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Tamiya Asia Cup Finals, Day 2
Date: September 6, 2008.
Venue: 1 Utama shopping centre
Classes: Buggy, Tamiya M-chassis, Stock, GT
Organisers: Tamiya Underground
Qualifying heat 1 -
Didn't do too well. The lack of practice is really showing.
The big ramps are still intimidating me, so I find myself slowing down too much sometimes.
Did 10 laps in 4:12.303. Pretty dismal compared to everyone else.
Qualifying heat 2 -
I'm overshooting the big ramp again, but most of the time, landing on 4 wheels when I do.
10 laps in 4:15.723 but had a fastest lap of 17.848, so there's hope if I can only keep the buggy on its wheels.
Qualifying heat 3
Zahari and a Korean boy had a frequency clash. Zahari was on 40.450 Mhz while the boy was on 40.455 Mhz.
Each country has their own legal standard frequency ranges either ending with 0 or 5 in the third decimal so there's
at least 0.01 Mhz difference between ranges, but since we're mixing countries, we sometimes only get 0.005 Mhz difference which isn't enough.
Both are "rare" crystal frequencies for Malaysia but the range from 40.395 to 40.655 (with the third decimal always ending in 5)
is common for Korea. Nobody seems to be able to tell me what the legal frequency ranges are for Malaysia. I run Korean frequency
crystals myself to avoid clashing with the usual Japanese and UK ranges, but I better be careful at this race.
The boy switched to 40.435 Mhz in the end which is the same as my backup set of crystals.
When the race finally started, I only managed 7 laps before a rear camber link popped and I lost a dogbone.
It's almost impossible to find black parts on the carpet. Wasn't doing great with the laps that I did finish anyway.
Did the 7 laps in 2:51.120 with a fastest lap of 20.581. Pretty slow.
Qualifying heat 4
Had a very careful run, slowing the buggy down way before the end of the straight to get prepared for the big ramp.
Was more consistent, but still quite prone to mistakes, plus I'm now driving slower, but it paid off. I finally, I did 12 laps.
Time was 4:20.424 with a fastest lap of 18.875
Quite happy with the improvement, but it still puts me deep into the last group (Group C), as I was only faster than 3 guys despite my effort.
I was going to collect my transmitter and head home when a last-minute decision was made to keep our transmitters impounded until
after the coming 801X truggy demo. This was slightly annoying for the drivers who were staying around to keep testing their cars,
but for me and several other drivers who had made other plans for the night based on the posted programme schedule, this was most
inconvenient.
I waited awhile to watch the demo with a friend. He said he hoped they got a better driver than yesterday. But they
didn't. He launched the truggy up the straight ramps at full throttle and landed it on its rear bumper a few times and that seemed to put an
end to that idea for awhile. We think he was trying to perform a backflip but the ramps were just too straight for that kind of thing.
Eventually, I managed to grab hold of Tamiya Underground's boss who helped me get my transmitter back so I could get on with my life.
He went into the impound area and asked "Which group were you in?"
I said, "Buggy 3. It's the only MX-3 in there. You can't miss it."
He nodded and handed it to me with a chuckle.
Thanks for the help, buddy!
The word around the track today is that the inspection of electric motors was not as strict as previous years.
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