R/C Madness of Enfield, Connecticut!
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The third HPI Challenge USA race for 2000 was held during the weekend of July 8-9 at R/C Madness in Enfield Connecticut. Just a couple of miles from the Connecticut/Massachusetts border, we saw racers from several Northeastern states, including New Jersey, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New York, even Maryland! All 140 racers had a great time, and we even had 11 racers in our first HPI USA Rally Challenge and a few racers showed up with their Nitro RS4 MT's, ready to run against each other! Luckily we were prepared, and everybody had fun and walked away with a great racing experience and some wonderful free gifts and prizes!
The owner of R/C Madness, Chris Marcy, was happy to see so many racers, in fact he was worried that some racers may be turned off by the sheer number of people who showed up! Everything went well, however, and the weekend was off to a great start and ended up being a great time for all.
First Impressions
When Steve Baker and Frank McKinney first pulled up on Friday afternoon (July 7th), they were amazed at the number of racers who already had canopies set up and were practicing on the track. The hobby shop was already full of racers getting parts, tires, wheels and inserts for the busy weekend ahead.
 The pits next to the driver stand |
 The pit area on the back section of the track |
 The pits near the off-road track |
After a night of rest and sampling the local cuisine, Steve and Frank showed up early the next morning to find racers already tuning their cars, trying to dial them in for the races, which were sure to be competitive. Already it was easy to see who would be the racers to beat in each class, and as usual the Nitro cars outnumbered the electric racers by more than two to one. The initial signup sheets showed us 21 heat races, with seven or eight cars in each race! We were glad the races were spread over 2 days, otherwise it would have been a long day!
 VERY sturdy driver stand! |
 It's not full now, but during practice the stand was packed! |
R/C Madness features three completely separate tracks: a groomed, freshly paved asphalt on-road racing surface, complete with PVC pipe infield and outer barrier and warehouse shelving driver stand (good for 4 tons of weight); and then there's the huge lighted off-road track with a straight that had to be at least 150 feet long, complete with roller jumps for the Rally racers; finally there is the indoor carpet track, which wasn't set up or in use but looked like a tight, technical track for the long New England winters. For this weekend, we weren't worried about the carpet track, but we did have plenty of racers ready to make use of the asphalt track, and a day's worth of races on the off-road track, featuring RS4 Rally and Nitro MT races!
At around noon the announcement was made for everyone to bring their cars up to the track for pictures and start the HPI Challenge Concours event!