Neumann heads 4WD qualification after 2 rounds
Winner of the opening round of the Euro Offroad Series in the Czech Republic, Joern Neumann had picked up where he left off by topping the opening two 4WD Buggy qualifiers by a substantial margin. The Team Durango driver TQ’d Q1 by 9 seconds from TLR’s Mike Truhe and in the second heat was almost 6 seconds clear of Tamiya’s Lee Martin.
A driver who likes to do most of his talking on the track, Neumann said his DEX410 was perfect and the only thing he needed to do was ‘just drive’. Team-mate Hupo Honigl, who was 8th and 4th fastest respectively in the opening heats, was also happy with his buggy adding he just need to drive better.
Failing to finish his first 4WD qualifier due to a problem with his speedo, Martin fitted a new speedo and motor for Q2 which he said transformed the drivability of his TRF502X thanks to a much smoother power delivery. Looking to gain a little more steering for Q3, the back to back British Champion said he didn’t know how he was going to achieve this without making the buggy want to grip roll.
Improving on his Q1 time which was good enough for 5th, Tom Cockerill was third quickest second time out after he cut the outside spikes on his dBoots tyres halfway down. The Schumacher driver said his SX3 feels horrible to drive but he can still get good times with it. For his third heat the British driver will try a shorter wheelbase in the hope of getting the buggy to turn in better through the 180 degree corners.
Despite running fractionally faster in his second heat Truhe only ended up 5th. The American said his buggy is getting better each run and he hopes changes to his front shocks will allow him to push harder next time out. Team-mate Dustin Evans got his qualifying off to a solid start in Q1 with 3rd but next time out failed to finish the run. Describing buggy as ‘awesome’ he made a mistake just before the 3 minute mark which resulted in a broken front caster block.
Evans wasn’t the only TLR to break as Darren Bloomfield ‘wrecked’ his XXX-4 in the first round. Only 13th fastest in Q2, he said he is finding his 4WD very hard to drive and he hopes by running a similar set-up to Evans for his next run he can post a decent round. Sixth fastest in both rounds, Portuguese 1:8 Offroad ace Miguel Matias said he does not think he can improve his Nosram powered TLR but his driving needs work as he made mistakes each run.
After an impressive opening heat that left him 4th for the round, French driver Sebastien Wartelle couldn’t match his pace in Q2 but once again was fastest of the non-team drivers in 8th spot separating the TLR Team Sweden drivers Oskar Levin and Otto Ausfelt.
In the 4WD Short Course class Hupo Honigl took the opening two qualifiers from Neumann with Truhe third in Q1 while in the second round young Czech driver Kája Novotny made it a Durango 1-2-3.
View complete results here.
View the event image gallery here.