So with the outdoor season approaching i decided to head up to coastal model car club for there march madness meeting to try and start work on my outdoor Astro set up for the upcoming regional series.

Practice : all i did from my current indoor set up was place schumy yellow mini spikes on and put the car down, just to see how it went and found immediately the car was over damped and way to much initial steering. Pulling the car off to prep for round 1 i cut 2 rows off the outer front spikes, 1 off the inner to take away the high speed bite, i also came down to 32 1/2 weight front oil to try and settle the car over the bumps and left it as that.

Round 1 : the car felt a lot better straight away. Being able to push harder but finding it still wanted to topple over. Inexperience on the track and still getting to grips with set up i managed to take 3rd overall. Fastest time a 23.09

Round 2 : for this round i cut the outer edge of the rear tyres, and went a little softer on springs. Blue front and pink rear from black and silver. Straight away again i found the car just allowing a little extra roll before it tried rolling. Even then it was a more progressive let go so it could be controlled. Getting faster and more confident in the 22-4 i went a lap quicker and until fellow tlr driver George fairweather went quicker was in tq spot. Fastest lap was cut down. 22.73

Round 3 : for the final round i cut another row of the front outer row on the tyres. Laid the rear shocks in at the top one more hole and at the bottom moved to the outer hole. Also raised the front roll centre by removing the outer spacer on the top link. This pretty much dialled the car in so much better. Could push a lot harder. I decided to go all out in this run and did make errors but went faster over a lap and even though my second round time was only 5 seconds faster i had to marshalled 4 or 5 times so the car was considerably more consistent and faster. Fastest lap 22.56 and qualifying 2nd overall behind tlr team mate George fairweather.

Finals. I knew the tyres were becoming more bed in by the round so i was able to lean on the car now.. So made no changes as i felt for the moment the car was ok as it was so decided to work on the driving aspect for the finals

Leg 1 : i got clipped early on by 4th place and found myself at the back of the field fighting my way back through. I managed to get to 5th and with 4th half a lap up pushed like hell and only lost out by a hard and the buzzer with him making the lap and me missing it! George took the win with his 22-4!

Leg 2 : myself and George broke away from the pack with a huge speed advantage from the word go and would take the fight to each other for the entire race. Both making errors along the way George would take the win now making it impossible for me to win the meet as he had 2 1st places. But in turn meant a tlr win and you can never be unhappy with that!

Leg 3 : time for me to take a stand. George clipped a bump  going into a corner and it threw him off line. I made the pass and never looked back. Lapping the entire field the car felt awsome and has given me a perfect starting set up to work on for the upcoming regionals. Although i felt i should have won the meet, the progress made with the car was brilliant and to take a tlr 1-2 was even better! Next up is the regionals!