USA Race Number Two: Englishtown, New Jersey!

Concours Challenge

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After the driver meeting, everyone was invited to the track to have a large (VERY large!) group picture for this website and R/C Car Action magazine. After squeezing everyone into the pictures taken from the tall driver stand, the Concours Challenge judges headed to the track surface to check out the competition!

Here are some notable standouts from the first round of judging:

As usual, the Concours Challenge judges (Bob Hastings of Radio Control Car Action, Troy Lyman and Frank McKinney) took their time choosing a selection of nice cars to pick for the "top ten or so" group. This is considered the semi-finals of the Concours Challenge - the racers who didn't have their cars chosen pulled their cars off the track but came back to see who would win.

After several minutes discussing everything together, Bob, Troy and Frank decided to choose the top three cars. One of these cars would take the overall win!

It took a couple more minutes to decide who would take the win, however once the very critical eye of the judges were cast upon all three cars in the final selection, it wasn't too hard to decide who would take home the trophy.

It's easy enough to choose the best-looking bodies according to their paint job - you look at the complexity of the paint masking, paint color choices, skill in masking (no bleeds, alternating colors, etc.) and other things. After choosing the nicest bodies, you have to look at the overall "package" of the car - wheel choice, interior set (if installed), lights, exterior details like wings, mirrors, windshield wipers and other details that really sets a car apart from all the other cars in the lineup.

The three cars that the judges had to look at were each appealing in their own way (of course, since they had made the top three!).

The Nissan Skyline body featured a huge number of different colors, great paint masking, and an overall very "busy" look that makes planning the actual painting very difficult. Tyler Swartz of Florida took home an HPI Oval T-shirt for his effort on the car body and taking a runner-up position in the Concours Challenge.

The Dodge Stratus had a very nicely coordinated color scheme that featured metallic paints which, when combined with the flawless paint masking, complemented each color and design of the paint scheme. The flames and checker pattern worked really well with each other and really "flowed" on the body itself. Dennis Storti of New Jersey worked hard on this car, and it really showed!

For the overall effect of the car, though, it was the CLK DTM that really took the attention of everyone waiting to see who won the Concours Challenge. Endless attention to detail really topped everything on this car - absolutely perfect paint masking, great color choices, a unique hood design, assymetrical paint design, "hooded" headlights, blue LED headlights, fine-mesh screens for all the vent and air openings for the fenders, grille, air dam, rear valance and other locations, side exhaust tubing for a three-dimensional look, highly detailed interior with A- and B-pillar and door "thickness" for a more realistic look, plus a windshielf wiper and mirrors from other kits to complete the totally realistic effect.

When we asked the owner of this car to step forward to claim their prize, it was Mack Boss of Jacksonville, Florida that came up to accept his victory!

Mack says that he drew out the design of the paint job on a computer, then had a friend cut out the design on a vinyl cutting machine. Many concours competitors are using vinyl these days to mask their bodies, because it prevents paint bleeds better than masking tape and is available in larger widths than normal masking tape also. HPI uses vinyl material for window masks and other paint masks that come with our bodies.

Excellent job, Mack! We hope to see more of his work in the future. Meanwhile, if you want to get this type of work for your own car, see the website noted on the car body! (This is another trend we're seeing more and more - the Concours Challenge winners having actual internet URLs on the cars.)

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Check out the American Raceway page for more pictures!