Anyway, I decided to write a small review on how Our unknown Russian Team spent this amazing weekend in St. Hertogenbosch.
After a small trip around Belgium, I and my wife arrived in a small, quiet town of Vught, which was totally different form what we were used to. For us, people of "big City", such places are true getaways, where we can rest our minds. Only 10km away form the comp. track, we had a nice bargain price for the 4* hotel.
A lot of small houses, restaurants and peacefull alleys. All villagers seemed to know each other, passing by on bicycles and waving each other.
It's the place where I used to rest in the evening, between the competition days. I became in Love with his place, and dream to come there again.
On the first day, I saw this. This track was bigger than any track I have ever rode on. Concrete produced nearly as much grip, as an asphalt + touring tire combination, which was unusual too. So, after 2 practice laps, I went to the tables to downgrade my CS from 1,6 to 1,23 and set up the chassis the right way.
Most of the chassis there were DRB's and VDF's. Some were running drift packages, a few MST FS's, couple of Enroutes and some DIB's from Japan. Found only one CE-RX and 1 D-like conversion.
Rare red Enroute looked gorgeous.
There they are. Almost 90 participants from all over Europe + Russia and Japan.
Somehow, Russian table was in the farthest corner of the Autotron, near the air compressors, which was really inconvenient. People wondered around every 2 minutes to smoke, blow the chassis, or whatever they needed. Here is me holding the Future champion Nikita's MST chassis, which turned out to be a piece of trash, which lost the set up angles in just few laps. So, he switched to 50/50 double-spool X-ray. Wierd choice in my opinion. I ran 1.23-1.25 CS with a One-way and it was perfect.
That's when the twin-battles were going. Everyone was at the track to watch them, starting from group F (last group was probably J)
All 4 Russian drivers
The event lasted for 4 days. 1st day was a practice day, 2 and 3 day - practice and qualifications, 4th day - final rounds. The organization was very well managed. Great practice track, group devision...Everything you need to show the best of yourself.
Few days later, had Adoru, Takahiro, and Masami sign my body. Rest of the team joined me, so did the other participants. I spent almost an Hour of the last day, walking around and signing flags, T-shirts, set up boards and other stuff. But the signatures that are on my BMW's roof - the ones I value the most.
Adoru is an amazing rider. Very consistent and self-confident. I was almost glad that I lost a battle to him, however we had to do a Re-run. Hope that I will be able to battle him next time )
Funky Yokomo stand. They had a lot of stuff for sale. Mostly vertex and Yokomo products. However they refused to sell a chassis when one of my teammates asked for it. I understand the reasons, but still - a bit strange.
After 4 qualifying runs, dropped down to group C, which is a terrible mistake for me. As I watched other people ride, It was clear that I could make it to top 10 easily. I need more practice(
First twin-ride in the group. Probably a German or Norwegian guy. Same I don't remember anyone.
The battle was pretty easy and obvious.
My BMW with no style at all. I planned it as a street version, but when I got to the track, I realised it's very uncomfortable to see the car without the spoiler. So I added one.
Then, to my surprise, I had to Run with Adoru. You can see, I'm a bit worried, and you're right - I was.
After first 2 runs - it's a tie.
Judges trying to figure out, who won the round. For almost 1 minute, everyone was sitting quiet. After that, seeing that judges can't decide, someone started shouting "one more time", which was pretty cool. So, everyone picked it up, and we had to run again. Masami told Adoru something, and Adoru went really hard on me, trying to make me do a mistake. SO, I did, and he won.
The practice track went hard on us. These bodies were almost new when we came there.
To buy a super expensive M11 and cover it's screen with a sticker - very wise choice)
I especially liked the speed trap. Nice way to give extra points.
End of the day 4 - Champion Nikita and the rest of us Loosers)
Stay tuned for some more random pics from other sources and a video.
A great report! Thank you
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