TC Euro's 2002
 

Hi guys,

So the Euro’s 2002 have come and gone……..and the best car won.

If you believed the hype then you would have thought there was no need to have an “A” final for it would have been just a formality, with X Rays in all 10 positions. But when it got down to putting one’s money where one’s mouth is, things were somewhat different.

In fact, the only X Ray in the A final was that of Jilles Groskamp, and we all know how good he is, whatever he drives. Indeed judging by the performances of the other X Rays one can only surmise that Jilles might have done even better had he remained faithful to Corally, for the most underrated car manufacturer in Europe actually got 2 cars in the A final. This in itself must have upset X ray somewhat for, when they copied the Corally so blatantly a couple of years ago, they thought they were going one better. The results have proved otherwise for the situation with Jilles Groskamp is a bit like the situation at Ferrari 2 and 3 years ago. Jilles is like Michael Schumacher who can make the car go a second a lap quicker than it should be going. If you need proof of this take a look where poor Chris Grainger ended up, and he’s no slouch! He too should have stayed with Associated.

So it wasn’t X Rays that filled the A main after all. But the 3 year old Associated TC3 actually filled 3 out of the 10 places in the A. A friend reckoned the TC3 was outdated and the X Ray was the future, and indeed if one reads all the hype you could be forgiven for believing it. Well reality proved otherwise. A big win in the states last weekend, another huge one here in Europe this weekend. What more proof do we need. And of course when you think that the European champion is just a 17 year old kid, it’s makes the TC3 an even better car.

Don’t for one moment think I am trying to take anything away from Eurochamp Juho Levanen. He proved himself most, not by beating X Rays, but by beating his more experienced fellow countrymen, and people like Drescher, Spashett, Moore, etc. A big well done Juho.

Craig Drescher’s article in this month’s RRCI magazine made interesting reading. He commented about manufacturers who poach drivers from other teams in their efforts to succeed – referring to Hara from Yokomo to HPI, and when they still don’t succeed they go one further and copy other people’s cars – again referring to HPI copying Associated at the Worlds, and X Ray copying Corally, I presume. I can’t agree with his sentiments more. But at the end of the day, despite the copying, where were HPI?

So congrats to Juho Levanen for winning the Euro at only 17 – surely a record in itself, and for choosing the best car with which to do it. And congratulations too to Jilles Groskamp for working wonders with a car which……well, just look where all the others were!

Any further comment would be superfluous.

Regards

Joe from sunny Malta.

"The best car won??"............does that mean we should all go out and buy a 414M2 WC????:D :D :D :D :D ................and the drivers??????

Corally?? Xray??? TC3??? Predator DTM??? does it really matter?.....I'm sure some people will say it does......but having owned all 4 of the above cars (and still do with 3 of them) .......I would still stick with an Xray!!:rolleyes:

Just my superfluous comment.

nono, the best car is "my car". everybody claims the best car is "my car" !! there is no doubt about it ! :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

Hi guys,

Just to get one thing straight. I don't race a TC3. I race a Yoke, and they just didn't feature.

My whole argument is that X Ray created so much hype around their car - just read anywhere - the X Ray is wonderful - the X ray is going to thrash everyone - everyone else can pack up and go home.

Well it's one thing saying it, and another proving it. We now have a result. Of some 20 X rays entered only 1 car made the A finals driven by Jilles Groskamp. He can win in anything. But just look at poor guys like Chris Grainger and Markus Mobers, and they're no mean drivers either.

They believed the hype - poor guys. They should have stayed where they were.

Regards

Joe from sunny Malta.

From that perspective.....I would agree!;) However, that is simply "Marketing"...........

Yeah, but you look at Tamiya. Putting 'World Champion' next to an advert for a TL-01!!!

I have to disagree with johnbull.

My belief is that the driver wins not the car.

All car kits nowdays are very competitive, you have the option to change everything on the car in order to find the setup that suites you for the track. The only difference the car's have is how easy/fast you can make the change. That's why I believe that X-Ray is the "best". Not that having it will make me a winner!! I also have pro3 and I won the same number of races with each car just because my driving skills got better not because of the car I raced with!

The driver is what makes the big difference. The driver is the one who will decide what should be changed to the car (faster or slower depending on the car).

This isn't F1 where a greate advantage is the car. If Michael Schumacher signs with Minardi do you beleive they are going to make any win or even be at the podium. I really doubted!! I'm not saying that Yong will win a race but for sure he will finish higher than now.

You can't know what went wrong with the guys you mentioned and they didn't perform as good as usual which is what makes racing to be such fun since you don't know the outcome beforehand! What about Steenari? He drove the same car as always and he finished 19th way back than his potentials and proven abilities. That means Losi is crap? No it means that he was unlucky and had difficulties to find the correct setup. Don't forget for some this track was the home track or close to that which is big advantage to perform the best (Finnish, Dutch, Swiss etc). It all comes to driver and luck at the day.

Regarding "cheating" design I wouldn't call it cheating. If there is a race proven design don't they all follow it? Look at real cars there is a tendency that makes all cars look similar, or nitro rc cars were there minor differencies between, mugen, kyosho, trinity, serpent, gs and noone ever said anything about cheating.

Between XRay and Corally even though the car at the beginning looked very similar, Xray managed to make it very different with all their hopups (race proven)


My thoughts on the matter

Nick

haha....OK..Tamiya 1:Xray 0......on Marketing at least!!!!:D :D

Hi all. Greetings from Malta.

How great to see someone else from the Meditteranean writing in these threads.

Nnick, welcome......even if we disagree!

Actually you contradicted yourself when you said that Schumacher with the Minardi wouldn't win. You are right, he wouldn't. But that's just what I was saying. Levenen won the Euros because a) he is good, b) the car is great too.

I think the biggest proof of the TC3's excellence is the fact that it is not just one or two in excellent hands that place well, but there are always so many of them well placed.

Perhaps it is because it is in fact an easier car to set up correctly.

My only experience with the TC3 is preparing my son's car and lots of customer cars. I have built Losis, Schumachers, Corallys. I myself run an MR4 TC Special.

Although my son won two National championships with it, since he has had the TC3 I hardly ever drove it. I do all the preparation - he does the driving. However in the last 6 weeks I have been running it quite a bit in order to learn a bit more about it, and i have to say i am very impressed. You can make it handle better so much easier than you can most other cars I have had experience with. That's probably it's greatest advantage - apart from the fact that the shaft drive is so much more efficient.

So how about doing a meeting in Malta some time. i understand there are direct flights Athens - Malta.

We start our championship season in October. At present it's too hot to race RC.

regards

Joe from sunny Malta.

Today in touring car we have alot of cars that are capable of winning any race. No other r/c racing class that I know of can match the number of good racing cars in the touring class.

That said I still think the TC3, XXX-S, MR4TC, and Mission are some of the best cars on the market at this time. They're a few more but I still think these four are at the top. The Hudy is a nice car but if you look at what is winning right now those 4 I mentioned win almost every race. Sure Tamiya won the worlds but all in all the four main cars still win most of the time.

johnbull did you ever run front diffs in your SP? I just built my SP and have yet to run it but our tracks are just too tight and are not flowing enough for a one way. You need lots of brakes to work traffic since they have alot of hairpins and 180's. I just got my parts to take the one ways out so I just did that. The Yoke SP is a super nice car. Even nicer than my Pro. I also have some 2 degree rear toe in blocks to put on yet. We run foams on our indoor asphalt track so I like all the hookup I can get. I can always get more steering If I need it but I like the rear to be glued to the track.

Brian

Wyd,

Yes, I have tried all the combinations on the MR4, and find it best with no one way at all - in other words constant 4wd.

The original front one ways used to break up, but Yoke now introduced a revised one with bigger bearings. However unless you are running on a very fast track I suggest you stick with full 4wd.

I agree with your choice of best cars.

Regards

Joe from sunny Malta.

???
 

Johnbull

What you wrote about is absolut absurdity. If you were at the Euros, you would know they were the batteries who were deciding, not the car, not the driver as all the drivers in A main were top and anyone could win. But if you were there you could see who had power on this large track and who not, just ask David!

If you were there, you would know Chris got problem with power as well and this was the reason he could not make the A, and in the last qualifier when he got the power, due some circumstences missed the start, otherwise his time was for 5th position in the A main. It was not due his car as you come up.

If you were there, you would know even Markus Mobers who had the power was setting one of the best times (5th overall in timed practice) but because he was first time at Euros he was in bad heat and had so much traffic and so many drivers crashed him that he never could do better result, even he could do that.

If you were there, you would know the XRAY was working all day long, in any weather conditions, that was not case of other cars, who achieved the best times only in the last heat when the track was cold and they cars did not slide.

If you were there, you would know Jilles would win the first final if he was not attacked by second car, who let his teammate go in front, that means Jilles would be 1,1,2.

If you had corret information, you would know when Jille run Corally in Vichy 2000 he was around 50, when he run Tamiya 2001 in Heemstede he was 14, now when he run XRAY, he could win, but finished 2nd. He was the most consistent driver at this Euros.

I could go more and more, but there is no reason. Please stop saying absurdities you have come up yourselve, ok, please!!!

Re: ???
 

Let him sell your car Mario. This will fix the problem. :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

He will have one more "best car" on his list.

Mario, I fully agree to waht you state here and keep on driving and loving my XRay!

johnbull,
Have you ever tried driving an Xray?