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| Race report by Erwin Luhur |
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| The 2011 Singapore Invitational Challenge is a yearly event held on 10 â“ 11 Sept at the East Coast Park Raceway. It was a 2-day event and for this year, the Indonesian team brought the biggest team with over 15 drivers. Other overseas drivers were from Australia, Brunei and Malaysia. The race format was a Christmas tree with no top four sit-out for both the 1/10 and 1/8 class. The schedule was 3 rounds of qualifying on Saturday and all finals on Sunday. |
| Saturday (Qualifying Rounds) |
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| The day started out a little cloudy and 1 round of qualifying was successfully run before the lunch break. From the beginning, Team XRAY driver, Sadikin and Jesse Wu were setting the pace with a very fast lap times on both the NT1 and RX8. Round 2 was also completed without much change in position but after that, the sky suddenly turns dark and it rain. The qualifying was stopped for about 1.5 hrs to allow the track to dry completely before starting the 3rd and the last round of qualifying for the day. Below were the top 14 drivers who would be in the semi-finals on Sunday. |
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| Qualifying Result (1/10) |
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1. Nelson Lee (Singapore)
2. Barry Ng (Malaysia)
3. Jesse Wu XRAY NT1 (Singapore)
4. Bowie Ginting XRAY NT1 (Indonesia)
5. Sadikin XRAY NT1 (Indonesia)
6. Nick Kuan XRAY NT1 (Singapore)
7. Don Chng (Singapore)
8. Tom Goh XRAY NT1 (Singapore)
9. Erwin Luhur XRAY NT1 (Singapore)
10. Ben Seet (Singapore)
11. Joe Hwee (Singapore)
12. C.H. Tay (Singapore)
13. Aidi Amin XRAY NT1 (Singapore)
14. Terence Ang (Singapore) |
| Qualifying Result (1/8) |
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1. Nelson Lee (Singapore)
2. Sadikin XRAY RX8 (Indonesia)
3. Jesse Wu XRAY RX8 (Singapore)
4. Richard Ling (Singapore)
5. Leigh Dytor (Australia)
6. James Loke (Singapore)
7. Blake Young (Australia)
8. Tay Wui Kiat (Singapore)
9. Tom Goh (Singapore)
10. Erwin Luhur XRAY RX8 (Singapore)
11. Dennis Ong (Singapore)
12. Ben Seet (Singapore)
13. Leslie Baker (Singapore)
14. Don Chng (Singapore)
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| Sunday (Semi Final-20min and Grand Final-45min) |
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Semi-Finals
After some exciting racing in both semis, XRAY driver Jesse Wu managed to get the pole starting position in the 1/10 class follow closely by another XRAY driver Bowie Ginting in 2nd, Sadikin in 4th, Tom Goh in 8th and Aidi Amin in 9th position. For the 1/8 class, XRAY driver Sadikin will start from the 3rd position and Jesse Wu in 10th position. |
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| 1/8 Class |
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| It was a clean start for everyone except for XRAY driver Sadikin who made a mistake and went in the grass on the 1st lap. By the time the marshall put his car back on the track, he was at the 10th position. Determined to chase the front cars, Sadikin drove all-out, overtaking every car one by one and in the process, managed to hit the fastest lap in the final and the only car to hit below 18sec. The other XRAY driver Jesse Wu drove a consistently fast laps and managed to climb to 6th position. In the meantime, Sadikin continued to drive at amazing speed and managed to climb to the 1st position at about 10 min before finishing and finally crossed the finish line to win the race with 2 laps over the 2nd position. |
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| 1/10 Class |
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| The final started with cloudy sky and there were many overtaking on the first few laps between the front running cars. At about 15min into the race, it suddenly rain and the race had to be stopped. Since the race had not achieved 75% in duration, the race director had decided to re-start the race and reduced the duration to 20min after the track had dried. Sunshine suddenly came out after a short bust of rain and the track dried very quickly. During the re-start, XRAY driver Bowie Ginting managed to defend his 2nd position and team mate Sadikin managed to climb up one position to 3rd. Soon after that, both Bowie and Sadikin made some mistakes and both dropped to 10th and 5th position respectively. After that, Bowie continued to drive consistently and eventually climbed to 2nd position. Jesse Wu managed to hold on to 3rd while Tom Goh climbed from the 8th to 4th position. Meanwhile, another XRAY driver Aidi Amin, with his consistent driving climbed from the starting position of 9th to 6th position. |
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| 1/10 Class |
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1. Nelson Lee (Singapore)
2. Bowie Ginting XRAY NT1 (Indonesia)
3. Jesse Wu XRAY NT1 (Singapore)
4. Tom Goh XRAY NT1 (Singapore)
5. C.H. Tay (Singapore)
6. Aidi Amin XRAY NT1 (Singapore)
7. Sadikin XRAY NT1 (Indonesia)
8. Joe Hwee (Singapore)
9. Barry Ng (Malaysia)
10. Ben Seet (Singapore)
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| 1/8 Class |
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1. Sadikin XRAY RX8 (Indonesia)
2. Tay Wui Kiat (Singapore)
3. Blake Young (Australia)
4. James Loke (Singapore)
5. Joe Hwee (Singapore)
6. Jesse Wu XRAY RX8 (Singapore)
7. Nelson Lee (Singapore)
8. Ben Seet (Singapore)
9. Tom Goh (Singapore)
10. Leigh Dytor (Australia)
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