Shoki Takahata & MRX7 is the 2025 1/8 WC in Chile.
Congrats

2.2mm front arb is not thin enough. Guess how much did he file?

Diva that chassis is suspiciously clean and that front belt looks suspiciously new too...

That front sway bar looks modified too.

Well, clean and tidy are always the moto of Japanese. I bet the Chile track is quite dusty.

Difficult to know with this view, but think that along the softer anti roll bar, there's a cut on the front of radio tray so it seems he was looking for a softer, more compliant car and that was the way he choose.
What you're seeing is a car setup patterned for that track on that conditions and his personal preferences. Check it with the standard setup and work it your way, look what they done but isn't the unique way.

SEF450 keep in mind that chassis may not have been the chassis actually used at the event.

Well... if you look, you can see the IFMAR marking on the chassis. So I would believe that was the car which raced (and won). Another thing if this is the car that comes on the cardboard boxes (minus some option parts/bling) or has some prototype parts (or specially built) for that race.

Nice car, but didn't awaited for it. Got an IF18-3 and I'll take a look if in local track appears one just to take a look.

I noticed that almost all thr cars have crazily worn chassis. Is that normal for gp racing? Or should the cars be setup to minimize wear whilst preserving performance?

Off-topic of the Mugen thread. What's the benefit of blocking the air holes of the ins-box?

If I'm not wrong, the taped holes are the ones that hold the two halves. IMHO purely aero matter to reduce airflow upsetting around the INS Box. A their level, every single bit counts to help, to the usual level, nope.

To make it legal?

If you look closely it seems it was cut open.

Hopefully they make a lightweight, silky smooth, egg shaped INS box...They are too heavy stock anyway, and they really are not needed since everybody wears headphones nowadays...

The insbox was a Serpent solution to lower the noise where the EFRA was hunting for. It is true that the inlet noise can be loud too but the effect with every engine can be different. You US guys have different environment laws than we Europeans do and so for us it is important to keep the noise level within the limits of the law so the track will not be closed down.

The US has the same problem once people decide to buy homes nearly a track. Then all the noise laws get enforced.

INS Box (no matter what: Serpent, Xceed, OS, ...) they're made in two halves and secured with screws because its assembled around the intake engine filter (I suppose that putting tape on those locations was a try to not upset laminar flow around the box). I remember seeing Serpent INS box that originally came with some adhesive tape to 'seal' the two halves. But that was about 25 years ago.


Takahata MRX3 with INS-Box attached

Remember to have read (żEFRA/IFMAR?) that any physical modifications to the INS box renders it illegal.

Unfortunately, this happens everywhere, so the unique solution is to reduce noise emissions (in some places, tree huggers start to target nitro cars as source of noise and pollution) so better to stay under their radar.