Now What?

Well, the 200mm season is finally over. It doesn't seem five minutes ago that we were travelling down to Weston Super Mare for the first round of the season, then up to Halifax, then out to Brooklands. Between the shop and racing it feels like I have done not a lot else so far this year. Get home Sunday, unload all the race gear and unpack what shop items we have taken with us, Monday back in work catching up with the weekend, strip and rebuild the car during the week and get it all ready do again the following weekend. Ben Racing is beginning to get busy for Christmas (Already!) and i'm finding myself with free weekends ("Whats one of them?" I hear you say!).

So what now? Take up golf....yeah right....There is I suppose only the one thing for it: Lets go racing (again)!!!

This winter I will be competing in the Don Valley winter series, orgainised
by Mirage RC Enterprises. This should be interesting as there are a lot of very good electric drivers in this championship, in both classes 19 turn and brushless. Me, I'll be using a brushless motor (Novak) and LiPo batteries as I belive both of these technologies will be the way forwards for model car racing in the future. As for chassis I will be using the Kyosho TF5 Stallion belt drive touring car.

I'll keep you posted on how it goes, as well as letting you know what we did to the car to improve it and get it un the pace.

You can go Stick it Sideways - If you Catch my DRIFT!

Sorry for not posting for a few days - I have been spending my evenings wasting time seeing how far I can drift a 1/8th scale car on VRC's awesome new Drift Park track.

This track is absolutely awesome! You can go over jumps (check out the jump above!), hold the throttle on full and try to control a full blooded powerslide...there is so much to do here! Plus you wont be facing a hefty repair billf or your cars engine after holding it on full for 5 minutes (try doing that in real life!). There are also other cars to watch out for....or aim for...depending on how blood thirsty you are!

The cars look cool, real street racers and you can download different colour schemes to suit your tastes...now every one can get fast and furious!

Here is what Virtual Racing Industries head honcho Pieter Bervoets had to say about the drift park:

"This track is the ideal starter's track. An easy wide open parking lot to get a first feel of how to drive a radio controlled racing car. The east side of the parking lot has some parking isles to drive around, the west side has some ramps to make some jumps with the car. You will find out that you can actually control the flight of the car with the throttle and the brakes!This track is also ideal to get the drifter car out and to start developing the high art of drifting. Once you have mastered this you should give the drifter cars a try on for instance the Kakagawa or Cincinnati track, these are also very suitable for drifting. "

If you have not already got VRC then hurry and join the fun! At Ben Racing we have sold loads of these controllers, gamepacks and VRC adaptors....so the fun can go on - even when the weather is awful outside!

Let me know how you get on with the drifting and remember - go stick it sideways!

Stallion Baby!!!

What the hell is he on about now I hear you ask, well, if you need to ask then you really ought to get with what will undoubtedly be the hottest touring car release in the last few years...Kyosho is about to release it's belt drive competition 1/10 Electric touring car....and it's called the TF5 Stallion (Baby)! (In case you are wondering where all this "Stallion Baby" is coming from - take a look at the film Shrek 2...where Donkey drinks a bit of the magic potion....a great film if like me you have a childish sense of humour....anyway, back to model cars!).

This little engineering marvel is no donkey however as it comes fully loaded ready to kick the competitions butt across the finish line! For a start take a quick peek at this little list of features:

• Chassis makes optimal use of belt-drive’s counter-torque control, transfer of drive power and mass balance.
• Equalization of chassis roll characteristics with single wiper used for steering linkage etc.
• Bolt positions for attaching components to main chassis are symmetrically arranged.
• Chassis design optimizes counter-torque when loads are applied from the motor.
• Benefits of easily adjusted ball diff without removing parts can be appreciated most in the heat of race battle.
• Includes a full set of 14 precision ball bearings.

Put simply, if you are not driving one of these then get prepared to come second. As soon as I get mine (should be next week!) I'll be testing it down at Mansfield Model Car Club, who run on a Wednesday night to get the thing dialled in so it will be a real track weapon! Plus in addition to the cars I will be stocking all of the parts at BenRacing....so there is no excuse for finishing second! Race a real thoroughbred....Stallion Baby!