TLR/Horizon Hobby UK Team Report:
Off-Road Wars 3 - Season Review
The third Off Road Wars series is now over
for another winter season and what a successful championship campaign the team
has had. Looking back on the series TLR has dominated both 2WD and 4WD on the
array of circuits at Maritime. The premier indoor facility has seen some
exciting and challenging tracks that have varied from multi-surface through to
100% carpet. The surface change is not the only variable that has occurred over
the course of the championship with the track extension being brought in for
the fourth round opening the track up allowing for a greater variety of
layouts. Both decisions by the club have proved to be popular among the
racers going to show that the Maritime club are truly about providing a great
track for all to compete on. Speaking with Ian Knight about the track surface
change he mentioned that the intention is to introduce wooden turns from time
to time to change things up, but the 100% carpet circuit has worked well and
provided a different challenge from the traditional mix at the venue.
In 4WD the team took both TQ honors and
the win at every rounds of the season with Karl Jackson, Christopher Delves,
Billy Fletcher and Ross Nicholson all contributing to this impressive tally.
The 22-4 really showed it’s pace in their hands with Karl Jackson being crowned
Champion at the penultimate round of the series having won 3 of the 4 rounds
and finishing 2nd in the other round, leaving the fight for second
and third to go down to the wire between Billy and Chris. At the final round of
the series Billy clinched TQ ahead of Chris and Karl only to make an error in
the final that ended his fight for 2nd handing it to Chris whilst
Ross took the final victory of the season to end it on a high and take fifth in
the championship. This meant that TLR took 4 of the top 5 championships spots!
Congratulations to Karl on his first ORW title, he was fully deserved of the
win ahead of teammates Chris and Billy with the trio often having some very
close and exciting racing during qualifying and the finals.
The 2WD class was dominated by Ellis
Stafford in the early rounds taking the TQ spot and the win at rounds 1 and 2.
Christopher Delves would be runner up behind Ellis but on occasion looked as if
he could take the fight to the lead driver only to make small errors that cost
big. Chris’ chance came at round 3 where he took his first TQ and Win of the
series which couple with a tough day at the office for Ellis meant that Chris
was leading the championship going into the 4th round. Ellis resumed
normal performance by clinching maximum points in the fourth round and thus
taking the title fight down to the final round with Chris having a single point
lead over Ellis. At the final round of the series 8th scale pro Jack
Embling was in attendance to take the competition level up a notch. Whilst Jack
took the TQ spot the final wasn’t a one horse race with the deciding podium
positions coming down to the last few laps where Jack took the win 1.5seconds
ahead of Chris and Ellis. Despite beating his teammate Ellis had a low counting
score from round 3 that he dropped to take the title win by 3 points. Billy
Fletcher has had a tough time in 2wd often showing blistering pace but
seemingly not coming together for him but despite this he managed to round off
the top 3 in the 2wd championship in 3rd to make it another
championship lockout for the TLR/Horizon Hobby UK team. Karl Jackson and Glenn Doman
finished up 8th and 10th respectively in the championship
that meant 5 of the top 10 were TLR 22 2.0 proving the cars pace and speed at
this venue. Congratulations to Ellis on his impressive third consecutive
championship win at ORW’s.
It has to be said that the Maritime track
crew out did themselves at every round giving up their own time during the week
on the lead up to the event to build tracks that challenged and excited all.
This is often a thankless job that goes un-noticed but all who competed at the
event had nothing but praise for their efforts and we would like to thank the
guys for their work on the lead up to the event not to mention during the event
to repair damaged features and keep the racing going. To the ladies (and Doug)
at Maritime Much we all thank you for the countless cups of tea and breakfast’s
you have prepared for all the racers to keep us going. Even if we have a bad
run a cup of tea can fix everything and help us to focus on the problems we are
having. Finally thank you to Ian Knight who not only runs a superb event but
works hard in the background before and after the event doing many unenviable
tasks that we all take for granted. Whether it’s changing a PT number or
putting up the race results immediately after the event so you can analyse what
happened throughout the day and see where you are in the championship. If you
have ever contemplated coming to race at Maritime we highly recommend it if you
are looking for some indoor racing at a premier facility.
Off Road Wars 4 will commence later on in
2015 and the team will again be back to defend their titles! For now the team
are looking to focus on the upcoming national season and will be using the next
month or so to prepare and we would like to wish all our team the best of luck
on track this season.
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