Calandra Racing Concepts rips up
the U.S. Indoor Championships in Cleveland, Ohio.
** The competition sees red as CRC take 32 of the 50 possible A-main spots! **
** Black Art R8C body wins 2 classes! **
** CRC Gen-X 12 and 10 cars win 3 of 5 classes! **
** CRC Pro-Cut Tires are dominant at the event! **
** Tom Firsching grabs the broom for a clean sweep of 2 classes! **
** Tom T.Q.’s and Wins World GT and 1:12 Super Stock! **
The U.S. Indoor Championships in Cleveland, Ohio. The original hotel race. The 29th year running. The grand daddy of indoor events. The race that many other events looked to first when setting up their hotel event. In the past, there were 3 large hotel races per year as the indoor circuit migrated from Cleveland, to Grand Rapids and then to Detroit. Now, only Cleveland remains as a true hotel race, with all pitting in the guest rooms and racing in the ballroom.
What makes up a hotel race? Organizers take over a nice ballroom, cover the luxurious carpet with a plywood sub-floor, then add the racing carpet. Put some barriers down and create a road circuit for these high powered model cars. Then, bring on the racers as they turn their neat, clean hotel rooms into a pit area, in some cases complete with milling machines, battery matching equipment, Dremel tools and parts supplies. Then, turn the closed circuit TV into race control. Fill the air with smelly tire traction additive. Hook up a bunch of computers and sound equipment and it’s racing time!
The 29th running of the U.S. Indoor Championships had some changes. Touring car entries were down substantially. The new World GT class had good numbers even in it’s first year at the Champs. Also new, all brushless motors, gone were brushes, springs and commutator truers. In a way, kind of ironic as the first portable comm truer from Twister debuted in Cleveland way back in the early 1990’s. Now a dinosaur. Also new, CRC’s Cliktrak barrier system was used in conjunction with CRC’s new Fasttrak HD racing carpet.
At the track…
Team CRC had a great contingent of customer cars, team drivers and factory reps at the event. The Rome, NY based CRC crew went out a day early to give a hand to the Champs crew with the carpet and to put down the layout using CRC Cliktrak. Mark Calandra, , Mark Smyka, Rob Barone, Myles Hale, Mike Woods and Jeff Dayger spent Tuesday afternoon securing the Cliktrak and tweaking the layout. The result; a GREAT track with plenty of challenge and also a nice straight/sweeper combo for those who wanted to display some big horsepower.
Nice rounded corners with CRC Cliktrak.
Some of the Rome, NY based track assembly crew.
The carpet; CRC’s new Fasttrak HD racing carpet. In a word; perfect. Great traction, no fuzz, no stringing fibers, durable, it’s all good. With today’s high speed R/C model cars, lipo cells, brushless motors and rubber tires, the demands on a racing surface have exponentially increased from just a few years ago. The HD was designed to resist the extra wear and tear and was used at the IIC in Vegas and now Cleveland with perfect results.
The Race…
World GT
In World GT, the rules for this class are 13.5 brushless motors, CRC’s Spec tires and 4 cell NimH cells. Yes, even though CRC’s new Generation X 10 car has provisions for inline stick 7.4 lipo packs, we are still stuck racing with NimH cells because unfortunately, none of the other manufacturers addressed the impending Lipo craze. So the rules were made to use 4 cell round batteries, for now.
After 4 rounds of qualifying, CRC drivers Tom Firsching, , Wayne Vince and Mike Pulfur put their Gen-X 10 cars in the A main with Tom taking the T.Q. position. Tom was on provisional pole with the quickest run in both round 3 and round 4. In the main, it was game, set and match as Tom drove away from the field taking the A-main by a half-lap. This large lead is very strange in World GT which is known for very tight, close racing as it is difficult to pull clear of the pack. In past events, World GT has proven to be much like restrictor plate racing for R/C road course cars. Even so, Tom laid it down and drove away taking an easy win to bolster his T.Q.performance. Teammates and Wayne Vince put their machines in the Top 5 placing 3 CRC cars in the top 5.
Close ups of Tom’s winning Gen-X 10…..
With victories in Las Vegas and Cleveland, the Gen-X 10 is now a proven winner as well as being the most user friendly World GT car out there. The car is super adjustable; bottom loading lipo packs, 4 + 6 cell NimH, the ONLY World GT car with a centered brushless motor, adjustable wheelbase, adjustable width, adjustable front axles, inline or trailing and a large body rear shock. Heck, the car even converts to a full blown 235 mm race car. When it comes to World GT, there is only one choice, the car that accepts lipos and NimH and wins races, CRC’s Gen-X 10!
| 1:10 World GT 13.5 | ||||
| Pos | Driver | Car | Tires | Body |
| 1 | Tom Firsching | CRC | CRC | PF |
| 2 | Eli Ezrow | – | CRC | PF |
| 3 | Michael Skeen | – | CRC | PF |
| 4 | CRC | CRC | PF | |
| 5 | Wayne Vince | CRC | CRC | PF |
| 6 | Donny Lia | – | CRC | PF |
| 7 | Sean Cochran | – | CRC | PF |
| 8 | Jeff Cuffs | – | CRC | PF |
| 9 | Eric Anderson | – | CRC | PF |
| 10 | Mike Pulfur | CRC | CRC | PF |
1:12th Stock…
The 1:12th stock class changed from 27 turn brushed motors to 17.5 brushless. Also new at this race was an alternative choice in bodies for 1:12th racers. The Black Art body line exclusively distributed by CRC made its production debut in the USA just 2 weeks after crushing the field at the IFMAR World Championships. The World Champion Black Art R8C was used by a number of competitors in Cleveland this year.
As usual, CRC had a strong group of contenders running the Gen-X 12 car in Stock. Leading the fray was the current ROAR National Stock Champion, . Joining was defending Cleveland winner, Mark Smyka. Mark Calandra who had helped set the track earlier in the week, joined Wynn and Smyka in stock using the full package from CRC, the Gen-X 12 car, CRC Pro Cut tires and the Black Art R8C body. Other Gen-X/Pro Cut drivers in the main were Mike Pulfur, James Brink and Max Kuenning. Add the Las Vegas T.Q., Pete D’Agnolo, and it made for a mostly Red field of cars with 7 CRC cars, 6 racers on Pro Cuts and 3 racers on the recently released Black Art body.
In the main, Mark Calandra, (a.k.a. Mr. Second) took off from his #10 qualifying spot. Driving hard from last to 1st, Mark took the lead about half way through the race. Unfortunately, his hard driving up front put some extra heat into his motor and batteries causing Mark to fade into second position. At the start of the race sitting 10th on the grid, Mark would have been happy with second, but after working up to the lead, Mark was clearly disappointed with his finish. Add to that, he has finished 2nd at this race at least 3 times. Currently, Mark is on suicide watch and resting comfortably at a local facility (his job).
Wynn who qualified second, had an early crash and wheeled it through the pack to get 4th. Former Cleveland Champ Mike Pulfur rounded out the top 5.
| 1:12 Stock 17.5 | ||||
| Pos | Driver | Car | Tires | Body |
| 1 | Donny Lia | – | – | – |
| 2 | Mark Calandra | CRC | CRC | Black Art |
| 3 | Michael Skeen | – | – | – |
| 4 | CRC | CRC | Black Art | |
| 5 | Mike Pulfur | CRC | CRC | |
| 6 | James Brink | CRC | CRC | |
| 7 | Max Kuenning | CRC | CRC | |
| 8 | Pete D’Agnolo | CRC | – | |
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