Hagberg and Evans crowned IFMAR 1/12 World Champions

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Mike Garrison

0 Aug. 16, 2018, 8:51 a.m.

By Mike Garrison
LiveRC.com

Race Report from XRAY:
www.teamxray.com

Race Report by Alexander Hagberg

The 2018 World Championships was held at the outstanding facilities of the Welkom RC Car Club in Welkom, South Africa. This brand new track, which is one of the nicest and biggest in the world, served as a perfect host for this event.

I had prepared meticulously for this event, joining the preworlds race in April, to make sure that I had as much setup data as possible for the Worlds. I had a good basic setup to start with, and after some fine tuning, the car really came alive as the race went into qualifying. I had settled for the aluminium chassis, which gave me the consistency that I was looking for on this high grip indoor asphalt circuit. Qualifying went really well. As the grip went up, I stiffened up my suspension and my side tubes, to try and get back some of the corner speed that I lost as the track grip increased. I could take a convincing TQ with 6 out of 6 round wins!

I converted my TQ into an overall win, after winning the first two legs of the A-finals. I had a great pace from the first lap, and could pull away at a safe distance to the competition. It was great to see young Florian Joos fighting with my other team mates, Antonio Caroli and Lex Tyler for the final podium position! In the end, it was Florian who came out on top, after a dramatic A3 final, with plenty of good racing between the three drivers.

Modified result:

1. Alexander Hagberg - XRAY X12
2. Hideo Kitazawa - Morotech
3. Florian Joos - XRAY X12
4. Antonio Caroli - XRAY X12
5. Lex Tyler - XRAY X12
6. Hein Kotze – Roche
7. Shaun Schutte - XRAY X12
8. EJ Evans - XRAY X12
9. Willie Du Plooy - XRAY X12
10. Marius Van Niekirk - XRAY X12

My X12 2019 was working flawlessly during the whole event, and I am very proud to have taken its maiden victory at this World Championships! To win a WC in this class was always a dream of mine, and especially after being so closely involved with the X12 project for years, it makes me even more proud! I would like to thank our designer Martin Hudy for his great work in designing and refining this car every season.

In the stock 13.5T class, it was EJ Evans from the USA who led the field from day 1. EJ showed a great pace with his XRAY X12 2018 car. It seemed as he was on rails, as the converted his TQ into a world championship title for XRAY! Brandon Solomon took a strong runner up position, and Neville Menezes rounded out an all-XRAY podium!

13.5T Stock result:

1. EJ Evans - XRAY X12
2. Brandon Solomon - XRAY X12
3. Neville Menezes - XRAY X12
4. Pat Lester - XRAY X12
5. Francois Laubscher - XRAY X12
6. John Fitzimmons - XRAY X12
7. Wayde Solomon - XRAY X12
8. Francois Erasmus - XRAY X12
9. Dion Simpson - XRAY X12
10. Petrus Wasserman - XRAY X12

XRAY was the most represented brand in both classes, with a full field in the stock class. XRAY not only won both world titles, but had a podium sweep in the stock class, as well as the 3rd podium spot in the modified class, with Florian Joos!