Malaysian Tamiya Asia Cup Qualifying Round 1, 2006

TAMIYA ASIA CUP QUALIFYING SERIES ROUND 1 (MALAYSIA)
Date: March 26, 2006.
Venue: 1 Utama Shopping Center (New Wing Oval Concourse)
Classes: Buggy, Stock Touring, GT Touring
Organisers: Stargek and Tamiya Underground (click)

	My Gravel Hound (foreground) next to Hock's Rising Storm (background). The DF-02 is the only legal chassis for the buggy class. Unfortunately, Hock's ESC burnt out before he could even start the first heat. Those orange flames are spray painted on the lexan.

Bryan and his buggy...	...which had very nice innards.
Azman's buggy which ran very fast and reliable to take third place overall. The blue rear and yellow front springs were popular among several of the buggies but the top two buggies had blue front and rears. Since Hock was out, there were only 7 buggies left for the entire race but it was a very popular class among the spectators. Since my pit table was near the edge of the fence, I was asked many questions by the spectators and about half of these were "When is the next buggy race?"
	Shariff's mini and his very nice TT-01 Subaru WRX. He drove aggressively during qualifying to gain pole position and then drove "fast but safe" to win the Stock class A-main very convincingly. It's hard to believe how fast these cars can move on just a silver can Mabuchi motor. The Mini was from the endurance race held at the same track the previous day. The participants had the option of buying the cars at half price after the race and many opted not to, so the offer was open to the public. I couldn't say no to that so I picked one up.
Ng getting a little pit help from his son Wei Han.
	It's always a good idea to have a group photo before we bruise our bodyshells and egos.
Team BigBigPlanet, all ready for the big race - or so I thought.
	The buggies at the start of the first qualifying heat. My wife and I were really happy that my buggy was the only red one in the race.
I think I lasted about 2 minutes before my crystal fell out. A marshall plugged it back for me but a little later, a dogbone fell out. If you've ever had a DF-02, you'd know that if you lose a dogbone, chances are you'd lose a diff cup as well. Luckily both were picked up by marshalls. I asked Chee Yong (race organiser/RC champ/all-around nice guy) for advice and he said to knock it back. The hardware store (Home Fixit) was only 2 shops away, so I ran there and borrowed their hammer and floor to straighten my dogbone while nobody was looking. This is actually a pic of the straightened dogbone (Ya, it was much worse before).
	After a few minutes, spectators were gathered around the hand rails on every floor to get a view of the race. By lunch time, it was all the race organisers could do to try and keep the younger ones off the track and podium, but it sure was great to have so many people watching.
The RC Planet blimp did it's rounds whenever the cars were off the track. It is and actual RC blimp that flies around indoors.
	According to the rules, you could only use Tamiya parts and only in the manner in which they were meant to be used. This meant no fuel tubing on shock shafts, but Tamiya O-rings were allowed. I had 12 on each rear shock. Also, you could see here that the bottom cap (the O-ring seal retainer cap) has worked itself loose. Azman said that this was one of two things you have to look out for after every heat. The other thing was the motor mount plate, which I had already found out the hard way in heat 2.
On display was this 1/16 scale mini frog. Not for sale just yet, but definitely looks like a high quality product.
	Hobby Haven had this new Sportwerks Raven stadium truck for sale. At RM899 RTR with a slipper clutch, and threaded alloy shocks, this could be the truck to bring electric power back to the local off-road tracks.
A close-up of the RC Planet Blimp.
	RC Planet also had this indoor RC helicopter which sold at RM499. Every time I walked pass, somebody was buying one.
Ezme and his buggy. He had a problem with the ESC not responding after each jump. The buggies didn't take the jumps very well in the first heat. The track had two really steep jump ramps (they were like 40 degrees straight up) followed by a moderately angled cardboard ramp. Ironically, most of the buggies took the steep jumps well but were somersaulting across the cardboard ramp. Fortunately for us, by the time the A-mains came around, the cardboard ramp was damaged beyond repair and retired.
	Azman and his buggy.
This is how many chargers you need if you had 2 serious racers in the family. Azam and his son had a podium finish in all three classes between them with dad taking home the biggest trophy of the day (GT A-main).
	While most drivers in the GT class were running the very latest TA-05 chassis, Nadzri was running the TA-04. Although there is a saddle pack chassis option for the '04, the stick pack requirements for this race meant the battery had to go in sideways. A little retro, but still a very blinged out car.
A lot of the interest in the race and cars came from the younger spectators, naturally.
	The buggies all line'd up for the A-main. The A-mains in each class consisted of 2 rounds while the B-mains were decided in just one.
The inspector went through our cars to check for compliance with the strict Tamiya rules.
	Left to right: me, Shariff, Mohd Iskandar and Ng.
Me being handed the hardware by Chee Yong.
	Buggy class drivers - all 7 of us.
Team Bigbigplanet takes home 6th. It could have been a lot worse, really. The reshaped dogbone behaved itself the whole race!

	Stock class A-main drivers.
GT Class B-main drivers
	GT Class A-main drivers. Chee Yong drove in this class as well and showed us the meaning of speed. He seemed to have the opposite strategy from Shariff and took the first few heats learning the track and then really pushed his car in the two A-mains. His car was on 2 wheels at times, but still led from start to finish every second it spent on the track.
A very happy Elwyn Lee wins this TB-02 Porsche Carrera GT as the lucky draw Grand Prize. On the left is Leonard Kee, race organiser and co-owner of Tamiya Underground, as well as co-emcee. In the background is DJ Raj, who emcee'd the event.

One final group photo.

Highlights video of the race.