/29m 16.38 Hobao O.S.
7 John Bennett   38/30m 6.39 Mugen O.S.
8 Paul Langley   37/30m 24.51 XRAY 808 RB
9 John Dear           6/ 6m 43.33 HPI HPI

B FINAL:
1 John Clarke        40/30m 3.93 RC8T         Alpha
2 Adam Bailey 40/30m 32.43 Hyper ST Alpha
4 James Tatlow 27/19m 29.13 8ightT O.S.
5 Paul Berkinshaw 22/19m 4.80 Associated   RB
6 Mark Byrne   7/ 7m 54.28 Associated Nova Rossi
7 Phil Bennett 4/ 7m 35.45 Mugen O.S.
8 Richard Hobbs DNS           8ightT Alpha

I would 1st like to thank all of the Clanfield RC Committee for all the work they have done so far on the track it has leaped forward already and once the whole track can be rolled again it will be fantastic! It was the smoothest I have seen it for a very long time things are looking very promising for the club.

A big thanks to Jon Wolfe for some incredibly close racing  and Brennen Ralls for a very good final  I cant wait to see more racers down here.

And a big thanks to John Bennett at RC Sure-Start for Sponsoring the Clanfield RC Winter Series!

Special Thanks to John Bennett for proof reading this!

James Kerr

Thanks to my Sponsors:
RC Sure-Start
Kifopaint