Darren Biggs (right) and Dwayne Barber fine tuning before the weekend's national champs. Photo Warren Buckland
Darren Biggs (right) and Dwayne Barber fine tuning before the weekend's national champs. Photo Warren Buckland
High speeds, fast turns and tricky jumps will feature this weekend as Hawke's Bay Radio Control Car Club plays host to the National Off-Road Championships.
Hawke's Bay RC Racing president Darren Biggs said he is expecting a busy weekend full of racing on Hawke's Bay's newest track.
"We've got 150-oddentries from all around the country. It'll be pretty full on," Biggs said. "All the top guys from around the country have come."
The 242-metre track, which was finished in February, has an expected lap time of just 32 seconds.
Biggs said the track's lap time equates to very fast for off-road racing.
"There are lots of corners, lots of jumps and we are very lucky that at the showgrounds, we've got the track elevated, so it's not just a dead flat track," he said.
"There's a lot of uphill and downhill - it adds a lot of interest to the track and is one of the few in New Zealand that are actually like that."
Qualifiers for the main event are due to begin on Saturday and the finals and prize-giving will be held on Sunday, November 1.
Radio-control enthusiasts test run the track at Tomoana Hawke's Bay Showgrounds. Photo Warren Buckland
This is the first large-scale competition of the year for Hawke's Bay RC Racing squad, after the competition, originally due to be held in autumn, was postponed because of Covid-19.
Briggs said rescheduling was put on hold until Auckland was out of lockdown.
The president, who has been racing remote control cars for four years, said he is still learning about the intricacies of the sport.
"The cars are very sophisticated, the engines are all electric. They have totally programmable speed controllers so that you can alter how the car performs through the motor by programming them via laptop top or now via Bluetooth," Biggs said.
"They're all adjustable in the suspension, exactly like a real race car. It looks simple, but it's very hard to do."
Briggs added: "The weather is looking great - that's the one thing we can't control, but it's looking like it's going to be on our side."
The weather over the weekend is set to be fine with light winds.
The last time Hawke's Bay RC Racing hosted a big tournament - the North Island On-Road Championships – was in October last year.
