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The first Dutch National of 2011 was at the track in the middle of our beautiful country, Utrecht; this track is one of the oldest so tire wear was an issue there. The weather forecast for Saturday was almost summer! 22 degrees (for Netherlands this is great!) on Sunday it was cooler but still dry. Just before the race I accepted a new challenge and switched to another brand⦠a newcomer in 1/8th scale: the XRAY RX8.
I got the car Thursday before the race and decided to race with the car because I had the faith that all would go well. And as it seemed, all did go well! I tested my new RB C11 engines a couple weeks earlier and they felt really good. The new black-coated crankcase delivers just a bit better flow in the engine which you can notice in top speed! Also just before the race I received the new 2092 pipe which was tested earlier this year by other RB team drivers and of course myself. This pipe performs a lot better in midrange and top-end than the previous 2018 pipe. Also a new brand of tires on the XRAY: Contact tires with carbon rims. So all was good and ready for the first race.
The shakedown of the XRAY took place at my home track in Rucphen on Friday afternoon. Then I was just finished with building and preparing some bodies. The car felt good out-of-the-box, a bit of understeer, but after some minor set-up changes the car felt consistent and fast.
Saturday it was practice on Utrecht and running in an engine. The track in Utrecht is a bit more technical than my home track, so again we needed some more steering. We laid down the shocks to lower positions, made both rear and front shock softer and changed the rear roll-center to the middle downward position. After these changes the car was almost perfect! In a training session we opted to disconnect the front anti-roll bar and with that my set-up was complete. The car had enough steering and on-throttle the car was very stable. Engine-wise we tried some exhaust/manifold combinations, but the fastest times were set with the new 2092 pipe and matching manifold. Tire-wise the Contact carbon rims worked good, but lap times were about 0.1â“0.2 sec faster with the lightweight rims so we decided to go with those that weekend. At the end of the day we measured and confirmed that the car and body met the âśrules of engagementâť but only then we noticed that the XRAY had an out-of-the-box weight of only 2390 grams⦠and I was using a normal battery pack (no LiPo) and a âśheavyâť body. So that evening I had to add 120g of lead weight to it.
Sunday started out with wet, and the track was wet but drying out. For the first few heats you needed to run intermediate tires. When the last heat came up, the track was too dry for intermediates so I thought Iâ™d go with normal tires. This delivered me the provisional pole because other drivers made other tire choices and some even quit. I got pole with 26 laps @ 7:03. The next heat the track was almost dry and lap times were about 0.5sec faster than before. Again, I got provisional pole with 29 laps @ 7:07 closely followed by Rick and Ilia within 5 seconds. For the 3rd and last heat the track was completely dry except for some spots close to the curbs, so it was tricky driving at some parts. The heat went well again, we had some trouble with the âśtricky spotsâť but the car/engine/tire combination felt great. So after 3 rounds of qualifying the first ranking of 2011 looked something like this:
1 Rick Vrielijnck NL
2 Ilia van Gastel
3 John Ermen NL XRAY RX8
4 Steven Cuypers
5 Gunther van Staey
Because NOMAC didnâ™t adopt the âśalways semi-final ruleâť the first 4 (including me) were direct qualifiers! After some semis it was time for the final. At the start it was a bit hectic because Rick and Ilia drove a couple of inches which caused Steven to jump start, and because I left ON the start signal I was in 4th place. But I managed to get by Steven and Ilia in the first 2 laps and got on Rickâ™s tail.
A couple of laps later Iâ™d gone wide on a curb and had to let Ilia pass. Steven had to come in due to a jump start so it was Rick, Ilia and me in front, a small gap, and then Steven followed by the rest of the field. After some laps Iliaâ™s engine started running richer which let me able to pass him and pull a small gap. Rick had a lead of couple seconds.
Rick was pitting on a 3.5min strategy and I was pitting on 4â“4:15 so I had a pit advantage later in the race. Steven was pitting even later, I think it was 5min but it was hard to say during the race. After the first third of the race, Rick had a problem passing a slower driver which let me pass and take the lead⦠at least for a while. Rick was pitting a different schedule and due to this and some traffic at my behalf he was able to take back the lead during pit stops. After the tire change the gap between me and Rick was only about 5â“7sec. I was not able to close the gap, and it was actually getting bigger. With 4 minutes remaining Rick still had to pit 1 more time and I was good to go. This was the only opportunity I had to pass him. Unfortunately a bump at the beginning of the straight put my car a couple of inches off the line and I ended up in the grass. I pitted again to get the body back in position and Rick made a safety stop at the last 2 minutes just to be sure. So after 30 mins this was the result:
1 Rick Vrielijnck
2 John Ermen XRAY RX8
3 Steven Cuypers
4 Arie Manten
5 Gunther van Staey
6 Michiel Renting |
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For the first time out with the new XRAY RX8 with not a lot of pre-testing I was really happy with the result! The car felt great and really consistent during the entire final. The Contact tires on lightweight rims worked a bit better than the same tires on carbon rims. I think that during lower temperatures the softer rims works better, but in hotter temperatures the carbon rims will work better. The RB C11 engine with 2092 pipe and Tornado fuel performed outstanding during the whole final.
Now we have some time to do some testing with the car before our next national in way-up-north-Groningen. That track is a real âśtire-eater.âť Itâ™s funny to say that the tire wear during this weekend seemed a lot less than last year. I still donâ™t know if this was because of the tires, car or weather, but it is certainly something to keep track of. I used to be a driver who used a lot of rubber during the races but this weekend it was a lot less. Maybe my 1/12th scale driving during the winter finally paid off!
Last but not least I would like to thank my mechanic âśInsaneâť Ismail for the fast tire change and refueling and of course my sponsors for their trust and support: Team XRAY, RB Products, Contact Tires, Tornado Fuel and RC Connect.
C U next time. |
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