Jörn Neumann and Durango Win 4WD European Title

The 4WD event at the EFRA 1:10 Off-Road European Championships in Pau, Southern France got of to a fine start with plenty of practice for the drivers on Thursday.  Unfortunately the rain came on Friday – and it was heavy – virtually washing out the whole day. Thankfully with the rain eventually stopping mid-afternoon, the club had some time to work on the track and amazingly got it into a usable state. This meant there was just enough time to squeeze in one round of controlled practice on Friday evening. The track held up well to this so as long as the rain held off things were looking good for Saturday.
After a brief shower Friday evening, the track was a little damp early on so a delay to the start of racing meant there would be only three rounds of qualifying with the best two results to count. This really put the pressure on the drivers to make a clean run.
Jörn Neumann was quick out the blocks for Durango and took the first round of qualifying with a clean run, again the double-double jump was the undoing of many a good run. Neil Cragg put in a storming round two with his Associated to claim that round win. With the track getting quicker all the time getting a good final round was important in case tie-breaks were required. In round three Jörn set the standard with the first 12 lapper, but crashed on his split lap. Unfortunately for the final heat of round three, Neil was late to the line and had to start last.  It’s fair to say he was extremely unlucky with the traffic that resulted in a non-finish. This left the Tamiya TRF502X of Lee Martin to set the quickest time and importantly to go faster than Jörn to clinch the all import TQ spot for the A finals.

Finals
The first leg of the A final was a classic.  It quickly boiled down to a battle between Lee, Jörn and Neil. There was a little bit of contact but the drivers all drove sportingly and put on a great show. A mistake by Lee at the end of the straight cost him badly as Jörn went on to take take the win from Neil and Lee. All three flying over the line and only split by one third of a second!Leg two kept up the tension as an early mistake from Lee over the double-double let Jörn past him and into the lead. Lee dropped back a little mid-race, but put in a charge near the end to be right on the tail of Jörn. Whilst this was happening, Neil also put in some storming laps to close up too. Come the last lap it was once again a jump to the line with Jörn holding on from Lee and Neil – this result giving Jörn the 4WD European title.
For the final leg, Jörn didn’t race to give a clean fight for those still battling for the podium. Lee got the start and although Hupo Hönigl pushed hard for the first half of the race, he couldn’t quite keep the pace to stick with him but still finished second. Neil again fought his way through and gave it his all to catch Hupo but just ran out of time to be third.

4WD Result
1  Jörn Neumann – Durango    
2  Lee Martin – Tamiya
3  Neil Cragg – Associated
4  Hupo Hönigl – Durango    
5  Marc Rheinard – Tamiya        
6  Vicktor Wilck – Tamiya    
7  Paul Bradby – Associated    
8  Martin Kreil – Durango    
9  Peter Pinisch – Associated    
10 Grant Williams – Schumacher