Nicolaisen and Karlsen split second round of Norwegian national series

0 May 26, 2016, noon

By Aaron Waldron
LiveRC.com

Race report from XRAY:
www.teamxray.com

XB4 wins at Norwegian National Series R2

On Friday we travelled down to one of our favorite astro tracks located in Skien, Norway for round #2 of the Norwegian National Series. This would be Malin's first National Series race in Norway.

Saturday morning started with a 1.5 hour free practice session in 2WD to test tires and adjust setup. Weather was colder than our last visits to the track and the forecast said rain was coming. We got 3 qualifying rounds in the dry where she ended up 2nd behind the very fast local driver Joakim Nicolaisen.

For the finals the rain started slowly to appear and made conditions very difficult as to what to choose for setup. With no experience from this track in the wet we opted to make some changes to her XB2 as well as putting on rain tires.

First final went okay and Malin ended up 2nd but lacked the speed to fight for the win. We then made some more changes for the 2nd final which made it better but still lacking a bit of rear grip.

For the 3rd final we opted to rebuild her XB2 into a 4 gear mid setup which made it a lot better on the slippery wet track. Unfortunately she made an early mistake clipping a pipe which saw her steering link come off. So with two 2nd place finishes she ended up 2nd in the 2WD totals.

Final results 2WD:

Joakim Nikolaisen - AE
Malin Karlsen - Xray XB2
Thorbjorn Doler - Schumacher
Oystein Doler -
Roy Gjemble - Schumacher
Tom Erik Strand - AE
Marius Kristensen - Serpent
Frode Skauen - TLR
Sindre Reitan - Schumacher
Petter Strand - AE

Sunday morning greeted us with a soaking wet track and no promises of the rain to stop. Malin was immediately very quick on the slippery track in morning practice, but we still made some small changes to her XB4.

She easily won all 3 qualifying rounds and took the overall TQ ahead of Roy Gjemble and Joakim Nicolaisen.

Lining up as #1 on the starting grid she was easily able to open up a small gap to the chasing pair and control the distance from the front to take the victory in A-final #1 and #2 to secure the overall victory.