Nitromania Race Report From CML
A great venue was unfortunately let down by a dodgy track.
The first annual Nitromania race took place in Belgium over the weekend and was quite an experience for all that attended. The entry list was great and there were a good deal of top line drivers that had made the trip, including Adam Drake, Ronda Skelton and Mike Truhe from the USA.
The first thing was that the schedule the organisers had laid out was going to be pretty gruelling for all, as practice was scheduled to start at about 8.30 on Friday evening, and open practice available until 6.00 the following morning.
When we arrived, the facilities were almost perfect for a big indoor race, heated pitting, grandstand areas and a restaurant all contributed to an excellent location in which to hold a race. However the big talking point before the race with all the drivers was the surface, which was comprised of basically compacted sand that is used to for equestrian events that the facility normally stages. It was pretty obvious to all that the surface was going to deteriorate very quickly but the organisers seemed unfazed. Anyway, after practice the drivers fears were borne out and the track was decimated in most areas making driving clean races virtually impossible. The main straight was also showing signs of digging out and this was to cause numerous accidents through the weekend.
Qualifying got underway on Saturday morning with the heats having been seeded from the practice round on Friday night. A few top names had had poor runs and were to run in early heats, Neil Cragg being the most notable. Neil put a reasonable run together but he succumbed to the main straight, which caught him out and cost him 12 seconds in one crash. As the round progressed it was obvious that Neil’s time, despite the crashes, was going to hold up well just because everybody was having such difficulty putting a clean run together.
The final heat predictably saw the biggest changes to the leader board and it was Lee Martin who produced the fastest time with his Reedy/Byron powered car. Another reason drivers were finding it so difficult to make clean runs was the organisers had really taken too many entries and as such there were 20 cars in a heat, making track space very hard to come by (and the pits a nightmare). By the second round the track had started to dig down to the concrete surface underneath in several areas that made it more slippery, but the sand that had been pushed aside had built up into berms on the outside of the racing line, making the track a bit like motocross in places!
Neil got his head down and turned a fantastic run in that knocked seven seconds off the time Lee had managed in round one to put him top of the leader board. (FTD qualifying was being used). Three heats later and Neil’s new team mate for 2010, Dave Bailey also produced a great run to beat Lee’s time by just under a second and put his RC8B second on the FTD list.
It was assumed that the track was getting faster and that the top heat guys would manage to improve on Neil’s run due to track improvement, however this turned out not to be. The closest was Darren Bloomfield who went one second slower than Neil to take second and Adam Drake a further three seconds back in third leaving Dave Bailey fourth. The final round of qualifying didn’t see many improvements as drivers were perhaps driving a bit harder with the track getting smoother in most areas as it wore down to the concrete surface. The straight was by this stage by no means a flat-out blast, and drivers were having to pick a line and try to avoid the worst of the bumps. The only real improvement came from David Ronnefalk who drove a very good heat to snatch TQ from Neil and put himself top of the list.
This left the overall top 10 as…
- 1. David Ronnefalk
- 2. Neil Cragg (AE/Reedy/Proline/Byron)
- 3. Darren Bloomfield
- 4. Adam Drake
- 5. Dave Bailey (AE/RB/Proline/Byron)
- 6. Richi Gomez
- 7. Lee Martin (Reedy/Byron)
- 8. Marcus Eirenschmalz
- 9. Daniel Reckward (RB)
- 10. Marcel Guske
The lower finals started Saturday evening and we made our way back to the hotel to catch up on some rest.
When we arrived at the track on Sunday morning, the track surface was all but gone in the infield, and the vast majority of the corners were now on concrete. The biggest problem this caused for the racing was that the racing line was now so narrow that it was pretty much follow the leader as you couldn’t get out of the grooves.
Alex Mortimer was first to race out of our drivers and set about putting right a troublesome qualifying by driving excellent races to bump from the 1/16 finals all the way up to the 1/2 finals only to be denied a chance at a main final place by the engine mount working loose. It was a shame for Alex who had driven fantastically through three finals and would have been right in the mix for a final place.
Neil Cragg set about his semi-final in determined fashion, he pulled about a 10 second lead over the field and just when he was about to put a lap on Adam Drake a strange landing off the big jump stopped the car dead and the engine also stopped. It would not re-fire and he was out. It was a shame for Neil as he was one of a handful of drivers who really looked consistent enough to win.
In the second semi-final there was controversy as TQ man David Ronnefalk cut in the pits and had to start from pit lane, his car then cut again at turn one and had to be brought back. Now in the process of doing this it looked to me like his car was deliberately carried across the timing loop to start his race clock and from there he drove very well to claw his was back into contention. He was later docked the lap he gained and fell to sixth, still good enough to make the main but the manner in which his car was carried across the loop left a very sour taste in the mouth, especially as it wasn’t required as his speed was such that he was still able to bump up comfortably.
The Associated RC8Bs of Neil Cragg (left) and Dave Bailey (right).
The main final was a close affair between Elliott Boots (Savox/RB), Adam Drake and David Ronnefalk. Adam had the lead for a while until Elliott passed him and pulled away and Ronnefalk went with him. Into the final few laps and over one of the jumps Ronnefalk tagged Elliott into a crash which normally would see the perpetrator wait for the victim to be marshalled and regain the lead, unfortunately this wasn’t the case and Elliott was left fuming by some unsportsmanlike behaviour as Ronnefalk drove off. Elliott mounted an incredible charge over the last two laps to try and get back to the lead but just ran out of time and had to settle for second with Adam Drake third. There is no doubting the talent of young Ronnefalk, and he was clearly one of four drivers that looked capable of winning the event, but these little incidents won’t do him or his sponsors any favours if they continue to happen.
So the first Nitromania event is concluded and for the most part was a good. If they can find a better track surface for next year and maybe lengthen the schedule to allow more sleep then they might be onto a winner. It will remain to be seen if the top guys return after this year, but in general the event was quite enjoyable…just don’t hire the heavy metal band to play next to the pits next year please!
Full results from Nitromania are available by CLICKING HERE
Source: CML Distribution
