Indoor remote control car race series in Kamloops this weekend

KAMLOOPS – Racers will be starting some tiny engines this weekend in the Tournament Capital Centre.

The Thompson Valley RC Race Club is hosting dozens of racers as part of the world’s largest indoor remote control car racing series. Brent Wende, president of the club, says the series of races will bring cars and drivers from around B.C., Alberta and a few from the U.S.A.

“We race all different types of classes modelled after full scale touring cars,” he says. “There’s F1 style, a nostalgic class with muscle cars from the 60 or 70s, there’s a minis class.”

The races will bring in 50 or 60 drivers racing around 100 cars in nine classes.

The little cars, 10 to 12 scale models, easily hit 40 kilometres per hour, about the same speed as Usain Bolt sprinting flat out. The courses are a series of twists and turns laid out on carpet on a basketball cout, covering an area 80 feet by 36 feet.

This will be Kamloops fifth year as part of the series, Wende says, which has been going on for 25 years. With eight events in seven cities from Victoria to Saskatoon and 1,200 entries this year, it’s the target racing series of its type.

The races are on from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Saturday, March 4 and 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Sunday, March 5 and free to spectators.

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