As mentioned before, the first round of controlled practice got off to a rather wet and slippery start as the track was still damp from the overnight rain. Pace was therefore hard to judge as some runners chose to stay on their dry setup and simply wait for the weather, and the track, to come to them whilst others, keen to make the most of their track time to learn the layout, opted to alter setups to adapt their cars to the lower grip levels. By the time P2 came round, the track was showing signs of drying in all bar the usual places which made the setup choice even harder but the fast locals are canny and know what berries to eat and weren't seemingly perturbed at all by the varying levels of grip or their practice pace. Even so, at this early stage of the event, it was already shaping up to be a cracker in all classes, with Ellis Stafford and Danny McGee looking particularly racy in both 2WD and 4WD and Nathan Ralls and Chris Brooke both looking good in the 2WD SCT class.

With qualifying over for the first day, but with 2 rounds to go on the Sunday, there was much to think about during Saturday evening. Those who had done well on the Saturday and who found themselves in decent qualifying positions were left pondering what the track would be like in the morning whilst those who had maybe broken out or crashed during a potentially faultless run were left rueing missed opportunities and wondering whether they'd be able to pull something out of the bag.

Sunday saw the temperatures really begin to soar and drivers were reminded to keep hydrated and protected with sun cream as the day was going to be a very hot one. Qualifying got back underway after an hours' free practice and immediately, it became evident that the track was fast. The usual suspects continued on good form with Ellis Stafford and Danny McGee battling for the overall TQ position in 2WD and 4WD whilst TLR driver Chris Brooke looked to have sewn up the SCT qualifying after his stunning performance on the Saturday ahead of Nathan Ralls and TLR team mate Andy Carter.

TLR's Darren Bloomfield had been struggling a little on the Saturday to get to grips with the subtle nuances of the EPR track and was languishing in the lower reaches of the top 10 alongside fellow TLR runners Andy Carter, Kevin Moore and Chris Delves but with the arrival of Team Supremo David Spashett on the Sunday morning, much more was expected from the IFMAR Worlds warm-up winner.
Tony Evdoka immediately laid down his intent to qualify into the top 10 in 2WD and 4WD after missing Saturday's qualifying with a couple of superb runs, helping to oust Darren Bloomfield into the B final along the way in 2WD.

But as so often is the allure and frustration with FTD qualifying, there was still much still to play for going into the last round of qualifying and with the track at it's super grippiest, nerves were beginning to fray as the racers made last minute subtle adjustments to their cars in their attempts to make the all important top 10 in each class. 4WD was a constant battle between Ellis Stafford and Danny McGee, both seemingly able to take TQ from the other and it would come down to the last qualifying run of the day to determine overall TQ. With no (current) 4WD chassis of his own, X-Factory driver Ellis Stafford had been constantly swapping between his Kyosho Lazer FS2 and the Tamiya 511 as he wrestled to determine which was best but at the end of the day there was very little to choose between them as both appeared capable to lapping at the same ultimate pace. But it was with the Tamiya 511 that the X-Factory driver took the overall TQ with to line up in pole position for the 4WD event just ahead of the Schumacher SX3 of Danny McGee and in front of the Schumacher pairing of Nathan '3-classes isn't enough' Ralls and David 'man-flu' Poulter. A terrific qualifying performance from local youngster Will Johnson saw the Faversham driver place his Tamiya 511 into the 4WD A final just behind TC specialist Ash Whiffen's SX2 thus securing himself as the top under 19 4WD driver – well done Will!

It was a case of déjà-vu in 2WD for the two front runners with Ellis taking the TQ ahead of Danny McGee in the last run of the day with Darren Bloomfield moving up from the B and into 4th spot overall to secure a second row grid slot alongside Trish Neal but it was less clear cut towards the back end of the grid where Andy Carter and Tony Evdoka secured 8th and 10th place slots respectively courtesy of their stunning performance in their last run where they traded fastest laps and the race position throughout the whole five minutes of their heat with Andy's TLR22 finishing less than a second ahead of Tony's Vega RB5. Andy Langdon was perhaps the unluckiest man of the round after having achieved the magical 15 lapper in 2WD to only then realised he was the 11th fastest 15 lapper overall thus making him the B-Q man - despite being less than a second behind Andy Carter and Tony Evdoka in the same heat. Tough luck Andy!

In SCT, despite the track feeling quicker, no one could match Chris Brooke's pace from the previous day and he'd line up for the final with his Losi XXX-SCT in pole position ahead of Nathan Rall's HPI Blitz in 2nd and in front of his TLR team mates Andy Carter and Steve Lissamore in 3rd and 4th respectively – both of whom were sporting the same Stronghold liveries on their XXX-SCTs making it difficult to tell the two of them apart.

With 3-legged finals for every competitor, there was still much racing to be had all round and throughout the field, intense battles were raging as the racers grappled with the grip, the ever-increasing dappled shade and each other to come out victorious in their finals. The 2WD C final saw a mammoth battle between TLR team mates Richard Thorpe and Ollie Crew which had to be decided on countback and fastest time to separate the two whilst visiting Belgian superhero Bart Van Echelpoel made the most of his 4WD B-Q position to win the firt 2 legs of his final leaving young Michael Vincent and Veteran Dave Church to squabble over 2nd place – this time with youth outwitting experience, it was Michael who stole 2nd place form Dave courtesy of his 3rd leg win.

Up at the sharp end, it was (almost) business as
usual. In 4WD, Ellis broke out from pole in leg one
allowing Danny to take the win relatively comfortably
ahead of team-mate Nathan Ralls and Matt Benfield in
3rd but in leg 2, he had no misfortune and took the
win with the TQ setting 511 ahead of Nathan and
Danny to set up an exciting 3rd leg scenario with potentially any one of the 3 of them able to win the
meeting. In the end, Ellis did what he does best and
got his head down and drove off into the distance, this
time with a Kyosho to secure the first ever TLR
SuperCup 4WD title.

In 2WD, despite the best attentions of Danny McGee's Schumacher Couger, the X-Factory man won all three legs from pole in a vitual faultless display of poise and controlled aggression. TLR driver Darren Bloomfield rounded off the podium in 3rd place tying on points with Tristram Neal but edging him out due to a faster time.

In SCT, Nathan Ralls made the most of his
opportunities to take the overall SCT title courtesy of
2 leg wins from pole-sitter Chris Brooke with the XXX-
SCT of privateer Dave Crew driving a steady race to
take the 3rd place overall.

So well done to Ellis Stafford, winner of the 2WD and 4WD TLR Super Cup title and to Nathan Ralls for winning the SCT class but also, a massive well done to the host club EPR and also to race director Ian Knight and also, from everyone at TLR / Horizon, a big thank you to every competitor who turned up and who had a great time. TLR Super Cup 2011 was a great success and has set the standard already for 2012…

Images courtesy of Ian Peckett/Racer Magazine & Horizon Hobby UK