The last round of the Dutch Nationals Modified was held on September 7, and in a few weeks the last race for Stock will be at the track in Rucphen. We were very successful by having all team drivers in the A-finals.
Our Nationals series is run on Sundays while Saturdays are used for practice. When we arrived at the track the weather was great. Because of the GP for Large Scale the weekend before our electric onroad national, the grip level was very strange. Even some club drivers from Amca struggled to find a good setup for their cars.
Hugo was already very confident about his car because Amca is his home track and he had everything sorted well. Amca is also Joepâ™s home track but Joep was in trouble today: he had an odd-handling car and spent all Saturday night trying to solve the problem. Patrick tried different settings and after a few batteries he was also confident. Fransâ™ car was looking very good on the track and he decided to do some practice runs because he had not been racing on Amca track for a few years. At the end of the day the only worry we had was the weather for Sunday because it was supposed to rain.
Sunday morning we had a small surprise: the track was still dry! All heats for Stock class were dry so this series was the one. Frans had a very careful first lap because he crashed in training with every battery on his first lap. On his last lap he managed to get in front and so secured TQ after series 1 for Frans and his XRAY T2â™008. XRAY had six cars in the Stock final!
After the first series of Stock, Modified got underway⦠but the rain started 4 minutes in the first Modified heat. Rules in Holland state that a series has to be completed in the same conditions for all racers in a class so the first series for Modified was cancelled. All Modified drivers were working on their cars to get them waterproofed. Meanwhile Frans was looking confident. Hugo Joep and Patrick drove the second and third series and qualified in the A main. Conditions were not good: the track was a bit wet and therefore it was very difficult to get a good run in. Joep drove a very controlled heat with only a single off-track excursion, and so qualified 7th in the A main. Hugo tried everything but for some reason his tires didnâ™t do the job he wanted. With almost no grip he still managed to qualify 5th. Patrick was having a go for the TQ spot, drove very well but simply came up short: he qualified 2nd. Four XRAY T2â™008 cars made it into the final.
Between the qualifying series and the finals it stopped raining softly⦠the skies opened up and now it started pouring heavily. But just before the finals were about to start it stopped raining.
Frans prepared his car for full rain conditions but when he entered the track for his final (A main Stock) the track was only damp but not wet enough. As Frans never drove in damp/rainy conditions before, he did the best he could and finished 3rd. Richard Oversloot took the win (also driving an XRAY T2â™008) with Vasco Christiaanse finishing in 2nd place.
Rob Jansen won the A main Modified. Hugo did his best racing this season, and with very good control he managed to take 2nd place to secure 2nd overall in the Championship. Alexander Roeleveld was 3rd, Patrick was 4th, and Joep was 7th.
I would like to thank our sponsers XRAY, Hudy and RC-Connect for their support of the team.
Joep Willemsen
Foto's: Erik Germeraad, Ronald Arts & Joep Willemsen
