Coelho heads time in first 4WD practice

Bruno Coelho has topped the times for the first round of 4WD controlled practice at the Euro Offroad Series season opener.  Back at the Nurburgring where he made his EOS debut 12-months ago before going on to be champion, the Xray driver had almost a 4/10ths advantage over his rivals over the 3-consecutive lap times that will determine the seeding for qualifying.  Closest to the winner of the last three 4WD EOS encounters would be Michal Orlowski, the Schumacher driver the only one able to match Coelho’s 18-second fastest lap pace. A sizeable gap back, Yokomo’s Marc Rheinard would complete the Top 3 followed by team-mate Lee Martin and Xray’s Martin Bayer.

While Coelho said his car was ‘going very well’, he added ‘the track is super difficult’.  The World Champion is having issue with the Associated step-up step-down which he said you arrive into super fast and it leads to you breaking your rhythm.  In terms of his XB4 he said it was not as fast as they were expecting in the first practice and they have been making small changes each run to improve. Adding they are ‘now getting there’ he will rebuild his diffs for the final practice adding they still need to try to get the car more consistent.

Orlowski said he knew from the first practice they had good pace but they just needed to get 3-laps.  The former European Champion said they had too much rotation in the car but lowering the rear camber link by 1mm made the rear more stable.  The Polish teenager said while the track is more difficult that any of the tracks on last years calendar he thinks he’s strong in terms of putting in a 5-minute run saying the biggest issue of the stacked practices heats was not crashing himself but avoiding other cars.  Happy with how is car is working he plans to leave it unchanged for CP2 and instead plans to help the rest of the team with getting their cars better.

Describing his YZ4 as ‘actually pretty ok’, Rheinard said as in 2WD he was ‘still struggling with the step down landing’.  The German continued, ‘the car feels ok and its all going to come down to no mistakes’ adding ‘it is better to go a little slower and try for a safe run’.  In terms of changes to his car after free practice, he would change to gullwing front arms but also changing to a bigger Muchmore motor having lacked punch out of the corners he said while the car was better he wasn’t sure how much of that came from the arm change.

‘Not too bad, feels pretty easy to drive’ was Martin’s reaction when asked how his car was in CP1.  The former 4WD Champion said the suspension felt strange with the front of the car bouncing up on the landings so he didn’t have the confidence to push it.  As he stated during 2WD practice, he said “I’m not going for 3-laps and I think our 5-minute pace is OK’.  Doing the double at last year’s season opener he added, ‘We are a little lacking compared to Bruno and Orlowski is looking pretty good too but we’ll get there’.

Having moved more into his role as Xray’s Offroad team-manager and taken more of a back seat as a leading team driver, Bayer’s reaction to his P5 time was ‘I’m having fun’.  The former EOS race winner, who recently married long time partner Tereza, said a lack of time has meant that his XB4 is straight off the track from doing the Euros in Spain with only enough time to rebuild the diffs. Focused on supporting Xray drivers, the Czech driver said it was nice to still be able to put his car near the top the time sheets adding ‘myself and Hupo (Honigl) are having good fun battling each other to be faster but its starting to get serious now’.  Honigl would post the seventh fastest time, Xray’s Kaja Novotny separating the two experienced racers.

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Wollanka tops 2WD seeding at Nurburgring

Martin Wollanka will be the top seed for tomorrow’s 2WD qualifying at the opening round of the Euro Offroad Series at the Nurburgring.  The Xray driver would be the only driver to complete 3-consecutive laps in 58-seconds when he went fastest in the final round of practice outpacing reigning champion Lee Martin by 2/10ths.  Having set the pace in the first of the two controlled practices runs, Michal Orlowski would fail to improve on his time which was still good enough for third.  Making the biggest improvement of CP2, Marc Rheinard would jump from 7th in the first round to post P4 as the other three drivers who made up the Top 6 in the first practice were unable to better their times.

While Wollanka would improve his pace by 2/10ths per lap, the Austrian was quick to admit that after a diff oil change on his XB2 for the final practice while it was faster it had left it ‘not so good for 5-minutes’.  Making the car ‘more aggressive’, he said it was ‘maybe too much’ adding the car was now ‘not as easy to drive’.  Set to carry the No.1 in the top heat of the 137 strong 2WD entry tomorrow, last year’s podium finisher concluded, ‘I need something in between these two (diff set-ups)’.

Improving his pace by 2/10ths over the 3-laps, Martin was pleased with his pace feeling he has a good car for the 5-minutes.  The British driver, who kicked off his successful title defence here last year with victory, said, ‘I started out the run as a 5-minute qualifier but started to push at the end which caused a few mistakes.  My three laps were when I wasn’t trying anything crazy for quick laps so I think we are looking good for qualifying’.

While Orlowski would be half a second off his opening CP pace, the Schumacher driver said ‘the car felt better but I just didn’t get three laps’.  Able to match his fastest lap time of CP1, the Polish teenager added, ‘I think the 5-minute pace is there’. Changing to a lighter diff oil for CP2, he said this made the car slightly slower in the corners and with his engineer Tristram Neal using CP2 to run 10K oil in the diff of his own car, Orlowski will on his advice do the same for Q1.

‘Not too bad’ was how Rheinard summed up practice.  The Yokomo driver said the big thing for him is he is ‘still trying to learn the track a bit’.  Pleased with how his YZ-2CA is working, the multiple onroad World Champion is having trouble with his timing on the jumps and needs to improve his landings.   He is also having problems at the Team Associated step-up step-down, saying ‘I’m still shit there’. The German said he keeps dropping the noise of the car on the step down instead of using the power to launch the car off it.

Trying a front shock oil/spring change for CP2 but fitting a new set of the Schumacher hand out tyres, Neil Cragg said his B6 was ‘not quite there’.  The former World Champion who dropped to P5 after being unable to better his opening time admitted he also ‘didn’t drive very good’.  While his fastest lap was good he said there was ‘just not enough of them’ and for qualifying they need to ‘go in between the two set-ups for the first one’.  Behind Cragg, Xray’s Hupo Honigl would drop to sixth followed by Joona Haatanen with an improvement from Bruno Coelho leaving the 4WD Champion P8 and in the top heat along with Christopher Krapp and Nico Risser.

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Orlowski sets pace at EOS season opener

Michal Orlowski has set the pace for the first controlled practice at the Euro Offroad Series season opener at the Nurburgring.  With the track needing to be tweaked after each of the opening two free practice runs this morning, the Schumacher driver would lay down the fastest 3-consecutive lap time for the first of the two practice rounds that will determine the seeding of 2WD qualifying heats.  Super close at the top of the time sheets, Orlowski would be just .0001 of a second faster than reigning Champion Lee Martin with Martin Wollanka completing the Top 3 ahead of Neil Cragg.

‘I’m surprised by my pace’ was Orlowski reaction to CP1.  The championship runner-up for the past two seasons, the Polish driver continued, ‘I didn’t feel the car was very good as I was having problems with it traction rolling’.  Describing the first run on the track as a ‘struggle’ he said after ‘a lot of changes’ to his car’s set-up the day had been getting better each run.  To address the traction roll he is having to contend with he plans to go to a thicker shock oil in the front.  As well as allowing him to ‘push harder’ he said he hopes it can help make the car more consistent. Asked about the track layout, he replied, ‘I don’t like the step up step down but it still fun to drive and I like the rest of the jumps’.  He concluded ‘it’s a difficult track’.

Commenting on his run, Martin said, ‘the car feels good and its nice to drive’.   The British driver continued, ‘it’s felt good since the first practice and other than trying some set-up ideas Shin (Adachi) has worked on at Yatabe I have only made a rear spring change’.  Having not raced on carpet since last season’s EOS finale which was also run at the Nurburgring, he said he has just been getting his ‘confidence back on carpet’ adding it was ‘good to have an easy morning’.  Having been involved with deciding the tweaks to be made to the track in free practice, he said ‘now the stuff is in the right place the track works pretty well’.   He added, ‘the steps are still odd but the rest of it works alright.  Describing it as a pretty short lap he feels ‘4WD will be fast and frantic’.

Describing the track layout as ‘different’, Wollanka added ‘it looks easy but its a bit tricky.’   The Austrian, who was a podium finisher here at last year’s season opener, said his Xray is ‘working really good’ contributing a new diff to his pace. Asked about the benefits of the new unit he replied it makes the car ‘corner to corner much faster’.  In terms of the chassis set-up he said the biggest change he has had to make is to the rear roll centre for the ‘long corners’. For the final 2WD practice he plans to test a different weight oil in the diff.

‘Pretty good to be honest’ was how Cragg summed up practice so far.  While 7/10th off the lead pace pace over his best 3-laps, the European Champion said his B6 is not far off and its ‘trying to get back into driving a 1:10 car’ that is his biggest issue describing himself as ‘driving like an animal’.  With the 1:8 World Championships early next month in Las Vegas, he said driving 1:8 has been his big focus so he needs a few more runs to get back into his rhythm as his last carpet outing was here last season when he was the Top Qualifier.  In terms of his B6 he said ‘if we can get a touch more steering we’ll be dialled’.  While the car is ‘really comfortable’ he needs ‘1 or 2/10ths’ and he will try going down in the front oil & springs for the final practice.

Setting the fifth fastest time, when Hupo Honigl was asked if he had changed much on his Xray over the morning he replied ‘actually no’.  The Austrian said his XB2 has been ‘pretty good’ from the first practice and he has just been working on his driving.  One of the EOS’ longest serving drivers, the former race winner is a huge fan of this weekends track.  ‘I love the track.  It has a really nice flow, there is nothing crazy in it’.  Looking to the final 2WD practice, before drivers switch over to 4WD for four rounds of practice, he said the car feels really good so I will just run new tyres, him having been on used tyres for the previous three practices.

Completing the Top 6 ahead of Marc Rheinard, Team Associated young gun Joona Haatanen described his car as ‘OK’ adding they have been ‘changing little things’ every run.   Having problems with his motor temperature, the Finn plans to switch to a smaller pinion for the final practice.  The 13-year-old said the consistency is there in the car but he needs to find a little more corner speed and so for the last run they will take weight off.

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Track Focus – Nürburgring

Venue – Nürburgring
Race Hosts – ADAC
Country – Germany
Location – Nürburg (120 km northwest of Frankfurt)
Direction – Anti-Clockwise
Surface – Carpet
No. of EOS Races hosted – 2

The iconic Nurburgring racing circuit is the venue for the opening round of Season #6 of the Euro Offroad Series, the event marking an important milestone for the championship as this is it’s 20th race.  While it is only a year since the EOS pulled off a major coup by securing the Ring Boulevard as the venue, this is actually the third time the championship used the location, it being a late replacement venue on the Season #5 calendar as host of the final round.   Again running alongside the Simracing Expo, the weekend’s big draw is the final round of the Blancpain GT Series Endurance Cup which is running on the grand prix track.

Having come in for some criticism over tracks lacking jumps and in particular suitable landers, this year the championship organisers have had the jumps redesigned by Gerd Strenge, who is better known for his efforts in car design rather than jump design a building.  The layout of the Round 1 track is also Strenge’s work with input from Marc Rheinard and more recently 2WD Champion Lee Martin.  After the first round of free practice on the original layout two jump sections were tweaked with Martin’s input with drivers of all levels enjoying the track much more during their second practice. In terms of the layout the biggest feature of the track is the Team Associated branded step-up step down corner in the front right corner of the track which covers an area of 34m wide by 23m deep.

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