On September 15/16 the annual buggy event attracted 60 drivers from all over the region, namely Singapore, Macau, Taiwan and the host country Malaysia. This included OCM and Nanda factory team.
Team XRAY/Hobbylink from Singapore, led by Sam Cheng, arrived at the beautiful Glenmarie facility in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on Friday night leaving only time to check in to the hotel.
Not having any practice time, qualifying began on Saturday morning. By late afternoon, 3 rounds of heats have been completed. By this time local Malaysian ace driver David Lim with his Werks-powered Losi was already sitting on a comfortable pole position. The final qualification round was to be held on the Sunday morning.
Sunday morning started with the truggy heats. Ah Leng from Singapore TQ’ed the truggy event and ultimately won the main event as well. It seemed that David Lim was destined to TQ the Buggy heats although Singaporean driver Glenn Phuah in an RB-powered XRAY came in a close 2nd after all the qualification rounds were completed. This meant that David and Glenn would sit 1st on the grid in their respective ? finals.
(click to enlarge)
The ? finals began after a brief rain shower that groomed the track as well. With the dark clouds overhead, everyone was eager to get race underway. Team XRAY Singapore put on a good show and put 4 cars in the main event: Glenn Phuah, Sam Cheng, Luigi Venturi, and Chester Chua. Last year’s Champion Ah M from Singapore showed some excellent driving and put his X1CR into the Top 10.
The main event began with Ah M pulling into the lead after managing to overtake Sam and Glenn and after the first few minutes of the 45min final. Luigi and Chester suffered flameouts, Luigi put on a good fight to reduce the gap with 3rd place finisher Danny Teh and his OS-powered Kyosho only to finish a close 4th with only a 7sec difference, however he managed to do the fastest single lap of 43+ seconds. It was a tough final and the lead changed several time times between Sam, Glenn and Ah M. Sam made a slight mistake that left Glenn an opportunity to overtake to lead the race. This seemed to be a crucial mistake that left Sam in 2nd close behind champion Glenn Phuah.
The final results are as follows:
1. Glenn Phuah (SIN) XRAY XB8EC
2. Sam Cheng (SIN) XRAY XB8EC
3. Danny Teh (MAL) 4. Luigi Venturi (SIN) XRAY XB8EC
5. Owen (CHN)
6. Eric Lim (MAL)
7. Lai Kok Heng (MAL) 8. Chester Chua (SIN) XRAY XB8EC
9. Ah M (SIN)
10. Didian Ho (TWN)
Report by: Sam Cheng/ Team Hobbylink
Pictures by: Sylvia Lim