Neumann takes 4WD TQ honours at EOS

Joern Neumann has claimed TQ honours at the second round of the 2012/13 ‘TLR/Spektrum Euro Offroad Series presented by Horizon Hobby’ in both 4WD Buggy & 4WD Short Course but the final buggy qualifier saw Naoto Matsukura out pace the German setting the stage for a thrilling battle tomorrow between the Durango and Yokomo factory drivers. The only driver to run a 19-second lap in the final qualifier, the Japanese ace outpaced the series’ defending champion by 1 second with a 15/5:07.512 run which was the fastest time set over the four rounds of qualifying.

Behind the pair, who are clearly in a different league to the rest of the 4WD field competing in Langenfeld, TLR’s Dustin Evans backed up his second fastest time in Q2 with third in the final qualifier to put his aging buggy 3rd on the grid.  Team-mate Darren Bloomfield took his example of the buggy which was designed before some of tomorrow’s A-Finalist were born to 7th in the final qualification ranking.

Durango will have the largest presence in the final with Neumann’s team-mate Hupo Honigl set to line-up fourth where they will be joined by Round 1 podium finisher Michal Orlowski, who has since switched from Tamiya to run as part of the newly formed Team Durango Poland squad, set to carry the No.8 on his DEX410 while young local racer Oliver Speith completes the line up for the main event.

Struggling with a cold all weekend which he openly admits is effecting his performance Tamiya Racing Factory’s Lee Martin will line up fifth on the grid one spot ahead of Martin Bayer.  Giving Xray’s new XB4 its EOS debut the Czech driver, who steered the buggy to a win recently in the popular Czech based Mibocup, could be one to watch tomorrow with the former 1:8 Offroad European Championship podium finisher getting more and more comfortable with the buggy every run.

Responsible for the creation of Schumacher’s new Cat K1 buggy, Tom Cockerill made a good come back after two difficult opening qualifiers to set the sixth fastest time in Q3 & 4 which scraped the British driver through to ninth on the grid.

In 4WD Short Course, Neumann will start on pole position ahead of Evans who at the opening race of the season in Poland brought an end to Durango’s domination of the big truck class.  Evans managed a TQ run in Q3 but overall Neumann easily dominated proceedings but in the last qualifier the American posted the only 20-second lap of the day hinting that he might have just at the right time found the form he surprised Neumann with at Round 1 of the EOS.

4WD Buggy A-Main Grid
1. Jörn Neumann (DE) – Durango – 310 pts
2. Naoto Matsukura (JP) – Yokomo – 308
3. Dustin Evans (US) – TLR – 305
4. Hupo Honigl (AT) – Durango – 305
5. Lee Martin (GB) – Tamiya – 300
6. Martin Bayer (CZ) – Xray – 299
7. Darren Bloomfield (GB) – TLR – 298
8. Michal Orlowski (PL) – Durango – 298
9. Tom Cockerill (GB) – Schumacher – 298
10.Oliver Speith (DE) – Durango – 296

4WD Buggy Q4 times
1. Naoto Matsukura (JP) – Yokomo – 15/5:07.512
2. Jörn Neumann (DE) – Durango – 15/5:08.513
3. Dustin Evans (US) – TLR – 15/5:16.097
4. Hupo Honigl (AT) – Durango – 15/5:19.327
5. Michal Orlowski (PL) – Durango – 14/5:01.494
6. Tom Cockerill (GB) – Schumacher – 14/5:01.505
7. Martin Bayer (CZ) – Xray – 14/5:02.325
8. Lee Martin (GB) – Tamiya – 14/5:05.441
9. Christopher Krapp (DE) – Kyosho – 14/5:05.737
10.Markus Metsch (DE) – – 14/5:07.046

4WD Buggy Q3 times
1. Jörn Neumann (DE) – Durango – 15/5:09.651
2. Hupo Honigl (AT) – Durango – 15/5:16.329
3. Naoto Matsukura (JP) – Yokomo – 15/5:17.819
4. Darren Bloomfield (GB) – TLR – 15/5:18.553
5. Oliver Speith (DE) – Durango – 15/5:19.637
6. Tom Cockerill (GB) – Schumacher – 14/5:03.166
7. Martin Bayer (CZ) – Xray – 14/5:03.904
8. Jiri Mara (CZ) – Xray – 14/5:04.015
9. Oliver Scholz (DE) – Team C – 14/5:05.467
10.Michal Orlowski (PL) – Durango – 14/5:07.603

Complete event results can be found here.

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Business as usual for Neumann in 4WD Qualifying

Team Durango’s Joern Neumann continued his reign as the master of 4WD buggy in Euro Offroad Series taking the opening two rounds of qualifying in Germany but the German had to work a lot harder for it than normal with series debutant Naoto Matsukura looking like he could be a serious treat to the European Champions undefeated winning streak.  An early mistake in Q1 by Neumann put Matsukura on the TQ pace but holding a comfortable margin the Japanese ace threw it away with errors on his final two laps.  In the second qualifier, the 6-times Japanese National Champion looked like an even more serious treat as he went the top of the timing screens on shear pace but again a mistake was to be his undoing.

Running a fresh set of the series’ controlled dBoots tyres in Q1, Neumann said his DEX410 was a little edgy and this is what led to his early mistake.  Lowering his ride height for Q2, he said the tyres where much better second time round but chasing his fifth consecutive 4WD win he admits that he has a real challenger this weekend in the 19-year-old who has already beaten him in 2WD buggy with a win in Leg 1 of the A-Main which was run earlier today.

Setting a new fastest lap of 19.856 in Q2, Matsukura has shown he has the pace to run with Neumann and the three time 1:12 World Champion doesn’t lack confidence in his own ability saying he wants to do the double this weekend.  Describing his buggy as a little difficult to drive for Q3 he will change to a harder shock set-up which he hopes will help eliminate some of his errors.

With this race marking Xray’s official EOS debut, factory driver Martin Bayer put in two solid qualifying runs despite having been twiddling his thumbs for much of the day as he is only racing 4WD Buggy.  The Czech ace managed the 6th fastest time in his first qualifying joking that after a long day of watching 2WD qualifying and the first round of finals it took him the first 4-minutes of the heat to get his head into gear again after yesterday’s practice.  Leaving the buggy pretty much unchanged for Q2, Bayer said his focus is on reducing the number of driver mistakes but improving his time and breaking into the 15 laps he said things are improving with every run.

4WD Buggy Q2 times
1. Jörn Neumann (DE) – Durango – 15/5:07.723
2. Dustin Evans (US) – TLR – 15/5:14.040
3. Naoto Matsukura (JP) – Yokomo – 15/5:14.113
4. Hupo Honigl (AT) – Durango – 15/5:14.275
5. Martin Bayer (CZ) – Xray – 15/5:20.793
6. Lee Martin (GB) – Tamiya – 15/5:23.457
7. Michal Orlowski (PL) – Durango – 14/5:03.279
8. Darren Bloomfield (GB) – TLR – 14/5:04.288
9. Oliver Scholz (DE) – Team C – 14/5:11.070
10.Oliver Speith (DE) – Durango – 14/5:12.185

4WD Buggy Q1 times
1. Jörn Neumann (DE) – Durango – 15/5:18.240
2. Naoto Matsukura (JP) – Yokomo – 15/5:20.720
3. Hupo Honigl (AT) – Durango – 14/5:01.908
4. Lee Martin (GB) – Tamiya – 14/5:04.511
5. Dustin Evans (US) – TLR – 14/5:07.326
6. Martin Bayer (CZ) – Xray – 14/5:07.592
7. Markus Metsch (DE) – – 14/5:09.391
8. Benni Groschel (DE) – Durango – 14/5:10.660
9. Oliver Speith (DE) – Durango – 14/5:12.506
10 Jiri Mara (CZ) – Xray – 14/5:14.429

Complete event results can be found here.

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Matsukura wins first A-Main with flawless drive

EOS debutant Naoto Matsukura has won the first leg of the 2WD Buggy A-main with a dominant performance in Germany.  Having secured overall TQ honours earlier in the day the factory Yokomo driver took his B-Max2 MR to a tone to tone victory ahead of defending series champion Joern Neumann with German National Champion Oliver Scholz working his way up from 7th on the grid to complete the Top 3.

A flawless drive from the Japanese ace his rivals were not able to pull off such a clean race.  First to hit trouble was Team Durango’s Joern Neumann, a mistake on the second lap allowing TLR’s Dustin Evans and Tamiya’s Lee Martin through.  Evans would hold the No.2 spot for next five laps but coming through the crossover section his TLR22 traction rolled leaving the American requiring to be marshaled.  Having got back passed Martin earlier this allowed Neumann back up to second. Up front however Matsukura was clearly in control of the race with Neumann’s best efforts not enough to close the gap the pairing separated by 1.6 seconds at the end of the five minutes.

The win is a huge confidence boost for Matsukura who is experiencing European style indoor offroad racing for the first time but the 19-year-old will have to wait till tomorrow to see if he can secure the overall win as the action in Langenfeld now reverts to 4WD with four rounds of qualifying set to bring Day 2 of the EOS Round 2 to a close.

In the 2WD Short Course class, the Top Qualifier also took the win in Leg 1 with local driver Michael Rybski taking his Losi to a 4.5 second winning margin over Tom Bujara with reigning champion & EOS track designer Gerd Strenge taking third from 10th on the grid.

2WD Buggy A-Main Leg 1 Result
1.(1) Naoto Matsukura (JP) – Yokomo – 15/5:15.081
2.(2) Jörn Neumann (DE) – Durango – 15/5:16.682
3.(7) Oliver Scholz (DE) – Team C – 15/5:21.234
4.(4) Lee Martin (GB) – Tamiya – 14/5:00.962
5.(3) Dustin Evans (US) – TLR – 14/5:03.572
6.(5) Hupo Honigl (AT) – Durango – 14/5:05/380
7.(8) Christopher Krapp (DE) – Kyosho – 14/5:09.178
8.(9) Otto Ausfelt (SE) – TLR – 14/5:09.460
9.(6) Darren Bloomfield (GB) – TLR – 14/5:11.142
10.(10)Tom Cockerill (GB) – Schumacher – 10/3:39.386

Complete event results can be found here.

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Matsukura is 2WD Top Qualifier at EOS

Japan’s Naoto Matsukura is the 2WD Buggy Top Qualifier for the TLR/Spektrum Euro Offroad Series Round 2 in Langenfeld, Germany, after the series debutant backed up his Q3 topping run with an even faster 5-minute pace in the fourth & final qualifier.  The Yokomo driver, who has never raced offroad on a carpet & wood surface track before, took Q4 ahead of Tamiya’s Lee Martin after both Joern Neumann and Dustin Evans with whom he was swapping the lead pace each made costly mistakes.  Finishing on the same points as Neumann’s Durango which TQ’d Rounds 1 & 2 of qualifying, Matsukura secured pole on tie break thanks to his Q4 pace and will start ahead of the reigning champion for what is an interesting grid line-up with four different buggies filling the Top 4 places.  Third on the grid will be Evans’ TLR22 while the No.4 will be carried by Martin’s TRF201.

Matsukura was understandably ‘very happy’ to take the TQ saying he actually likes the high grip surface more than clay adding that his touring car experience benefited him. The 4-times reigning Japanese National Champion said the result is great for the new B-Max2 MR buggy and he hopes he can convert the TQ into a win.  Asked about the finals the 19-year-old said on pace he thinks himself and Neumann are very closely matched with his advantage being in the corners and the Germans strength being the jumps.  With all the drivers saying passing will be difficult Matsukura said starting at the front is going to be a huge advantage.

Neumann agreed with his fellow World Championship finalist that overtaking will be hard but added that running the full 5-minutes without a mistake was just as hard and the race would be decided by who made the least amount of mistakes.

Evans said the technical design of the Gerd Strenge built track was going to make for ‘pretty exciting racing’ with the key to passing being to force the driver in front of you into a mistake.  Although his buggy started to push in the final laps of the last qualifier due to his front tyres going off, Evans is confident he his buggy is a match for the two starting ahead of him and it will come down to who drives the cleanest finals.

The first A-Main will take place later this evening with Legs 2 & 3 scheduled for tomorrow.

2WD Buggy Q4 times
1. Naoto Matsukura – Yokomo – 14/5:00.195
2. Lee Martin – Tamiya – 14/5:04.407
3. Hupo Honigl – Durango – 14/5:06.232
4. Christopher Krapp – Kyosho – 14/5:07.591
5. Dustin Evans – TLR – 14/5:07.726
6. Tom Cockerill – Schumacher – 14/5:10.452
7. Otto Ausfelt – TLR – 14/5:12.216
8. Bjorn Prumper – TLR – 14/5:12.550
9. Benni Groschel – Durango – 14/5:14.604
10.Markus Metsch – – 14/5:14.762

2WD Buggy A-main Grid
1. Naoto Matsukura (JP) – Yokomo – 310 pts
2. Jörn Neumann (DE) – Durango – 310
3. Dustin Evans (US) – TLR – 306
4. Lee Martin (GB) – Tamiya – 302
5. Hupo Honigl (AT) – Durango – 302
6. Darren Bloomfield (GB) – TLR – 302
7. Oliver Scholz (DE) – Team C – 301
8. Christopher Krapp (DE) – Kyosho – 299
9. Otto Ausfelt (SE) – TLR – 298
10.Tom Cockerill (GB- Schumacher – 298

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Matsukura TQ’s Round 3

Team Yokomo’s Naoto Matsukura has TQ’d the penultimate 2WD Buggy qualifier at Round 2 of the TLR/Spektrum Euro Offroad Series in Germany, the Japanese ace taking Q3 by the narrowest of margins from TLR’s Dustin Evans. The result took some time to be made official as it originally looked like Evans’ penultimate lap hadn’t counted. Manually giving the American what was thought to be a missed lap it resulted in the first 15 lap run of the event but Yokomo did their own calculations which showed the time given wasn’t possible.

With timekeeping pulling up the readings from the loop for Evans TLR22 it was discovered that a blistering final lap from the former US Champion was quicker than the minimum 21-second lap time set in the timing software. Crossing the loop at 5:02.694, the computer discarded the rocket 20.952 second lap allowing Evans to go on to run another lap and stop the clock at 5:24.117. Ultimately it was a bad lap three laps from the end of the run which cost Evans the TQ run as he got out of shape a number of times losing over 3 seconds. and handing the lead to Matsukura. Building on his Top 6 time in Q2, Team C’s Oliver Scholz completed the Top 3 for the round, the German Champion clearly happy with his run.

Having comfortably topped the opening two qualifiers Joern Neumann struggled after switching to a new set of tyres for the run. Expecting to have more grip the Team Durango driver said for some reason the fresh tyres gave him ‘zero traction’ on the wood sections. Struggling through the run the defending champion could only manage the 11th fastest time.

2WD Buggy Q3 times
1. Naoto Matsukura – Yokomo – 14/5:02.614
2. Dustin Evans – TLR – 14/5:02.694
3. Oliver Scholz – Team C – 14/5:04.469
4. Darren Bloomfield – TLR – 14/5:05.468
5. Otto Ausfelt – TLR – 14/5:07.846
6. Lee Martin – Tamiya – 14/5:08.420
7. Christopher Krapp – Kyosho – 14/5:09.854
8. Hupo Honigl – Durango – 14/5:11.158
9. Bjorn Prumper – TLR – 14/5:13.019
10.Oliver Speith – Durango – 14/5:14.090

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Neumann again in Q2

Day 2 of the ‘TLR/Spektrum Euro Offroad Series presented by Horizon Hobby’ got underway in Germany with the second round of 2WD Buggy qualifying with yesterday’s Q1 pace setter Joern Neumann once again topping of the timing sheets. The Durango driver produced a time of 14/5:05.631 to take the round by 4.5 seconds ahead of Yokomo Naoto Matsukura with TLR’s Dustin Evans completing the Top 3 on what was a much faster track following the overnight removal of a small roller just before the crossover which was causing problems for many of the record entry.

Neumann was happy with his run but said the track change caught him out in the early laps as he over jumped the crossover leading to a moment coming off the following table which lost him some time.  With many drivers having trouble correctly clearing the crossover due to the short run up after the rollover, with it removed the defending champion said it was now very easy to give too much throttle and this took a few laps to adjust to.  Interestingly Neumann’s team-mate Hupo Honigl who was so focused on trying to put in a clean five minute run after suffering a serious of mistakes in Q1 didn’t even notice the removal of the rollover only becoming aware of the track change after the race when Schumacher’s Tom Cockerill asked him what he thought about it at the end of the run.  For Q3 Neumann said the only changes he plans is to fit a new set of dBoots tyres as his DEX210 was starting to understeer a little by the end of the second qualifier.

Despite suffering one very costly mistake that lost him a massive six seconds, Japanese ace Matsukura said he was much happier with his B-Max2 MR today.  Adding weight to the buggy, the World Championship Finalist said this helped settle the buggy better on the landings and for Q3 he plans to add further weight. The 4-time Japanese National Champion who has never raced on a carpet offroad track, adding that his confidence and feel for the uniquely European style track is improving every run.

Evans was annoyed with himself after the run saying his TLR22 was easy to drive but he just made too many mistakes.  Setting the lead pace he lost it with a mistake after which he tried to push too hard leading to further mistakes.  With a 2nd in Q1 and 3rd in Q2, the American said as he is ‘here to try win’ he will now use the remaining two qualifiers to try a some things with a view to finals.   The former Reedy Race Champion added he doesn’t need to find much but with a fraction more pace and consistency he is confident he can race with Neumann, the current Reedy Race Champion, for the win tomorrow.  Team Losi Racing team-mate Darrren Bloomfield repeated his Q1 performance with another 4th fastest run time. The British driver said he was happy with the speed of his buggy but he just needs to get it to ‘flow better’ through the corners.

Completing the Top 6 in Q2 was factory Team C driver Oliver Scholz despite three mistakes each of which required his TM2 to be marshalled.  The 17-year-old German National Champion, who is making his EOS debut, said he is happy with performance of his buggy but hopes he can improve the driver in the remaining two qualifiers.  Leaving the buggy the same for Q3 he will try running a new set of the controlled dBoots rear tyres from which he has removed the outside row of pins.

Having suffered a speedo thermal shutdown in the opening qualifier yesterday, Tamiya Racing Factory’s Lee Martin was to suffer further electrical wows this time with his batteries lacking power.  Running saddle packs in his Vega mid motor converted TRF201 the European Champion said one of the cells went faulty.  Still suffering from a cold he only managed 12th for the round.  Fellow Brit Tom Cockerill also had electric problems on his Cougar SV2 with a motor wire coming off leaving him one spot behind Martin on the time sheets.

2WD Buggy Q2 times
1. Joern Neumann – Durango – 14/5:05.631
2. Naoto Matsukura – Yokomo – 14/5:10.111
3. Dustin Evans – TLR – 14/5:11.810
4. Darren Bloomfield – TLR – 14/5:12.058
5. Hupo Honigl – Durango – 14/5:15.409
6. Oliver Scholz – Team C – 14/5:16.452
7. Oliver Speith – Durango – 14/5:16.686
8. Christopher Krapp – Kyosho – 14/5:16.772
9. Oskar Levin – TLR – 14/5:18.881
10.Wesley van Helmond – TLR – 14/5:20.558

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