This race meeting marked the beginning of Louis Nortje’s Nitro racing career.. His friend Rolan Ferreira recently moved over to nitro as well. And the two of them convinced Leon van Rooyen to start racing nitro, too!!   All three of them used to be electric drivers, but although we now have lost them in that discipline, we are very happy to have them with us on nitro race days.

 

We were pleasantly surprised by a visit from an old nitro driver from Brakpan, Tony George . Apparently we have Francois Geyser to thank for that. Tony arrived a bit late, but he only missed the first qualifier round. We trust that he has enjoyed the day with us. I am sure he did, because he said he will see us again, soon.

This race could have been called “The Race of the Blown Glo Plugs”     

Esmarie lost 3 glo plugs.  And then another one, which almost drove insane. 

Henry has blown a couple, Louis has blown seven of his own and several borrowed and gifted ones.

Someone bumped into Leon’s car to the extent that his car’s body was torn.

Piet and Henry both had gearbox breakages.

Tony lost a wheel.

André had flat batteries when he needed it most.

And Rolan…oh gosh, NO!!!!!! Read about it in Final race remarks.

 

Round 1 :

There was a little oopsie when Henry accidently allocated Francois’s transponder to Tony, but this mistake luckily was not detrimental to Francois’s final score. Sorry, anyway…

Rolan won the 1^st convincingly. His best lap, out of 20, in this round – 17.46s. His average lap time of 18.88 seconds is excellent. Good job, Rolan, we are very proud of you.

André Steenekamp and Leon van Rooyen were engaged in a fierce struggle for the 2^nd place. André beat Leon though; his average being .1 of a second faster than that of Leon.

Piet du Toit ended 4^th. Francois was next in line, but as I have said, his results were allocated to Tony’s name. Francois’s quickest lap – 17.89s.

Esmarie, Francois’ better half, equaled her husband’s 17 laps, but with a 2 second slower average.

Then came Louis in 7^th place, but Louis was plagued by car trouble. That wicked glo plug ghost…

Henry only completed 2 laps before the evil spirits arrived…

Johan Korff did not start.

Round 2:

Rolan improved some more. He had a better average (17.9s) as well as a better fastest lap time – 16.69s. Whoop whoop!

Piet du Toit moved into the 2^nd place. His fastest lap – 17.03, which is pretty fast!

Andre ended 3^rd. He also improved on his previous best lap time.

Leon improved on his fastest lap time, but unfortunately not on his average.

Francois improved dramatically on both his best and average lap time. 17.33second…Wow!

Tony completed 17 laps.

Louis completed 10 laps before the disaster struck again.

Korff completed 7 laps before his glo plug went.

Henry didn’t bother to return for this round.

Esmarie also gave up after several blown glo plugs.

Round 3:

Rolan beat his rivals once again.

Andre claimed his 2^nd place back and Leon returned to his previous 3^rd place.

Korff now completed 19 beautiful laps. His best lap an amazing 16.82seconds.

Tony repeated his own performance of completing 17 laps.

Francois once again completed 17 laps.

Louis managed 10 laps again, before bad luck returned…

Henry just made an appearance and left straight away…

Main Race:

Rolan headed for a sure win, when spur gears on his car stripped after 65 laps. Unbelievably sad news… But NOT before he drove the fastest lap of all for the whole day – 16.73 seconds. Great job, Rolan!

Johan Korff moved upwards slowly but surely… and managed to stay in the lead up to the very end. He wrote 97 laps behind his name. Congratulations, Johan!

By the way, Korff changed his fuel from Beetle Juice to Nitro X before the Final race, which seemed to solve his glo plug problems. But other drivers were already using Nitro X, but were still blowing glo plugs like nothing..

 

 

Francois drove 84 laps and ended 2^nd

André, after being out of the race at least twice, managed to return after each setback and delivered even better lap every time. André ended 3^rd.

Overall :

1. Johan Korff
2. Francois Geyser
3. André Steenekamp