The irrepressible group of slotcar fanatics erstwhile known as the ‘Slotcar Legends’ descended on the abode of Jordan and Therese Zanella in the early after noon of Saturday the 23 of August for the singular and selfish reason of racing slotcars til their thumbs ached. The crowd gathered early with rising starlet Paul Stevens being almost the first there to get some serious track time in. The trickle continued until a host thronged the under house venue.
Busy catching up was the first order of the afternoon and as a few strange and rare models made it to the practice other pressing topics like the suitability of the SCX Renault alpine chassis as a donor for a Supershells Lotus Europa were amongst topics discussed rather noisily!
Amidst a flurry of chips and dips the final ensemble totalled eleven addicts with ten putting their names to racing. Playing their cards close to their chests it was going to be a difficult call to make as to what might be the best models for the job. Jordan’s track ‘til now has not featured as part of the circuit and it was going to be hard to gauge the best model for the short technical track. Most of us had driven the track previously and was aware of what to expect but a winning model? Mmmmmmm. It was to prove to be an open event.
First Class up and it was to be wildcard class Classic sports cars pre 1970. open motor class!! This class is normally raced as an NC1 class and open motor was to set the cat amongst the proverbial. Still a lot of NC1’s though! and Justin raced a Ninco! . The Corvette was always going to be a firm favourite and the rest of the field was also going to be a Ninco event with XK 120’s well supported. A new Testa Rossa joined in and Chris and Jordan opened up with 356’s, a brave choice!! Earlier preparation saw me fixing two lumps of lead to the underside of Chris’s 356 just to get it to stay upright. I must admit, it looked like it had long range fuel tanks hanging underneath. Another job for me between events.
I decided to run my latest scratchie in the form of a Ferrari TR59 but as it is unballasted I didn’t expect too much from it. Glen drove a hot 356 too. This one was the convertible and it showed a lot more track manners than it siblings.
First heat saw a good start to the event. A false start!! and to top it, the leader of the heat was to prove troublesome after a restart was called! I can’t understand why?? Anyhow, the race management system was able to take up from where the false start stopped so we started again and only stopped at the finish! OK John! Heat two was started but we stopped before we started when I stopped taking pictures of the start as, once again, John wanted to know why we hadn’t taken pictures of the false start before it was stopped and restarted (are you with me?)
Heat four saw Paul scorch home at an amazing rate of knots, at least two laps in front of second man. A lap of 5.033 for the event dictated the pace to come and mid fives weren’t going to be enough. Next up was the first of a few jump starts for the race. Someone leapt across the start with the field in hot pursuit,... before the green light! Heat eight saw Al take out the heat win and the rest of the field was a bit ‘Hogan’s Heros’ behind him. A good win for Al with his Converted Corvette. But as always the lat heat was run and the computer spat out the verdict which was
Event 1 Classic Sports cars pre 1970 Group B 1. Paul 2. Glen 3. John 4. 1. Bob 5. Phil 6. Justin 7. 2. Alan 8. Chris 9. 3. Jordan 10. 4. Ken
Because of the requirements of the last event the Subaru Challenge was moved into second spot. Once again this was to be a non magnet affair with plenty of close racing. Marshalling and track conditions were improving and the sub five second lap had to be round the corner. Paul looked to be dominant in this class too but, in one heat in which he stormed off into the distance, he deslotted a couple of times and lost the plot which gave me chance to catch up and pass him at the finish. I have decided to name that sort of behaviour the ‘Magoo Syndrome’ !
The unkindest cut of all was on my last heat. I exited the last corner at speed and over cooked it and deslotted. The model rolled forward and stopped six inches short of the light and it took about four seconds before it was Marshalled. Paul observed that it would be tough if I lost the race by four seconds. I lost the race!....... by four seconds!!! Thanks Paul. All the rest had their share of tragedy and I’m sure there was more than one was glad to see the end of the race.
Final results were as follows- Subaru Challenge 1. Paul 2. Phil 3. Justin 4. Glen 5. Chris 6. 1. Jordan 7. 2. Ken 8. 3. Bob 9. 4. Alan
Last event of the meeting was track owners choice and this was to be GT cars under lights. Jordan’s track has excellent lighting made from clear leds and when on the track is well lit. By now the track was well warmed up and grip was at a premium. Most people took advantage of models with lights although there were one or two who didn’t have them. No matter this wasn’t going to be about model light. In my case it was about seeing anything at all!!
Choice of weapons was good too. Again Ninco was a good choice but the fastest models were to be Scalextric and SCX. Both Aston Martins. I probably didn’t make the best choice of tyre for the now red hot track conditions but I persevered as the model was easy to drive in prevailing conditions. Spills aplenty on most parts of the track with the Fiddler’s Elbow catching many out. John’s GT2 Porsche took a shine to this corner and stopped to admire the landscaping on several occasions! There was also a gulf GT40 which spent a lot of time as a static display!!
Mid event John one comfortably with his GT2 in total contrast to his contribution to date. I think there will be a steward’s inquiry and many hours spent watching the video footage....John!! But dark horse (literally) was Glens Carrera 375, a stealth fighter on wheels Jet black and under the radar. He kept very quiet through out the event and dividends payed off by not drawing attention to himself. The black Ferrari showed no vices and Glen took full advantage of it but at the end of the event the tallest seemed to be the most victorious. Which goes to show you have to be over 175 cm to be a good slotcar racer!! Paul took a small margin win with his Scaley Aston Martin DBR9
1. Paul 2. Glen 3. Justin 4. Phil 5. Chris 6. John 7. 1. Ken 8. 2. Alan 9. 3. Jordan 10 4. Bob
If you are local to Brisbane and would like to join in, email me at pwix@yahoo.com or pm me on this board
