This past weekend my father and I attended the RCGP Australia event down in Adelaide, Victoria at the beautiful Southern District Model Car Club. This event was a two- day event in which we raced the RCGP race format that they created in 2019. The weekend held practice on the Friday, followed by one seeding round and 4 RCGP heads up races to complete the day. Sunday held one more RCGP 'qualifier' followed by all the main day finals and bump up races.

Friday, we landed in Adelaide around lunch time and headed straight to the track to begin practice before Saturday's racing. The track is an oiled track in which they apply many litres of vegetable oil into the surface. It looked high grip, smooth and the layout was flowing with plenty of high speed and low speed sections. Most of Friday we just ran around the track, learning the layout and getting an idea on which 6MIK tire I felt most comfortable with and received the most speed from. My Sworkz S35-4 felt very solid to begin with, OS B2104 was tuned up and ready for the next days racing. I decided on a 6MIK Magma 2.0 in 0/18 (Yellow/Super Soft). Although the temperatures were higher and there was plenty of traction, the harder compounds were slower for me and did not provide me with as much 'grip and rip' around the track. There was next to no tire wear, so I opted for the softer compound!

Saturday, we kicked off the day with one seeding round, best 3 laps would seed us into our respective heats for the heads up racing ahead. I had a very clean run and a fast time to take the top spot in Nitro buggy, which placed me on pole position for all the heads-up races from there onwards. I was happy with car, all I was looking for was to take some edginess out of the car in the rear and I was good to go. We made a few adjustments to get my car comfortable and Saturday could not have gone any better. I went on to secure strong wins in all four heads up races without losing the lead at any point in time. Each run I got more comfortable with my car and the track, putting in a lap record and best lap of 37.5. I loved the traction and speed that the 0/18 Magma tire was giving me and my setup was on point, ready for the next day!

Sunday hosted a cloudier day, but the temperatures were still up at around 26-28 degrees Celsius. The track looked just as high traction, if not higher than the previous day and we were ready to race. I prepped my differentials, clutch and went over my car the night before and prepped some fresh tires for the final heads-up race in the morning, before finishing the day with the 45-minute showdown. I smashed the final heads-up race to place myself on pole position for the 45-minute A final in Nitro buggy. I found that a brand-new set of tires were edgier than those that had been run for a solid 10 minutes. So, I kept the tires I used in the morning for the final ahead.

The buzzer sounded and we were away! I got off to a great start and put in clean laps to gap myself from the field right away. My car had never felt so good… I had plenty of speed, ripping around corners and felt comfortable to be able to push for the entire race. I managed to lap 2nd place at the 17-minute mark with smooth driving and pushing as hard as I could to keep up an aggressive pace the entire time. I made it through the whole 45 minutes, having two small rollovers, and sent it by the finish line with almost a 3-lap lead over the field. I was stoked to take the win at this race, mainly impressed with the pace that I kept the entire race and the consistency I was able to keep the whole race. My car, engine, fuel, electronics and entire package was next level to drive. After getting off the stand and monitoring the results, I managed to destroy my best lap time by .5 seconds and put in a 37.0 lap time to finish off the weekend.

In conclusion to this race, I am more confident then ever moving forward with my entire package and this has packed on even more confidence for the big year ahead. We learnt further things about the car and found further speed through some changes on the S35-4. Thank you so much to all my sponsors for always being there for me and supporting me in every way possible. Next event is the NSW State Championships in Maitland, NSW at the very start of April. Looking forward to heading internationally and attending the Silverstate Nitro Challenge in the next couple of months! Bring it on!!!

Kyle McBride