Round 5 of the Belgian national 1:10 200mm took place on September 21 at the MRCC circuit in Charleroi. The weather was really good with 20° and a nice sun was present all the weekend. The track is nice and very fast with long sweeping corners.
(click to enlarge)
Qualification:
The Sunday morning begins with a practice run followed by three qualifying rounds. In the practice run, the car worked really well and set a new record (faster over 0.5seconds than the old one). I was confident for the qualifiers.
In fact, I set the fastest time in all the three rounds of qualifying. 5 seconds behind me was the young fast Xray driver Jonathan Sanza.
T1 Top four qualifiers: 1. Jerome Renaux XRAY NT1
2. Jonathan Sanza XRAY NT1
3. Manuel Henriet
4. Maartem Kempeneers
My car before the qualification (click to enlarge)
T1 Final:
Before this race I was in the lead for the championship but everything is still possible and there were still four racers that were in contention to be the new national champion. The pressure was there and no mistakes were allowed.
I had a good start and within the first few laps I was able to get a gap of a few seconds on the rest of the field. Jonathan Sanza who was second on the grid had an awful start and getting caught up in a crash in the first corner.
Sanzaâ™s car in action (click to enlarge)
After 20 minutes, my engine began to run lean so I decided to slow down and drive conservatively. Sanza was able to go up to the second position and behind him was Michel Tomagra. Eventually, Sanza had some tires problems, but managed to finish in third position just behind Tomagra who passed him in the last minutes.
I was able to win this final with a 5 lap cushion ahead of the second place. The car was perfect and really easy to drive.
T1 results: 1. Renaux Jerome XRAY NT1
2. Tomagra michel XRAY NT1
3. Sanza jonathan XRAY NT1
4. Tebaldi Marc XRAY NT1
5. Henriet Manuel 6. Roufosse Stephane XRAY NT1
7. Kempeneers Maartem
8. Vonsters Guy
9. Aerts bert 10. Yerna hugues XRAY NT1
A great race for Xray who place three cars on the T1 podium and two cars on the T2 podium.
Mathematically, Iâ™m already the new Belgian champion. But there remains the sixth round which will be held in Charleroi again. I hope that I will be able to finish on a last victory.
