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    20.11.2014 SMI Motorsport News 
2014 IFMAR World Championship
SMI Motorsport News 2014 IFMAR World Championship
 
The 2014 IFMAR World Championships for 1/10 IC cars was held at the Huge RC Circuit located in Bangkok, Thailand. This very high grip, indoor asphalt track would prove a tough challenge to master for all competitors due to its different nature as a result of being covered. The ORCAN team was represented by myself, Dirk Wischnewski and Thilo Tödtmann. Both myself and Dirk had done previous testing at the track, with myself finishing as the runner up at the preworlds, giving us a good base engine setup for the WC.

I arrived at the WC with my mechanic Bertram Kessler. As I couldn´t practice during the first two days of "IPA" practice, due to the new IFMAR rule, I watched the progress of my team mates and tried to collect as much information as possible.



I started off day 2 of practice by setting the quickest single lap time. I knew from that point that I got my stuff working pretty well, and that I had a good feeling going around the track, which seems to suit my driving style well. Even though the track changed a lot for the next few days, I was never really worried as I was always putting in consistent laptimes with very few mistakes, compared to other drivers. Going into qualifying, I started as number 1 in the second fastest group. This turned things around as it was actually drivers from that qualifying group who would end up going fastest in qualifying! As the drivers from the last group, who dominated practice, would find it hard to put together clean runs.



Basically qualifying came down to the last round between myself and Dominic Greiner. I knew that I could have TQ`ed already if I didn`t make a mistake in Q4 when in the lead in that run. Because I would have had a 1-1-2-2 string of results already. I ended up loosing the TQ on a tie break to Dominic as he did a faster overall time than me in Q6 which he TQ`ed. I wasn`t too concerned about qualifying 2nd as I knew that it could be and advantage to run the semi, in preparation for the main final. Later it would turn out that my assumption was right. I knew that I had a very consistent car in qualifying, not necessarily the fastest, but with a very good feeling.



The semi went fairly well for me as I did a clean 30 minutes to finish 2nd to Jilles, who won over me thanks to his 6 minute fuel strategy. Judging from the results of the two semis, it seemed that myself, Jilles and Meen would be able to give Dominic a good match in the final as we all showed great form.

As the final started, I knew that the car was fast enough though, and it actually proved to be super easy to drive with no tendencies to traction roll for the duration of the 60 minutes. I could push as hard as I wanted to without the fear of the car doing anything strange. At first, I was following Jilles who was difficult to pass.



After the first two fuel stops, I found myself in the lead as I ran both faster and more consistent than Jilles and Dominic. I would then battle closely with Jilles for the next 40 minutes. Due to us having a different fuel strategies, him refueling at 6 and me at 5:20, the leaderboard would swap back and forth. By the 35 minute mark, I thought that I had made up the time for the extra pit stop, and was clearly in the lead, even after having a very scary moment with the mechanic of JJ Wang stepping on the front of my car while I exited the pit lane, which made me lose 2-3 seconds. Luckily the car was intact, and I could continue running. Around the 45 minute mark, Jilles suffered a flameout. This definitely gave me some breathing room as I now had an almost 2 lap lead. For the rest of the race I just tried to control the pace, and bring the car to the finish line. The car handled well for the entire final and I could just focus on driving it. The final endured without problems for me with fast pitstops all throughout.



At the closing stages I was just counting the minutes until the end. I crossed the finish line almost a lap in front of Sahashi, the runner up. I can not fully express the joy and satisfaction that comes out of this win as it is a result of years of hard work not only by myself but our entire team. A big thanks to my pit crew, Bertram Kessler, and second mechanic Per-Ola Hård for giving me the best possible pit stops and assistance.

The ORCAN products worked very well throughout the week. We had a fuel milage good enough to make 5:20-5:30 runtime. We we running the well proven RS3-MH engine configuration with the optional low cooling head, for a lower CG and a much improved handling in the high grip conditions. This seemed to be a big advantage to our competitors as the car carried better corner speed with less problems of flipping over! We chose the OA2654 exhaust made by HIPEX in combination with the OA1911S manifold for the best possible bottom and mid range power. The FX6 glowplug proved to be the most reliable in these conditions. Bertram had installed a special 3-needle carburator to suit the special needs of the HUGE track conditions. It all worked out very well in the end, with good power, fuel consumption and feel. The engine ran very stable through the entire final.



To win a World Championship is not easy, and we don`t get many chances to do it, as everything has to come together at the right time. I have come close before, most notably at the last WC in Bangkok in 2012, where I also had the chance to win, with ORCAN products fitted to my NT1. This time we did everything right, and it worked out. It is a big achievement for a small company like ORCAN but it is the best possible reward for hard work and well designed products. We will keep working hard in future to stay on top!

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