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The first round of the 2008 North German Regional Championship took place on April 26/27 at the 2007 German National Championship circuit in Munster. The 50 competing drivers (twenty 1:10th Scale and thirty 1:8th/235mm) were treated to blue skies, sun and temperatures of around 20°C. I was very excited about the prospect of my first outdoor race of the year, with my new car and equipment. Also, with the circuit being well known to me, I would be able to make a direct comparison to my performance last year with the Serpent car.
Saturday was for testing and practicing and also saw the first round of qualifying taking place. The grip was very low at first and although it improved throughout the day, it never reached the level where cars started to traction roll. |
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My car was immediately very good. I had simply taken the setup from last year's German National Championship runner-up Dirk Wischnewski. Only later in the day did I change the springs on the rear axle from blue to purple in order to generate a bit more steering in the fast corners.
Unfortunately my rear belt stripped during the first qualifying session and I used the rest of the day to replace all the belts and rebuild my car - better safe than sorry on Sunday!
On Sunday, the first qualifying session in the morning was the quickest, thanks to the cooler temperatures. Unfortunately I managed to get involved in two crashes with two cars whilst trying to lap them, which lost me a total of three seconds (one 17 second and one 18 second lap, instead of a 16 second one). However, my car was performing superbly, as was my Novarossi LR3 and I was able to achieve 19 laps in 5.11. Without the crashes, this would have been 8 seconds, which would have given me a direct qualifying position in the German National Championship race from the previous year.
The fastest lap of 15.9 seconds was super and I was really happy with the pole position and the performance of my car. |
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From the semi-finals, the XRAY drivers Hasselbring, Steinhaeuser and Grund were also able to make it into the main final, thus completing a great performance from Team XRAY.
The 30min final took place late Sunday afternoon. My car performed superbly once again and also my father was in top form - refuelling my car each time in the blink of an eye! I was able to lead the race from start-to-finish and took victory with almost 4 laps more than I did in the race the previous year with my old car/equipment.
Unfortunately, the other XRAY drivers suffered small problems and thus couldn't get themselves to the head of the race.
I would like to thank the MC Munster club for the very well-organised and superbly-run race, also my father for his help and to my sponsors: Hudy, SMI, and Novarossi.
Results:
1 Krause, Ralf XRAY NT1
2 Hennemuth, JĂĽrgen
3 Pätz, Michael
4 Knispel, Jan Simon
5 Hasselbring, Bernd XRAY NT1
6 Grund, Stephan XRAY NT1
7 Steinhäuser, Carsten XRAY NT1
8 Lemke, Frank
9 Guttschau, Kai-Oliver
10 SĂĽdhoff, Frederik |
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