April 21, 2016

New ENS season brings new competition

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The wait for the highly anticipated start to the third season of the Euro Nitro Series is over as the world’s best onroad drivers travel to Bologna, Italy, this weekend for the first of four stops on the 2016 calendar.  New to the championship last season when it also hosted the opening round, the L.Collari RC Raceway circuit owned by RC legend Lamberto Collari has attracted over 150 entries with the biggest news of the new season being the arrival of the new Infinity team.  Making their ENS debut with a small presence at the 2015 season finale in Fiorano, 1:8’s newest manufacturer has over the winter recruited an impressive driver line-up in it’s quest to win the prestigious ENS title.

In 1:8 it’s Capricorn who are the reigning champions with Dario Balestri and the successful Italian partnership remains upchanged for 2016. One interesting addition to Capricorn’s line-up is multiple World Championship Finalist Robin D’Hondt.  Infinity’s intentions are clear with the Creation Model owned brand having signed up none other than 9-time World Champion Collari to lead a star studded team.  Although they have yet to produce their own 1:10 car, another top signing is reigning ENS Champion Jilles Groskamp who is also joined by his race race winning HB team-mate of last season Teemu Leino. Racing in both classes this weekend, Groskamp will use a Capricorn in 1:10 while Leino will focus only on 1:8.

As the 2015 1:8 Champions, Team Shepherd will be relishing the prospects of a competitive campaign. Winners of the inaugural ENS title with Simon Kurzbuch and on the back of a great win at the season final back in October, the Swiss driver went on to be the World Champion in Brazil.  The German manufacturer will also be looking for a strong 1:8 performance from European Champiom Oliver Mack.  In 1:10 Dirk Wischnewski will again lead the Shepherd challenge.

Winners in Bologna last year with Collari, then running as a privateer,  Mugen will this year look to former World Champion Robert Pietsch.  By his own standards Pietsch didn’t have a great 2015 season and will be looking to make amends for that.  Alberto Picco, the man responsible for Pietsch’s engine sponsorship, will again be another of the leading Mugen contenders.  In 1:10, having lacked strong representation in the class last year, Mugen have boosted their efforts with the signing of 2014 Champion Eric Dankel. The German returns after a break from racing following a difficult & curtailed campaign last year.

While Xray have a new 1:8 car which they hope will bring them improved success in the sport premiere class, in 1:10 they can be expected to again be title contenders.  A World Championship year for 1:10 nitro touring, they are the reigning World Champions with Alexander Hagberg and everyone knows the threat that is Bruno Coelho.

In 1:10, expect Serpent to be right at the sharp end thanks to the sometimes controversial but very fast Dominic Greiner.  On outright speed the German is unquestionably one of the touring car classes’ fastest drivers but luck tends to elude him.  Dominating the season finale, he was robbed of a potential title victory by an engine failure.  That win would go to his team-mate Alessio Mazzeo, who with Greiner makes Serpent a formidable 1:10 title challenger. In 1:8, Merlin Depta showed strong for Serpent last year and should be one to watch.

Elsewhere ARC will be hoping to build on a strong debut season with Lars Hoppe a potential winner. Former ENS race winner John Ermen and Silvio Hachler will be aiming to be in the mix also with the R8. Having started 2015 with just one team driver but adding Michele Ramagnoli, WRC have high hopes of improving on their 4th position in last year’s overall championship with Andrea Pirani.  Unfortunately Daniele Ielasi has opted to sit out the opening round.

Supported by Shepherd, Xray, Serpent and now Infinity, the Euro Nitro Series continues its single tyre supplier per race format with Contact providing drivers with traction for Round 1.  Ettlingen in Germany is the venue for Round 2 when Enneti makes  it return to the championship with Hotrace the supplier for Round 3 in Aigen, Austria. Having supplied the tyres for the season opener the past two season’s Matrix will now take care of drivers needs for the final round at Fiorano, Italy.

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December 7, 2015

Euro Nitro Series releases 2016 calendar

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The Euro Nitro Series has released details of its 2016 calendar with the third season of the hugely successful nitro onroad championship again set to run over four rounds. With almost 300 drivers from around the world registering championship points over the 2015 season, a growth of over 10% on its inaugural running in 2014, the ENS will take competitors to Italy, Austria and Germany.

Kicking off on April 22-24, the opening round will be hosted by legend of the sport & the ENS’ most winning driver Lamberto Collari.  Opened in 1978, L.Collari RC Raceway was the first ever permanent track to be built in Italy, a country widely recognised as the spiritual home of onroad racing. Making its first appearance on the calendar in 2015, it was at the Bologna track that Dario Balestri would score the first championship point of his successful 1:8 title winning season when he took the overall TQ.

After Bologna, the championship travels to Germany. A very popular addition to the 2015 calendar, Ettlingen moves to an earlier slot hosting Round 2 over the weekend of June 17-19.  With the 1:10 200mm World Chamionships taking place in August, the championship takes a two month break before resuming on September 2-4 in Austria.  The Aigen track witnessed one of the closest races in the ENS’ 8-race history with Teemu Leino taking his first win ahead of champion elect Jilles Groskamp and Dominic Greiner all three covered by just 6-seconds after 45-minutes of racing.

Attracting a record 156 entries when it hosted the 2015 season finale, the Mini Autodromo Jody Scheckter in Fiorano, Italy, will again be the concluding round of the championship. Round 4 will run on October 21-13. Running a different brand of handout tyre for each round, an element of the ENS which has contributed to its success, details of the 2016 tyre partners will be announced early in the new year.

2016 Euro Nitro Series Calendar (Season #3)
Round 1 – Bologna, Italy (22–24 April)
Round 2 – Ettlingen, Germany (17–19 June)
Round 3 – Aigen, Austria (02–04 September)
Round 4 – Fiorano, Italy (21–23 October)

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October 25, 2015

Kurzbuch wins but Balestri claims ENS title

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Simon Kurzbuch won the fourth & final round of the Euro Nitro Series, but second behind the Shepherd driver in Italy was enough for Capricorn’s Dario Balestri to deny the season’s only double winner from retaining the title he won last year at the Mini Autodromo Jody Scheckter track. Starting second behind Top Qualifier Balestri, Kurzbuch would drive the ‘near perfect race’ coming out on top of a thrilling mid race battle between the two world class 1:8 drivers.  Knowing even if Kurzbuch took the win Balestri would see out the 45-minute final in a controlled fashion finishing 5-seconds behind his Main title rival while the other title contender Robert Pietsch finished a distant 5th after an early incident with last year’s race winner Lamberto Collari.  Starting from 12th on the grid having bumped up from the B-Main Alberto Picco would completed the race podium in Fiorano.

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‘That was a very enjoyable race’ was Balestri’s reaction to a race that saw the pair rub body work and make contact twice.  He continued ‘It was very competitive and I am happy to have battled like this with Simon, he is a very good driver’.  Having shot into title contention with his first ENS win at the previous round in Germany and then making Kurzbuch’s quest to retain the title even harder by securing the bonus championship point for the TQ, he said his only problem in the final was tyres.  The former Eurpean Champion said ‘we made something wrong with the set-up for the tyres’ holding up his worn out front tyres.  He said ‘I am ok with arriving 2nd and I’m happy for Simon but this weekend is a huge boost for the World Championships as we should we have a really good package in Capricorn and my Tesla engines’.

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Kurzbuch said apart from mistake early on it was a perfect race for him.  Describing his Velox V8 and Novarossi engine as perfect he said the key moment of the race was his quick tyre stop which gave him ‘a few seconds on Balestri’.  Sharing his Italian rivals views that it was it was ‘a really nice battle’ between them he said it was particularly ‘nice to win in Italy against drivers like Dario’.  The only multiple race winner of the second season of the ENS from either classes, he said he was OK with 2nd in the championship highlighting his ‘two bad results’.  Describing the event as the perfect warm-up before travelling to Brazil for the World Championships he said ‘the stuff is ready and I am really happy with the improvements we have made with the Mito 9C engine’.

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Claiming his first ENS podium finish Picco said ‘I couldn’t have expected more when I look at how the weekend started’.  Keeping the same set-up as he used to bump up from the B-Final, he said his Mugen again worked well but added he was ‘delayed by starting last on the grid’.  Not an incident free race for the Picco engine boss, the Italian said he made a mistake during one of his pit stops in which he crashed into Collari, the Infinity driver suffering a flame out as a result. The crash would also brake a rear tyre on Picco’s car leaving him to run 10-minutes with it before his scheduled tyre stop.  He would again find himself crashing with Collari, this time a problem with the 9-time World Champion’s car causing it to slow out of a corner and on full throttle Picco couldn’t avoid him.  Damaging the body and front bumper he said he would lose some steering but he was able to drive around it, adding considering everything finishing on the podium was a ‘very good result’.

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Finishing fourth having been in the mix for a podium finish, Daniele Ielasi described his race as ‘super’.  Having to fuel every four minutes he said with 2 more stops than his rivals he was very happy that he could still run at the front, the gap to Picco at the end only 3.9-seconds.  Braking his ‘race car’ in half in practice and having to race a standard version of the GTX, he said ‘I am super happy with the performance and let the others know I am here’ which he said was a huge physiological boost for the Worlds.

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Debuting Mugen’s new MRX-6, Pietsch said he was ‘very happy’ with the new car adding that the event and racing against such a high level competition was hugely beneficial, if slightly risky.  With the new car having different handling characteristics to the MRX-5, he said the set-ups it requires are also different but given that he had no proper testing prior to the ENS finale it was a positive first race.  The former World Champion said he had a lot of understeer with his first set of tyres and he just tried to keep 3rd having got by Ielasi early on.  Battling with Collari, contact would see Pietsch end up on his roof, the German saying with the lost time his ‘race was done’.  With the incident damaging a tyre he said the car was then horrible until the stop.  Much happier with the second set of tyres, he said he was able to set good lap times and run with Picco.

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