Getting Started – Race Day

What does a race day involve?

Race meetings do vary a bit, but here’s a typical Sunday at Bedworth RCCC.

Things to bring

• Folding table and chair if you have them, or you can pit out of your car boot, or borrow a table from us.
• Mains fast charger.
• Any spare parts you have for your car, plus extra batteries if you have them.
• All tools for working on your car.
• Water, lunch and snacks. The sports club bar opens from around 11am for cold food and drinks, but it’s a bit of a walk, so you’ll want something with you, as race days can get hectic.
• A reusable mug to get a free tea or coffee.
• Appropriate clothing for being outdoors all day! You’ll want lots of layers in the winter, and a baseball cap and sunscreen in the summer.

Arrival and set-up

1. Check our Facebook page for arrival time. It’s around 8am in the summer, later in the winter.
2. Set up your pit area. Ideally bring a folding table and chair, or you can pit out of your car boot.
3. Run an extension cable to get mains power for your charger.
4. Get your car checked over by the organisers. We’ll look for common issues like body height, ride-height, trim not straight, things catching.

Practice

1. Now it’s time to get some practice runs in.
2. Check in with race control to find out when your practice runs are. We publish this online the evening before the meeting too.
3. The main aim of practice is to learn driving your car round the track. It’s much harder than driving in the street!
4. You’ll get at least three 5-minute runs with other new drivers.

Qualifying

1. Qualifying then starts around 10.30am.
2. You’ll get three 5-minute qualifiers, usually with 4 or 5 other new drivers in your heat.
3. Qualifying heats use a staggered start, a bit like rallying, where each car starts when it’s number is called.
4. In qualifying you’re racing against the clock, so concentrate on getting round with as few crashes as possible.
5. Don’t worry about the other cars in qualifying, you’re not racing them, you’re just trying to do as many laps in 5 minutes as possible.
6. There will be around 45-minutes between each of your races. So you’ll need a mains fast charger to get charged back up for the next race.

Finals

1. After qualifying we’ll sort the finals (main races) based on the qualifying results.
2. If you’re brand new then you’ll likely stay in the same race for the finals.
3. Don’t worry, we’ll let you know what’s going on!
4. You then get two 5-minute finals. These use a grid start just like in full-size motorsport.
5. If you’re brand new and don’t yet have a lap counting transponder then you won’t get any lap times I’m afraid, but you can still practice racing against the competition!

Then it’s time to pack up, head home, and plan what changes you want to make to your car for next time. Tinkering and car maintenance is as much a part of RC racing as the racing itself.