Video – Pro Stock Qualifying Rd1
Coelho tops brief practice after carpet change at ETS
Over a short 2-minute practice at the Yokomo Euro Touring Series in Germany it was Bruno Coelho who laid claim to being fastest on eventful Day 1 at the second round of the championship. The biggest race of the ETS to-date, with over 440 entries, a hidden problem would arise during practice when an incorrect batch of carpet left racers struggling for traction. With no sign of conditions improving, the carpet fluffing up, the championship’s promoters made the brave call to resurface the track. Having to wait 4-hours for the delivery of the correct ‘ETS Black Carpet’ all the way from the centre of the Netherlands, a pre-selected crew which included the current World Champion Naoto Matsukura did an impressive job to rebuild the track in just 2-hours. With the two planned rounds of practice on the busy schedule having run on the bad carpet, a reshuffle of the timetable during the track resurfacing allowed a quick 2-minute practice round to give drivers a feel for the regular carpet racers have become accustomed too. The difference in the carpets was immediately clear as Coelho went from a 44-seconds 3-consecutive lap time to a 41.364.
Having done 2-days of testing at the Hudy Arena, where they have ETS carpet, as preparation for the ETS, Coelho said they got a ‘big surprise’ when he put his Hobbywing powered T4 on the track this morning. ‘Completely different’, he said his car was ‘impossible to drive’. With a rumour quickly circulating that they may rebuild the track he said he changed the car slightly to make it possible to do laps and use the next practice to learn the flow of the track. Putting back on his Hudy Arena set-up for the new carpet, the Round 1 podium finisher said ‘it was amazing, really amazing’. With last year’s Muelheim-Kaerlich event marking only his second carpet race, the Portuguese driver as he put it himself ‘flipped’ his way to 10th on the grid, but with a lot more experience on carpet now he is hopeful of a better outcome tomorrow when all four rounds of qualifying will be run.
Making his ETS carpet debut, Naoto Matsukura would set the 2nd fastest time. Having not raced his touring car for 2-months and not raced on carpet for a few months prior to that, the Tamiya driver said he got a bit of ‘surprise’ when practice started and was relieved to find out the lack of traction was a carpet issue. Running just one car, team-mate Marc Rheinard running two cars in the 2-minute practice, Matsukura said his TRF419 was ‘good’ and on the proper carpet so was the track layout. Feeling his car was understeering a little, he will tweak his set-up changes for qualifying adding ‘then it will be perfect for tomorrow’.
Winner of this race last season, ending a 5-year winning drought on carpet, and taking the win at this season’s opening race in Czech Republic, Rheinard would record the 9th fastest time. The 4-time World Champion described it as ‘an interesting day’ adding ‘but at least we ended up on good carpet, it was definitely a good call’. With only a 3-quick laps to get the feel of each car, the German said while difficult to fully tell he said the second car felt better and it is this he will run in qualifying leaving it unchanged for Q1.
Setting the third fastest time, Team Yokomo’s Meen Vejrak was pleased with his comparative pace but said ‘I needed more time to test’. Another driver to run two cars over the short practice, the former Nitro Touring Car World Champion said of his two Scorpion powered BD7s, which ran different set-ups, the second one was better. While he will use this for the opening qualifier, he feels the car needs to be more stable and so he will make some small set-up changes.
Sixth fastest behind Olly Jefferies (4th) and Viktor Wilck (5th), reigning ETS Champion Ronald Volker said the change was good and that decision was reflected in the lap times. Adding that the rebuild came ‘just in time’, he said the 2-minute practice was ‘tough’ in terms of getting a proper feel for conditions and the car. Overall the Yokomo driver ‘wasn’t too happy with the feeling of his car’ and they have to come up with a better set-up for qualifying.
View the event image gallery here.
Chassis Focus – Cyril N’diaye
Chassis – TM E4 RS III +
Motor – LRP X20 4.5T
ESC – LRP Flow
Batteries – LRP 5600mAh
Tires – Volante (handout)
Radio/Servo – Sanwa
Bodyshell – Protoform LTC-R
Remarks – French ETS veteran Cyril N’diaye is running a pretty standard version of the new RS4 III “plus” from Team Magic. The features of the new car include a single piece front arm mount, aluminium pivot balls and a shorter wheelbase, with the front arms placed 1mm towards the back, while the only option used is a set of titanium screws.
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Pit Focus – Naoto Matsukura
Team: Tamiya
Neighbours: Takayuki Kono (front), Akio Sobue (left)
Charger: Muchmore “Double Accel”
Tools: Muchmore/Tamiya
Setup Tools: Hudy Setup System, Muchmore setup board
Car Stand: Muchmore
Lipo Bag: Muchmore
Transport Bag: OGIO
Features: Schwip-Schwap bottle, Monster Energy can, wallet, iPhone 6+, Lucky Charm, Airwave chewing-gums, Muchmore digital scale, Ferrari Watch, Muchmore pit lamp.
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Chassis Focus – Lars Hoppe
Chassis – ARC R11
Motor – Muchmore (handout)
ESC – Muchmore (handout)
Batteries – Xcite RC 7400mAh
Tires – Volante (handout)
Radio/Servo – Sanwa/Savox
Bodyshell – Blitz LSF
Remarks – Top ARC driver Lars Hoppe is debuting the all new R11 here in Muelheim-Kaerlich. The car features narrower bulkheads, ball raced anti-roll bar mounts and a lower centre of gravity. His example is a standard car, the floating servo mount now coming in the kit, with the only exception a pre-production aluminium chassis.
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Carpet issues force track rebuild at ETS
Having attracted a record 440 plus entries made up of some 360 drivers from around the World, Round 2 of the Yokomo Euro Touring Series threw up an unexpected drama this morning during practice as the copy of the 2015 layout through up a hidden problem. Ordering their renowned ‘Black ETS Carpet’, as is done every round, it would transpire that in error a different carpet was delivered to the Muelheim-Kaerlich venue. With the carpet fluffing up and having low traction, the record Formula entry in particular struggling to get their cars to work, the ETS organisers have made the decision to resurface the track with the correct carpet.
With the only hint during the build that there was to be an issue was that once rolled out the carpet had a plastic protective sheeting which was removed. A massive under taking to rebuild the track during the World biggest race, on announcing the decision drivers gave a round of applause. With the supplier a three hour drive away, practice will continue on the old carpet, until the carpet arrives after which a track crew of around 20 staff will set about doing a full track rebuild. This is expected to take around 2-3 hours. With the surface change and new carpet needing to be broken in, once the rebuild is complete, the layout staying the same, drivers will get a 2-minute practice round before qualifying getting underway, Formula 1 now the only class that will run a qualifier today due to the revised schedule.
Another , but somewhat smaller issue to face the organisers this morning was the highly anticipated ETS debut of Masami Hirosaka. Set to run in Formula this morning, it turns out the 14-time World Champion is still on his travels from Japan after his passport expiry date was found to be too short to meet European entry requirements. Having to leave Narita airport and go get an emergency passport issued, he is now on his way but will now not land in Germany until tonight. Coming out of retirement for the race, the announcement of his entry generating a huge reaction, Masami will now go in at the deep end with his first lap of the track set to be in the second round of qualifying.
Track Focus – Muelheim-Kaerlich
Host – ETS
Country – Germany
Location – Muelheim-Kaerlich
Venue – Philipp-Heift Halle
Track type – Temporary
Surface – Carpet
Direction – Anti-Clockwise
Previous ETS races hosted – 4
Now on its fifth visit to the 1344 sq meter Philipp-Heift sports hall in Muelheim-Kaerlich, the German round of the Yokomo Euro Touring Series continues to set new records. Joining the calendar in 2011, when it hosted the Season #5 opener, this year’s event has attracted over 440 entries with some 360 drivers travelling from around the world. In terms of the track layout the track looks almost identical to last year. Set out in an area 20m X 39m, the flow of the track is a copy of 2015 with just a little more length in the middle straight and tightening up of the right side sweepers a little.
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Chassis Focus – Victor Wilck
Chassis – Serpent S411 Eryx 4.0
Motor – Speed Passion 4.5T
ESC – Speed Passion GT4
Batteries – MTB 315 6900mah
Tires – Volante (handout)
Radio/Servo – Sanwa
Bodyshell – Protoform LTC-R
Remarks – Top Serpent driver Viktor Wilck is running an updated version of the Eryx 4.0 here in Germany at the 2nd round of the ETS. The car features a stiffer top deck with no cuts in the front and a new servo mount, while the 2,25 mm thick chassis is from the 3.0 version of the car. He is also debuting the production Speed Passion GT4 speedo.
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