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Calandra Racing Concepts, Inc.

2007 IIC Race report – Las Vegas

Calandra Racing rolled into Las Vegas for the 2007 IIC with a small but strong race team piloting the finest 1:12th car in the business, the CRC Generation X.

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In the practice rounds, the CRC team looked strong with Austrian driver Hupo H?nigl from Hoeco Modellbau on provisional pole with his Orion Powered Generation X. Hupo ran the first sub-10 second lap of the weekend in the Wednesday practice session. Then on Thursday, Hupo’s 47 8:02 was the fastest run for the 4 rounds of timed practice. Other modified drivers were also lurking near the top of the time charts with Jilles Groskamp, Jeff Dayger and Alexander Hagberg just off Hupo’s time.? In stock, the Gen-X cars of Jeff Cuffs and Frank Calandra were in the top 5 with Mark Smyka, Pete D’Agnolo, Lutz and lurking near the top 10.

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In the early qualifying rounds, some real poor luck cost both Hupo and Groskamp. Hupo was on T.Q. pace in round #1 when he suffered thermal shutdown while leading. Groskamp had a fast round going and hit a car turned around backwards, costing him a bunch of time. After all was said and done in qualifying for modified, CRC had 4 drivers in the 1;12th modified division, 3 of the 4 made the A-main, 75%!. Young Alexander Hagberg just missed the main in his first trip to the USA. Look for him in the near future, he is smooth and quick!. Veteran CRC driver, Mike McMahon also ran in the modified division. Mike ran some awesome lap times, but his busy schedule at Extreme Magazine keeps him from getting the radio time needed to put in his normal blistering pace.

Joining the trio of CRC Gen-X cars in the A-main, was 2 CEFX cars, 3 Hot Bodies Cyclone cars and 2 Corally cars. The A-main modified consisted of 3 different 12L4 clone t-bar cars with only one brand of link cars making the A-final, the CRC Generation X.?

In the main, clearly the Hot Bodies team had the a great chance with their “Dream Team” of drivers, the red hot Andy Moore, Ballistic Marc Rheinard and the always dangerous Astushi Hara.

In his first ever brushless A-main event, CRC’s Jeff Dayger worked up to 4th place, passing many cars from his 8th place qualifying position. Jeff had 4th all wrapped up until some evasive maneuvers put him in the marbles, picking up some debris on his tires causing him to drop to 5th. Groskamp and H?nigl finished 6th and 7th.

In stock, oval national champion Pete D’Agnolo and Mark Smyka put on a show the last round. Both drivers battled hard for T.Q. with Smyka wrestling the top spot with two laps to go in the qualifier.? Unfortunately for Mark, a late bobble knocked him from the T.Q. spot. Pete went on to a solid 2nd place qualifier. Mark’s bobble put him 5th with last years defending champs Jeff Cuffs in the 7th place A main qualifying position.

In A-main of 1:12th stock, Pete proved to the world he is ready for prime time with an outstanding run. After radio interference issues shook his nerves at the start, Pete battled hard with his Gen-X, leading many laps. One corner had his number all weekend and that corner cost him the event as he tapped while leading. Still a great 2nd place result.

At the 2007 IIC, the main day schedule had the 1:12th stock B main running right before the A-main. Some interesting data from that B main as the 1-2-3 in the B main (all CRC Gen-X) easily rolled the A-main winner, both in fastest lap and overall run. ’s B main winning Gen X with CRC Pro Cut tires,? had THE FASTEST single lap and the FASTEST overall run on main day. Unfortunately for , it was in the B main. Wynn’s CRC teammates of Lutz and Frank Calandra Jr. finished 2nd and 3rd. They? also rolled the entire A-main with their fastest lap and their overall run. In fact, looking at Sundays results, in addition to the 3 fastest 8 minute races, the 4 fastest laps in 1:12th stock were turned by CRC Gen-X cars! Solid performance.

With the CRC Carpet Knife Generation-X just now reaching it’s first birthday, it is amazing to see the car continue to lead the technology train even while others release new cars in a vain attempt to keep up. The competition continues to fall short while CRC keeps moving forward.? For example, the original, revolutionary Gen-X rear pod design, while copied by many others, still continues to lead the pack in ease of use and strength.

At the 2007 IIC, while other companies were attempting to get on the same page with their rear pods, CRC wrote a new chapter taking rear pod design one step further ahead of the competition with our new pod that will soon be available for the Gen-X. This new design, called the Open-X pod, defines what a brushless rear motor pod should be; strong, light, rigid, with centered weight and ease of use. The key to the Open-X pod is the new pivoting center standoff that moves with the rear pod. This center standoff braces the center shock mounting area and the top plate, allowing us to remove the left hand side of the top plate and the left hand side of the bulkhead. This open side frees up a good amount of space for motor wires and sensor wires. There is nothing interfering with the wires on the Open-X pod.? This was all possible because of the original Gen-X design with the vertical X-pod rear brace. This rear brace, combined with the center pivot standoff, allows the use of the new Open-X graphite top plate and the wide open left side aluminum bulkhead.??

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Coming soon, the new Open-X pod from CRC, you can throw the motor in the car from 10 feet away!

Lots of room for brushless wires, yet very rigid, strong and lightweight thanks to the unique pivoting center standoff, only from CRC.

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Now, this is an EZ to use brushless rear pod! However, it is great for brushed motors as well!

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Also approaching it’s first birthday is the revolutionary CRC Pro Strut front end, the only pivot-ball front end made for pan cars.? And, like a fine wine, the new Pro Strut gets better and better with age as we exploit all the functionality of the design. At the 2007 IIC, some CRC drivers used the carbon fiber front end brace with the long arm ball studs. The carbon fiber brace allows the racer to mount the upper arm mount in one of 2 positions; either in the stock position above the lower arm, or the “Long arm” inboard position. The carbon brace (#3277) is ready now, the long ball studs very soon. Then later in the future, look for a new long molded arm.

Also, this past weekend at the IIC race in Las Vegas, Team Corally Driver Marc Fischer was really struggling with his Corally 12X. For the front end, Marc used a Associated front end with a lot of CRC option parts on it. Running out of ideas on how to get his car competitive, he dropped off his Corally in the CRC pits and asked us if he could give the new CRC Pro Strut a try on his car. We put a Pro Strut front end on his car (yes, CRC guys working on the Corally!).

Until that point, Marc’s best lap was a 10.3. On his 3rd lap after installing the Pro Strut, he nailed down a 9.9 and came back from practice with a big smile on his face. His car felt great and he went from off the pace to contender, just that easy. Shortly after that, a few other Team Corally drivers were busy fitting their cars with the front end.

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And if you are worried about the long upper balls, have no fear, we tested the ball and it holds up great. Even against the infamous Vegas chicane, the long ball stud suffered ZERO failures and no bending. Shown in the picture above is the following Pro Strut items;

New graphite cross brace (#3277)

The new molded spacers that replace the red collars, #3233 in 3, 4 and 5 mm set

The new titanium front end screws #12392

The 3345 new long upper pivot balls for the Long arm option front end. Available 11-1.

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That is the wrap-up from Vegas. Good racing, good performance, could have had better luck. Other than that, the CRC effort was strong.

Good luck and we will see you in Cleveland.

Team CRC

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