- ARC R10 2013 - Hugo Miguel - European Championship - Torres Novas - 01-04.08.2013 -

Report of European Championship 2013 at Torres Novas track, Portugal:

This past weekend, took place at Torres Novas track, the European electric touring car championship, unfortunately only 62 drivers attended.
As usual the big names were present, the weather was great all the time surrounding the 30ºC and the track was low to medium grip.

After practice heats we had 5 qualifying rounds and 5 sets of new tires, it counted the 2 fastest lap times for reseeding for the finals.
The "A" finalists were allowed to use 3 sets of new tires for the 3 rounds, so there were no tire strategy issues for the top 10. The following finalists only could buy one more set, so here we had previously choose to run at least one qualifying heat to save a new set for the finals.

On Thursday we had 4 practice heats, where I tested and setup new eletronics, tested some oil and spring settings.

Qualifyings started on Friday with two heats, at the end I was not happy with the time sheets and was running slower than with the older car at the warm up one month ago. I was struggling to find an equivalent spring/piston holes/oil match between the old and new shocks, to carry the corner speed I had on the previous car.3 qualifyings were left for Saturday and I could not waste them. The night before I changed oil and springs, redone the setup and installed for the first time in my life the DJ CVD.

Saturday morning I was very anxious till I went for the first laps of the 3rd qualifying, I imediately felt I had done a big improvement on the car setup. The amazing part was the DJCVD that made car so smooth during cornering, as the front didn´t step out anymore, no chatering or bouncing in the front drive train. Now I could drive better lines, being more predictable and consistent.
I could shave 10 seconds from the first 2 qualifying heats and my best lap finally arose with 14.999s against 15.4s the day before.
This made me step up from 45th to 25th at the end of the day. Now I was happy with the result and would start with number 5 on the grid of the C final.

I enjoyed a lot the 1st and 2nd finals with great driving, finishing in 3rd and 4th respectively with a big smile in my face. The 3rd final a driver went into my rearend, I spun out and I was knocked by other cars. My car looked like a bouncing ball. Nevertheless it kept undamaged and I could recover to 6th place.
In the end I grabbed the 25th place, which I consider very good for myself as "A" final was composed by factory drivers and even a few could be found on the "B".

The ARC R10 2013 once again showed how extremely is a good performer, the building quality and materials employed are among the best! It never lets you down!

I want to thank the support of BBS Modelismo in the hands of Mr. Luís Simões and Mr. Jones Chu from ARC company, for the support for this event!

Hugo Miguel

Source:

H. Miguel