Sports/GT 2 May

1/32   Nationals   2022

Champion James Cleave

3rd Mark Harwood       2nd Will Stemman

Main Grade Champion Mike Read

3rd Neil Grogan       2nd Pete Clarkson

The final day’s competition commenced with best presented body.  Thanks to Ian Fitzpatrick for judging the entries.

Michael Ovens took his second win of the weekend.  This is the winning Audi R8 - most of the field were using the similar shape R10 body with only 4 drivers using anything else.

Ross Grogan took the top qualifying spot with a 4.996 second lap, James Cleave was a few milliseconds slower in second,. James still holds the qualifying record which he set in 2021.    These two were some way clear of the rest. James Noake was the top main grade qualifier, an excellent 6th overall but was an unlucky early retirement in the heats.

Either brushless or brush motors can be used in this class.   Richard Mack took 13th overall, Bob Budge took 23rd overall and 8th  place in the main grade final with their brushless powered cars, everybody else used conventional brushed strap motors.

Ricard and Bob’s brushless powered cars

The 35 racers were seeded into 4 heats, the  first 3 heats being run for 9 drivers ( 8 lanes plus a sitout) and the top heat was a simple 8 x 3 minute segmented race.  James Cleave was quickest in the heats with 265 laps, 3 laps quicker than he archived last year and some 8 laps ahead of Ross Grogan.  Gordon Dickson and Ron Kiddell made their first overall National finals with quick runs in the B heat.

                                                                                          Main Grade Final
Neil Grogan          Mike Read          Bob Budge   Peter Donley   Michael Ovens  Ian Howard  Pete Clarkson  Ant Hawkes

Mike Read overtook the fast starting Bob Budge for the lead a couple of laps into the main grade, and was a clear leader throughout the rest of the final. Mike took the main grade title by 7 laps, the largest final winning margin of the weekend. Pete Clarkson was very rapid in the last quarter of the race to take a clear second ahead of the  close contest for third between Neil Grogan, Ian Howard and Peter Donely.   Bob had reliability issues so we didn’t see the full potential of the brushless car.

Mike Read’s main grade winner

Car weights (grams) weighed after the heats, before being serviced for the final

      68.5               66.0              67.0               66.6                 68.7               67.7               69.7             65.8

James took an early lead and pulled away until segment 4 when an accident put the body into the gears.   Ross Grogan was also delayed in segment 4, he needed a gear change. That gave Will Stemman the lead at half way, he was passed by Mark Hawood in segment 5.  James retook the lead in segment 6, and extended his lead to 4 laps by the final segment where Will, Mark and Ross were swapping 2-3-4.   Congratulations to James won the championship for the 12th time (including the last 7 in a row).   Will completed his best ever Nationals with a second ahead of Mark and Ross.

The body damage happened during segment 4 of the final - you can see where it went through the gears!

James Cleave’s winning car

Chassis - Horky         Motor - Cahoza 16 mag setup with a 20 turns of 25g 0.300” long  armature
Tyres - Pirana         Gears 5:39  72 pitch        Body BSP/CAT Audi R10

                                                                Overall Final

Martin Ellis   James Cleave   Gordon Dickson   Josh Bryant  Mark Harwood  Ron Kiddell  Ross Grogan  Will Stemman