| Race Report by Uwe Baldes |
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The XRAY Racing Series (XRS) Germany has successfully started its fourth season. For the third time, the Model Auto Club (MAC) Adenau hosted the opening round, and it was already the sixth XRS appearance on the Eifel-Ring, the permanent indoor race track of the MAC Adenau in Leimbach, not far from the legendary NĂĽrburgring. After an intense day of practice, which provided eleven hours to optimize the car's set-up for the challenging 111-meter track with ETS carpet, Sunday morning saw the so-called "Sunday drivers" (those joining the meeting only on race day) enjoying one and a half hours to make up for the alleged backlog of practise. As always with the XRS races, the fully represented team of the German XRAY importer SMI Motorsport offered comprehensive support to all drivers. In addition, SMI managing director Anke Mueller even supported the MAC catering team.
After the drivers' briefing, race director and timekeeper Uwe Baldes sent the participants into the three heats, with the best run to be counted by lap and time. The drivers were divided into the classes Touring Car FWD / Fronti 17.5T, Touring Car Stock 13.5T and 1/12 GT 17.5T.
In the touring car stock class, the positions were hotly contested. With 27 laps in 5:02,042, the Pole Position went to Xray driver Joerg Baldes in front of his brand colleagues Marc Stuebben and Tobias Hoefflin. Hoefflin won the first final just ahead of Joerg Baldes and Mugen driver Daniel Toennessen. In the second round Joerg Baldes countered successfully, Hoefflin was beaten only by two and a half tenths of a second with Toennessen third. Thus, in this class the third final had to decide. Marc Stuebben won the last run ahead of Toennessen, while Baldes and Hoefflin finished only on places three and four. Thanks to a razor-thin result in the second final, the day's victory went to Joerg Baldes ahead of Tobias Hoefflin and Marc Stuebben. An amazing performance was shown by the only eight-year-old Thilo Baldes (Xray), who was able to keep up with the speed of the veterans and lost only a single tenth of a second to the record lap of the day. In his seventh XRS race, he finished fifth.
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| Stock Results |
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1. Baldes Jorg â“ XRAY T4
2. Hofflin Tobias â“ XRAY T4
3. Stubben Marc â“ XRAY T4
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| The front-wheel-drive touring cars are the youngest class, but also the class with the most starters. Not only the true-to-life bodies, but also the enormous power density give the "Frontis" a remarkable inflow. The Pole Position conquered fronti-veteran Oliver Kaufmann, who completed 25 laps in 5:00,700 minutes with his Destiny. Second place went to Harald Schmittgen, who was significantly involved in the test program of the Xray T4F. He was short of Kaufmann for just under one and a half second, half a second behind came Frank Hoeschler (Xray) in third place. In the three finals, however, Kaufmann left the luck, once he stuck while lapping back markers and twice he made a mistake on his own, so that he finished in fourth place overall, but he accepted the disappointment calmly. The fight for the win was extremely exciting, as the first finale Hoeschler won half a second ahead of Schmittgen, while Kaufmann came in third. In the second final, Schmittgen conquered the victory, prevailed with just under two and a half tenth of s second ahead of Hoeschler and Daniel Schober, who has switched from Formula to the front-wheel-drive touring cars. So the third round had to decide. Schmittgen and Hoeschler chased bumper to bumper around the Eifel-Ring, but in the end Schober was happy about his first race win, while Hoeschler finished second to Schmittgen. In equal points, the better run decided in favor of Harald Schmittgen, who was very happy about his victory. Frank Hoeschler in second and Daniel Schober in third provided a complete Xray podium. |
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| FWD Results |
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1. Schmittgen Harald â“ XRAY T4F
2. Hoeschler Frank â“ XRAY T4F
3. Schober Daniel â“ XRAY T4F
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| In the 1/12 GT class Harald Schobner had the event under control. With his Project Godspeeed chassis, he was the fastest in qualifying with 42 laps in 8: 02.838 ahead of Xray driver Alexander Seitter and PG driver Roland Streb. By winning the first two finals Schobner also brought the daily victory with lap advantage ahead of junior Jody Mueller, who even left her grandfather Bertram Kessler behind. |
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| 1/12 Results |
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1. Schobner Harald â“ XRAY X12
2. Seitter Alexander â“ XRAY X12
3. Streb Roland
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At the atmospheric award ceremony at the end of an exciting and fair day of racing on the Eifel-Ring, which is available in 24/7 mode 24 hours a day, seven days a week for training, not only the best riders were honored. In addition, some useful articles from the SMI program were given to drivers with the longest journey, the best marshalling, to the youngest competitor, for the most beautiful bodies, etc.. And of course all participants were given the compulsory Xray T-shirt at the end.
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