Radio gaga: the wild and wonderful world of RC racing

I’m enthralled by the paddock, at once rudimentary and resolute, benches covered in implausibly large RC cars and their numerous parts as fastidious owners do some final tinkering ahead of their heats.

The age span is broad, too, from mid-teens well into retirement. Nevertheless, Oddie, 58, humbly plays down his successes among the group: “I used to drive around Europe, testing tyres and shocks for a week to perfect my set-up.

But now I don’t do any testing – just the national races. It’s an excuse, but I’m getting too old! I’m nearly 60 now, and against the younger competitors it all comes down to hand-eye co-ordination.

Just like with full-size cars, there’s no advantage to being old here. Europe has an over-40s class because of the difference.”

Two classes are racing today. The four-wheel-drive Minis sit at the ‘beginner’ end of the spectrum for large-scale 1:5 cars and will set you back around £600 second-hand and in fully working order. Plastic construction keeps them relatively affordable, while a 4WD chassis is a mite easier to control.

The rear-wheel-drive Touring Cars heading up the weekend are something of a step up. Costing several grand, weighing 10kg (minimum) and with a top speed of around 55mph, they’re mighty things.

And that’s before their devoted drivers have lifted off their robust outer shell – primed to take an impact at the end of the rapid back straight – and let snapper Max and I have an excitable poke around.

While the grid perhaps lacks a little variety, the tried-and-trusted nature of the bodyshells on the market means the Alfa Romeo 156, Audi A3 and BMW 3 and 4 Series designs lead the way.

The Alfa remains a favourite for its handling capabilities almost 20 years after its full-scale equivalent departed top-flight motorsport. There are lots of them here today.

“Aerodynamics and downforce are crucial,” says Craig Orman, 46, one of Oddie’s key rivals – and mates. “If your wing falls off, your car is undrivable.” He guides us round the intricacies of his car, at its heart a buzzy 26cc two-stroke engine making around 7bhp.

He shows off its CNC-machined aluminium chassis, steel brake discs and bespoke pads, its trick differential (a key to controlling these things in all weathers) and its generous stack of tyres.

Priced at around £35 a pair, they resemble adorably scaled-down versions of proper racing rubber, with slicks, treads and wets available. The most focused competitors even plug in tyre warmers to prime them ahead of each race. Told you it was serious.

Others simply pin their car down and smear the rubber to the floor with a liberal use of throttle, which I have to admit looks more fun.

Two minutes of warm-up laps before a rolling start provides an opportunity to observe whose tyre prep was most successful: one BMW pirouettes repeatedly into the grass.

Stricken cars are returned to the circuit throughout practice and race sessions by corner marshals. This is a role played by the drivers themselves, the grassroots feel of a sport never more evident than when its competitors quickly shuffle into volunteer roles between their own events.

“If you can already drive a model car, it’s not a step up, more a step across,” says Orman when I ask how easy the Touring Cars are to drive. “With a Tamiya, you have an electric motor, whereas here you have a clutch to engage.

But it’s fundamentally an RC car, so you can use sticks or a steering wheel control just like anything else on the market. What’s trickier is learning how to set up the car. Fuel and tyre management, engine tuning, castor, camber, roll bar thickness and positioning… You can get very lost very quickly. Most people who get into the sport have someone they know already doing it.”

The youngest competitor today is Sonny King, aged 15, who has travelled almost 300 miles from Kent. His dad got him into racing smaller, cheaper Tamiya models at Crystal Palace when he was just 10, and he’s since graduated through the 4WD Minis and into 2WD Touring Cars.

“There are people here triple my age,” he admits. “It feels like an achievement beating people with so much more experience. But it’s one big family. I see everyone here as my friends.”

Chairman Russell admits competitors typically fall either side of their twenties – keen to compete in their teenage years when they discover the sport before typically disappearing until they’ve settled down in their thirties (or beyond) and begun to crave a hobby again.

But hobby culture – and its myriad benefits for mental health – has clearly led a minor resurgence in paddock sizes and diversity. And next summer the European Championship for the Can-Am racer-esque 1:8-scale Circuit Cars will come to Halifax for a five-day extravaganza.

Those are the devices that will beat a full-size electric car to 60mph on their way to an 80mph maximum. Crikey.

Back to today and the clouds have rolled over, rain starting to plip-plop on the smooth surface and sending even the 4WD Minis into minor oblivion; the marshals are busier than ever plonking them back into place.

It’s hard to know where to look: the cars are fast and spread out, performing in a simultaneous time-trial fashion to avoid too much pricey contact. Rubbin’ ain’t racin’ here. 

Some of the slides would put an Autocar ‘Handling Day’ shoot to shame, however, so how do you even go about controlling one?

“You have to countersteer and use opposite lock, but you’re doing it without feel and just by sight,” admits Orman. It’s all the more tricky when you’ve adopted an almost bird’s-eye view of the circuit and the concept of left and right visually switches around a clockwise lap of the track.

Some drivers have dabbled with forward-facing in-car cameras and first-person-view screens to aid their control, but it limits awareness of cars nearby or immediately behind. 

“More experienced competitors have honed techniques for the rain too,” continues Orman as we duck back into the paddock for cover.

“They will do tyre prep, add ballast, even play with their radio signals and programming. You can in effect add a delay or curve to the power delivery, or make the brakes apply with your steering inputs to shift the weight around.”