Actually an unpleasantly cold morning; enough to put off some potential drivers. But as usual, the weather turned out nicely after 10am. 

The 41 entries were sort- of- satisfying for this time if the year. Could have been better, but we belief that the numbers will quickly pick up as soon as the warm weather returns.. and this is bound to happen soon enough!

Best presented RC car body:

This was definitely the toughest decision EVER! Some weeks there is one car that clearly stands out from the rest in its immaculate appearance, but on this say there were several cars that were equally appealing. I know this may seem a little unfair or bias, but the fact that Bianka de Beer painted her own car, tipped the scale a little more towards her side. We awarded her the trophy for Best Presented car. But that does not take anything away from the beauty of her dad, André de Beer’s new car body and definitely not from Piet du Toit’s freshly painted car.

 Above: Bianka de Beer and her handy work. :

THE RACE:

Beginner class:

Tyronne Visser was the best performer overall in this class today. A month or two ago he was an absolute novice with a brand new, but poorly set up car. He now has advanced to a proper driver with a well set up car. As we all know; this doesn’t come without a lot of time and effort, and not to forget finance and practice, to gain the necessary skills. Well done, Tyronne.

Esmarie Geyser, a mature lady, working as a nurse as a day job, together with her husband, Francois, joined our club recently. Her husband decided to return to RC after many years and she took the decision not to be a spectator this time around. Esmarie displayed a steadfast performance throughout the day, but in the last race of the day, she boasted a lap more than she ever before could achieve. Well done and congratulations with your second place overall, Esmarie!  

Armand Mayer ended 3^rd overall. His case is a bit controversial, because he is driving a car with a 17.5 motor. People who can handle a car as fast as this, usually are seen in the top performing class of the day. But we gave Armand permission to (still) compete in the Beginner class until such time that he can handle the car properly and e achieve frequent laps of 25 seconds or less. Chae-mari Smit  had more completion than she had last month, when she ended in a podium position. She also encountered quite a bit of car trouble on this day. But her average lap time is on the increase and we are looking forward to see her joining the ‘normal’ classes next year. Chae-Mari ended 4^th overall.

Lauren Winiecki wasn’t feeling very well, probably in the first stages of a bad cold. She however participated in all of the qualifiers and the two Final legs. Lauren is coming closer to achieving a 25 second lap time, which is an indication that she will soon be a very capable driver.

Electric Mini:

Giovanni Toldo was the undeniable top achiever in the Mini class in this month’s race meeting.

In the absence of the regular Mini driver crew, namely Jakkie and Jason Landsberg, Ewald van der Neut, Paul Langenhoven and even the two Robertson brothers, Justin and Quintin and Francois Bam, this class was meagerly represented.  But to compensate a little, we had two new entries, in the form of Paul de Wit and Gerhard van der Merwe.

Janu Lombard also competed in the 1^st qualifier.

Giovanni’s average throughout the day was 24 seconds and his quickest lap was 22.42s. The best lap recorded for today in this class is Gerhard van der Merwe – 21.56s.

Paul de Wit apparently used to race many years ago. So, achieving lap times of 23 seconds should be good enough to help him get his confidence back. Glad that you’ve enjoyed your day here with us, Paul.  See again soon, I hope?

 

TTO1 stock class:

Our current TTO1 king, Rolan Ferreira was on a mission again. Rolan beat his opponents in every TTO1 race of the day. He also succeeded in achieving a lap time of 20.7 seconds, despite the extremely cold tar surface. Well done, Rolan!

Gerhard van der Merwe from Pretoria joined this race, although he admitted that his car was not up to our specs.  Gerhard ended 2^nd  three time and 3^rd in the last leg of the Finals. 

Gerhard’s friend, Paul Booyens also competed with an illegal Mini . He ended 3^rd twice and 2^nd in the last Final round.

Janu Lombard, a local club member, did not fair too badly and the same goes for Louis Nortje.   Louis had still been racing in the Beginner class last month. Louis’s average lap time came down from 25.8s in the morning to a very capable 24.3 in the afternoon. So, that’s it, Louis, you are now formally a driver of note!!

Henry Ogden was seen in the first two qualifiers, but he did not bother to repair his broken car for the Finals.

Bianka de Beer, the only rose amongst the 7 thorns, had her best race in the 1^st Final leg, when she managed to get her average lap time down to 24 seconds. That’s what we want to see…You go, Girl!

Nathan Steyn, the very young boy, had several 23 second lap. He unfortunately ruins them with very long ones in between. As soon as you manage to deliver more consistent laps, we will on your way to the podium, Nathan.

540 super stock:

Artur Winiecki won both the qualifier rounds as well as the 2 Final legs. Artur is the most consistent driver of them all and that secured him his 1^st position overall, although he did not get the fastest lap times.  Artur’s best lap – 20.05s

In three of the 4 races Artur was followed by Rolan Ferreira. Rolan’s fastest lap – 20.98s

BUT: Let’s look at Giovanni’s performance. In the 1^st qualifier Giovanni  DNS (did not start) In the 2^nd qualifier he ended 2^nd . In the 1^st Final leg he ended 3^rd , although he was out of the race for about a minute!!  And in the last leg he retired from the race about halfway through the race. Overall he managed to complete laps of 19.something seconds laps…..wait for it: 9 times!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Giovanni’s fastest lap – 19.16sec. Great job!!

Anzea’s best lap – 20.7s  -  Wow!  Congrats!

Dana’s quickest lap – 21.4s Nice!

Henry only raced in the 1^st qualy for the day.

Piet’s best lap – 20.05s (he equal those of Artur)

Bianka de Beer’s best lap – 21.69s

André de Beer’s best lap – 24.4s

Proud winner of 540 motor: Rolan Ferreira

 

21.5 Touring:

As he did in the TTO1 class, Rolan Ferreira cleaned up this class as well. I was about to say that he was the only driver that was capable of doing 18 laps, but then I noticed that Kevin Gates also achieved that performance in the last Final leg of the day.

Rolan’s best lap – 19.48s

Kevin’s best lap – 20.12s

Henry Ogden ended 3^rd overall in this class  His best lap – 20.3s

Piet du Toit got 4^th place overall. Best lap – 19.89s  Wow!

Janu Lombard ended 5^th overall. Best lap – 20.98s

Francois Geyser ended 6^th  His best lap -    21.3s

Andre de Beer ended 7^th  His best lap – 20.5s

17.5 Electric Touring:

Overall:

1. JP Sweeck                 Fastest lap – 16.97s
2. Kevin Gates                                  - 16.95s
3. Andre Steenekamp                    -  17.62s
4. Michael Glauss                           -  16.89s

Paul Booyens and Gerhard van der Merwe competed with cars that did not meet our specs.

Paul  Booyens best lap – 20.7s

Gerhard’s best lap – 23.9s

We were promised by these two guys that they were going to get their cars ready to meet our specs for the relevant classes and that they would be back. We are looking forward to have them with us again.