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Serpent at TITC

It was a last minute decision to go to TITC this year. I arrived on the 15th of February with Marc Fischer arriving a bit later on the 18th. Ludo was already there as he is working at the Ride office at RC Addict!

My car felt pretty good as soon as I put it on the track, and I really liked the new layout - it was a bit more technical and more difficult to drive than the last one. I started on Yokomo springs from Australia, Pink/Blue. Which was quite fine for the first few days I was there, but as the traction started coming up I opted for Blue/Blue like a lot of the other competitors. The softer spring at the front made the front bite less and made the car a lot easier to drive.

Other big changes were rear toe in, rear shock position and V2 motormount with topdeck screw. Later into practise Marc and I also played a lot with the rear diff oil, as many teams were running quite thick. We ended practise with a solid setup...one we could have probably gotten better given more time.

First Qualifier:
I had a pretty good run, one mistake through the fast chicane costing me 2 seconds. I ended 13th for the round

Second Qualifier:
I had a better run, no mistakes and opting again for new tires I finished 9th for the round.

Third qualifier:
This was 'happy hour' run, and majority of top 30 were all on 2nd run tires. In practise for Happy hour my car hadnt been great. I knew Yokomo springs werent perfect for all competitors, so I decided to give Xray short springs a try...in this qualifier the car felt really nice and I was able to complete a nice clean run. However majority of competitors also had a great clean race, with almost no retirements in the top 2 heats. I got 11th overall for this round.

Fourth Qualifier:
My car was feeling really good in this morning run, but I just rolled it after being too far on the curb, causing me to loose a lot of time. So I decided to pull in and save my tires for the final qualifier.

Fifth Qualifier:
Again my car felt great, and I was able to do my best position of the weekend coming in 8th for the round. Giving me 14th place for qualifying and therefore starting 4th in the B Final.

First Final:
I knew I needed something extra to make up positions, so I went up to 2.5 Linear Xray springs in order to try and give me the pace I needed. I also turned the timing up on my motor to try and give me a bit moe pace down the straight. The car felt pretty good, but I chose to use two pairs of rear tires from qualifying, trying to get nice looking tires front and rear. This wasnt a great decision as turning right the car was very hard to drive, but I still managed an awesome start and stayed in 2nd position behind Alex Hagberg for the race.

Second Final:
I knew I had to go for it in this final, as id already gotten a second, but this run was likely to be faster as the track had gripped up since the morning final. Once again I got a great start and slipped into second behind Alex, I was able to close the gap and pressure him for a few laps, with very fast local Thai driver Chavit very close behind me. Whilst we were all battling, Alex just clipped the curb after the front straight, rolling his car. I was able to get through and he recovered into 2nd with a close fight between him and Chavit. I knew this race time needed to be faster than Alex's from the first final, so I pushed hard right until the end even though I had a few seconds lead. In the end I did 18 Laps in 5:00 as opposed to Alex's time of 18 Laps in 5:02, so I took the win of the B Final!
Was great to see the team and work with Marc and Ludo! Given the quality of the field, this was my best international finish in my R/C Career, and only the second time ive driven this new car on asphalt. With Marc also never driving it on asphalt before this event!