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| Following our successful pre national warm up race the weekend before, we were confidant that the Xray buggy was in good shape for the main race. The EMORC race track is unique in top level off road racing in that it is fully astro turf and features some difficult combination jumps. This was the 3rd national that the club had held, but for this year some layout changes had been made, giving a more raceable circuit. At the previous 2 national Jon Hazlewood had TQ and won at both events which again fuelled more confidence. |
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| The set up for this track requires an almost circuit car style as the grip is very high on the carpet like astro turf. Heavy shock oil, springs and roll bars are used in order to calm the steering and with plenty of pre national practice available for everyone, a fierce race meeting was set. In round one Xray team driver, Jon Hazlewood was just a bit to careful and the run unfortunately included some mistakes, resulting in a lowly 10th in the round, but the car felt good. Round 2 was looking very good for Jon until a miss timed jump with a backmarker put jon on his roof and with it any chance of getting TQ. |
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5th in round 2 was ok, but should have been much better. After 2 rounds World Champion Neil Cragg was leading in points and in overall time, having set a 9 laps in 21 seconds in round 2. Jon knew he could go faster than that, so the last qualifying round was going to be balls out.
The final run was perfect and a time of 9 laps in 17 seconds resulted in TQ for the round and a new track record. With all the qualifying runs completed to top 5 was:
1st Neil Cragg (1+4)
2nd David Crompton (2+2)
3rd Graham Alsop (2+3)
4th Jon Hazlewood (1+5) XRAY XB8TQ
5th David Spashett |
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| Xray Team drivers Brennan Ralls and Lee Taylor were placed in the B final. Unfortunately neither was able to bump up, with Lee having engine problems and Brennan recovering well from a bad start to finish mid pack. |
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| The first five minutes of the 30 minute A final started at a fast pace. Cragg got a slight break from the rest with Jon dropping down to 5th. The top 5 soon broke away from the rest of field. Jon tried hard to make a move to the front, but with little room to pass had to wait until the pit stops. |
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| At 7.30 Jon came in for fuel and re entered the track and moved up from 5th to 2nd place behind Crompton who was on his normal 9 minute stops and then a short final stop. With Crompton pitting late the race was not going to sort itself out until Crompton completed his last stop. By that time Jon was a just few second behind Crompton and when he pitted for the final time Jon took the lead and never looked like loosing it. Jon crossed the line a comfortable 4 seconds in front to take his first major win in 2007. |
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Jon drove an excellent race and the XB8 EC handled the track to the very highest level. Only small changes were made to the car all day long which helped with consistency.
A final result:
1 John Hazelwood XRAY XB8TQ
2 David Crompton
3 Graham Alsop |
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| Photos copyright by www.piraterc.com |
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