Or possibly “heavy’s 3.5” or “Schumacher Mi3.5 Race” or “3.5 Race S1” or several other possible titles to this story.

With the release of the new 3.5 all the attention has focused on the Pro, Schumachers full house race ready chassis, kitted with all the bling and all the Speed Secrets money can buy – at $550 great buying.
There is, however, another option, a cheaper option. It’s the 3.5 S1 Race version. At $385 it’s easy to dismiss it as a beginners car. Here at Action RC we thought – let’s have a look at the RACE and see if it can cut the mustard in the super competitive stock class, we’ll also give it a run in 540 from time to time as this is the class where we expect to sell some of these cars. The plan is to run it standard to start with and then try a few nice bits to see if there is a difference or a need to go the upgrades.
For the first run we took the car straight from the box (they come assembled apart from bumper and body mounts ) fitted our electrics (Speed Passion ESC and SP 17.5 motor, Spectrum receiver and KO 2143 servo, CORE LIPO ) and went to race. (I did put the car on the super tweak board to make sure it was flat – which it was ). At the track I checked the ride height before the first race and found that the car was set 6mm front and rear – for Bayside I like a little more on the rear so I set 1 shim in the back shocks for 6mm front and 6.5 rear – set to go.

In the first race I got shunted into the boards off the start by my mate Tony so had to come from behind. Found the car pretty good, wouldn’t mind a little more rear end rotation in a couple of corners but overall very safe and easy to drive. Good enough for 3rd in the heat with a 20 lapper behind Keith (TC5) and Brad (008) which is probably about as good as my driving ability anyway whatever the car – I was well pleased with the car at that point.
Decided not to make any changes to the car apart from tightening the rear diff a tad, but did change a gear ratio which was a mistake. In teh second race I had a run in with a couple of back markers during lapping which effectively put me out of contention – still pleased with the car. After the 3 qualifiers still with no changes from the box set up I was qualified 4th still 1 of only 4 to go 20 laps on the day. Other commitments prevented me from running the final but will be back in 2 weeks with a further report. I plan to run the car over the set up station and check camber and toe etc and maybe check for tweak again after the good shafting I got in the second race today.
For the record the difference between the PRO and the Race are as follows (what I;ve found so far – there could be more)
1. SI material for the chassis, top deck, front and rear shock towers as opposed to Graphite on the Pro
2. Plastic hex wheel drives instead of purple al on the Pro
3. Older model al shocks with clip adjustment instead of wind down adjustment new type as on the Pro
4. Early style top deck instead of the EU style on the PRo
5. Standard turnbuckles instead of Titanium on the Pro.
6. No roll bars come with the Race but they do with the Pro
➡ Check back often as we detail our progress with this exciting new budget style car