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<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\u2018Proxy\u2019 is a type of slot car racing with a long history \u2013 it basically means someone else drives your car for you. That might work well if the competitors are spread out geographically \u2013 the other end of the country or the other side of the world. Or, like at the moment, it\u2019s impossible for people to meet and race together.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s very different to \u2018normal\u2019 slot car racing with family, friends or club mates. Usually one car runs after another and their times are compared. That\u2019s just like real-life formats such as drag racing, time trials, hillclimbs, rally stages and club sprints. I do like my slot racing to be a miniature version of something real…<\/p>\n
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<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\nFor our Rally-Sprint event, competitors sent their cars by post to the first host venue in Brighton. Once checked over to make sure they complied with the rules and regs, each car was raced by the host for a certain number of laps and the overall time recorded. The cars then moved to the next venue and raced again. And so on, for the four venues and the eleven stages. The times for each stage were added together and the winner of the event was the car who\u2019d completed all the stages in the least amount of time.<\/p>\n
We called our event a Rally-Sprint because we had a mix of rally-style stages and others that were shorter and more like a club sprint \u2013 cars timed individually over a lap or two of a circuit. We used different track systems \u2013 Scalextric Sport, \u2018classic\u2019 Scalextric, SCX, Ninco, Ninco Off-Road and a small routed track. That gave us a nice variety of track surfaces, plus two of the stages took place on a hillclimb \u2013 which had some steep gradients. Other stages took place in the gloom at dusk or dawn.<\/p>\n
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<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\nFour of us hosted stages in our various homes, with lockdown-legal road transfers and Covid-safe decontamination in between. It would have been nice to include more club members as helpers, but lockdown #3 meant that wasn\u2019t possible this year.<\/p>\n
The racing itself was really exciting. There were 46 cars sent by 28 people from the local area and further-flung parts of the country. Different cars were matched in three different classes \u2013 an \u2018old\u2019 1990-2000 Scalextric World Rally class; a modern DPR Scalextric 80s Group B class; and a very broad nationally-agreed UK Slot Rally class. I\u2019ll take a look at \u2018proper\u2019 slot rallying another time – it’s a fascinating branch of our hobby.<\/p>\n
From the first stage to the last, gaps between the front runners were just a second or two \u2013 sometimes fractions of a second. Some cars did better than others on one type of stage, but then that advantage was reversed on different track surfaces or layouts. There was heartbreak when leading cars hit problems and excitement when other cars edged up the leaderboard\u2026<\/p>\n
Everyone was able to keep up with the action \u2013 wherever they were in the world \u2013 through results, pictures and reports posted on the SlotRacer forum and six of the stages were streamed live on Facebook. I can tell you, there\u2019s a lot of pressure on the driver when you know you have a live audience!<\/p>\n
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<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\nI had the honour of driving the final stage on the tiny routed \u2018Brighton Pavilion Ice Rink\u2019 track. The top two went into the stage just 2.7 seconds apart. I didn\u2019t want a driving error to determine the outcome of the entire eleven-stage event\u2026 and Facebook told me there were about twenty people watching! I held my nerve, the first and second-place had fast, clean runs \u2013 the leader won the stage and the runner-up came third, just 0.3 of a second slower on the day and 3.04 seconds behind after the eleven stages. That was close!<\/p>\n
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<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\nAll the competitors received a sheet of Jadlam stickers and the winner – Phil – got a lovely Scalextric BMW M3, kindly donated by Jadlams. The club also presented medals to the overall and class podium finishers and produced WHO Winter Rally-Sprint stickers for everyone who took part.<\/p>\n
We enjoyed the event so much, we\u2019ll be doing it again next January and February \u2013 whatever is happening with the pandemic and our club racing. It\u2019s also a type of racing that\u2019s possible for anyone to do \u2013 although it probably works best for groups who know each other, but are separated by distance or a pandemic. It\u2019s the basis for a great family activity in a world that\u2019s connected by technology.<\/p>\n
All you need is an idea \u2013 a vision for the event you want to create in miniature \u2013 a track or several tracks, a way of timing cars, some rules to create a level playing field and then a way of sharing the coverage and the results \u2013 even live streaming the action. In my blog post about building rally loops<\/a>, I did look at some simple ways of creating and timing rally stages for Scalextric cars – definitely worth having a look at.<\/p>\n Of course, it doesn\u2019t need to be a rally and you don\u2019t need to use rally cars \u2013 Scalextric haven\u2019t given us many of those in recent years. Rallying is just one option, the other formats I mentioned \u2013 hillclimbs, club sprints, drag racing or speed trials all work perfectly too. Let your imagination carry you away!<\/p>\n