eighth euros warm up

This past weekend was the warm-up meeting for the Rally Cross Euros to be held in Auxerre France later this year. The track is well known to most of the drivers and was the venue of previous European championships only a few years ago. Used regularly by the French Federation to hold some of their national and club events the host club and organisation have all the required experience to run one of the premier events of the year.

On arrival it was evident that the competition was going to be very tough with all of the major company players in attendance with full team support. The track initially was very dusty and low in traction but this soon changed into a high grip track with a fantastic blue groove and the lap times simply fell turning the track into an incredibly fast layout. The track stood up very well to the punishment from all the cars and with only a few sections developing some rough ground the racing simply got closer and closer.

The British Losi team had a little bit of a mixed bag of luck during qualifying. Stewart Wilcox and David Spashett simply couldn't finish a clean run while Reece Sawyer drove exceptionally well to qualify 29th and only one place behind the eight times national champion David Crompton. This was also the first time the Horizon/Losi/Novarossi drivers had the chance to use the very latest spec engines from Novarossi. The team were given the option to use two types of engine, both providing exceptional power and performance and yet still very controllable. The NPLUS215K proved to be an excellent all round performer with great power and still capable of making just over nine minutes on fuel with ease and without stress. The new 367buggy21 was the second option. The power was astounding and provided an amazing top speed. With both engines we found the following to be the best set-up: Carb Insert 7.5mm, Plug NC6G std type, Short round manifold with a 2015 or 2006 pipe or Short manifold square with 9901 pipe

On the Team Losi 8ight cars we ran a very standard set-up that has proved to be successful on a number of different track surfaces, this set up can be seen on the set-up sheet. Tyres were so important at this event and finding the correct compound and tread was very important. Medial Pro and GRP were on hand to support their drivers with new compounds in original tread patterns but we decided to stay with Panther tyres. In testing we found the Komodo Dragon 2 to give a very easy drive feeling with good low speed steering and a slight push at high speed, this helped when entering the high-speed chicane at the end of the main straight. The Panther Gator gave the best balance of all; on and off power steering was very neutral and this allowed us to push very hard and in the confidence that the car would stick when it counted. We used the standard soft compound for qualifying and then moved over to the medium/soft for the finals. Two twenty-minute finals was no problem for the medium/soft compound.

During the finals Stewart found himself bumping up and up, driving very cleanly and consistently and racing some of the best in Europe. His journey through the finals finished in the quarter finals with some bad luck leaving pit lane. I guess we will need to take some lucky charms with us for the real event! Reece also had little luck and was taken out on the first lap of his quarter leaving him with no chance to catch back up to qualify for the main final. Me? I was still testing and I decided to try some tyres from another company in my quarter final, the set-up on my car simply didn't like the tyres and I struggled to hold on to my fourth place. In The semi final we returned back to Panther Gators and qualified fifth for the main final which for the team was a great result. In the final we didn’t help ourselves and mistakes made during the run cost us dearly, but we still finished 7th.

This is the first time the Horizon/Losi/Novarossi team have been to a European event and the whole trip was a great success proving that team effort and team spirit go a long way.

Good Luck to the whole British team later this Year !!

Tony hard at work on Reeces car

Stuart drove well in the finals despite problems in qualifying

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