The race was held at the RCC Glenmarie track that is located in Syah Alam, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The track was beautifully prepared by Mr. Alvin Lam and Mr. Chee Siong Ku. Both of them are also very fast on the track.
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This is a picture showing the track at the facility from an earlier event. Unfortunately, I was unable to get a picture of the layout used for this race.
The track proved challenging as the traction levels would vary from round to round. The size and number of jumps made it even more challenging to make a good perfect lap, as you had to balance the carâ™s setup to keep the chassis from bottoming out too much while still having good corner speed and forward traction.
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This race is actually a Malaysian National League Round 2 but I was invited by Mr. Alvin Lam to participate. I was eager to come because at the same track there will be an important race coming in July, when there will be a FEMCA race held here. I was taking this opportunity to get to know the track better for the big race. I had actually been to this track 2 times before, but the layout was different on the earlier visits. It was only the hot weather that is the same.
The result of the qualification is as follow,
1. Stanley Wangsanegara XRAY XB808'09
2. Eric Lim
3. Chopin Yusuf
4. John Agus
5. Super Khoo
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In the first qualifying round, the traction was not there. I had changed my shock set-up the night before and I had misjudged what the conditions would be like.
For the second round I altered my suspension a bit and got the best run of the day. I consider that I had a bit of luck because at the second round I was able to avoid traffic since we run 15 drivers in each round.
In the last run, I was not able to avoid traffic as good as in the round before and I was not able to improve my time but I made the fastest lap for the race in that round.
In the final, the start was clean until about the 5 minute mark there was a slight glitch in my radio and I was falling back to maybe 7th or 8th. After this glitch I thought there was a problem in my electronics because suddenly the servos felt very slow. I decided just to cruise for some time and suddenly my servos got all of their power back. After that I worked my way through the crowd bit by bit until, around the 45 minute mark, I was battling with the leader at that time, Mr. Chopin. His engine flamed out, allowing me to seize the first position which I held onto for the remainder of the race.
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Final results:
1. Stanley Wangsanegara XRAY XB808'09
2. Chopin Yusuf
3. John Agus
4. Alvin Lam
5. Eric Lim
I was using the latest XB808 2009 spec in this race and with all the improvements I could finish the race without any mechanical problem. I also would like to mention is that the new body is awesome, the car looks very sleek. Itâ™s a testament to the new car that could endure the gruelling 60 minutes of hard racing in a demanding 390C ambient temperature.
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It was a good race and looking forward to go back to that track again next month for the Pre-FEMCA race. I also would like to Thank Mr. Alvin Lam, Mr. Chee Siong Ku, Mr. Eric Lim, Mr. Kelvin Ngow, and Mr. Chai for their unrivaled hospitality for taking care of us while we were there.
