A good crowd of over 40 drivers made for an enjoyable and competitive night’s racing at Logan last night. Not only was there a good crowd in terms of numbers, but quite a few junior drivers and lots of new faces. I also spoke to a couple of people there to check out what racing is about before jumping in. That’s all good news for thec lub, and the sport. I hope the Logan club can take on the example of the sunshine coast club in terms of how they encourage and support those newcomers and particularly juniors.
On track the action was competitive, and enjoyable.
With Modified running first, we took advantage of the sequence and got a head start on the long drive home – so I didn’t see the finals for the other classes. Full results will be up on the lcrccc.com website later in the week. In 540 Tristian was going well (and I think won the night), while in stock, Johnny Hyde was the quick man all night. In Gas Tourer, Martin Nichol made an appearance and showed the regulars he’s just as quick peddling a nitro car as an electric tourer. He won the night.
In modified, there were 9 cars, most of whom are relatively new to modified – and that was fantastic. Qualifying belonged to Karl Yeung who demonstrated that he will make the transition from stock to mod well. Karl was quick throughout and improved on his own times from last fortnight (even dipping into 19 second lap times). There was some frenetic action including some pretty willing dices between our own Heavy D and Brad Hall – with Arjen getting in on the action as well. Some of the guys had a few reliability glitches, but that’s part of the modified learning curve.
In the final, Karl and I got away well and pulled out a small gap over the first few laps. I managed to sneak past Karl on about the third lap, and then enjoyed a trouble free run. Karl finished second, with Aaron Fryer third. Both these guys set their fastest time of the night in the finals – Karl going 15:5.09 and Aaron 15:5.19. Those are both good times in comparison to times set on this layout over the past few meets. Aaron in particular benefitted lots from taking some power out of the car – dropping from a 3.5 back to a 4.5 motor. That’s a good lesson for anybody stepping up to modifed – you are better off running a little less power than more. Something like a 6.5 or 5.5 brushless (on 6 cells) is more than enough. Heavy is running his 6.5 on 5 cells and happy with the pace.
My Night: I was really happy with the Mi3 last night. Over the first couple of runs I got it dialled back in to a suitable setup – having started with the Sunshine Coast setup from Queensland Titles. The first few laps were a real eye opener – having done so many laps at the Sunshine Coast it was a little strange to be back on a much tighter and bumpier layout than the wide open spaces of Landsborough. I had some enjoyable races in qualifying – including one where I was trying very hard to catch Karl but to no avail – he was going quick! The last qualifyer was very enjoyable. I came up behind Brad Hall, Heavy and Arjen who were engaged in unholy warfare and spent quite a few laps trying to sneak past the three of them without interfering in the battle.
The final was definitely the best race I’ve driven since we started running the Mi3 back in May and the car was working exceptionally well. For the record I was running 5 cell last night, with the Speedpassion 3.5 motor. I also really enjoyed racing with some new mod guys – all of whom I thought did well. It’s important to say once again, that any of the experienced mod guys will be more than happy to help with setup, motor, gearing, driving tips – so if you are trying out mod (or thinking of it) don’t be afraid to ask for a bit of help.