IRIS In Focus: an ETS weekend with the IRIS team

Since the July IRIS in Focus article, I have travelled to Trenčín in Slovakia to race at Round two of ETS Season #19. This month I will give you some insights to what it’s like to be at a big race event with the IRIS team.

Preparation and Planning

An ETS event starts with Registration on the MyRCM pages, in this case shortly after Round 1 of the season was held at Apeldoorn. There is an initial entry cap and it fills up quickly, so we’ve learned to be logged on and ready to enter at the nominated time and date. You pay the entry fee in advance, and now we order sets of practice and race tyres shortly before the event.

Rob Brighton races IRIS with me at our local EARCC club here in Norwich, and he told me that he was keen to come to an ETS round this season. I sent him the calendar and waited for what I knew he was most likely to pick: this Round 2 at the world famous Hudy Arena.

I put together a plan and budget options. We selected Ryanair flights from Stansted to Bratislava as the easier and more affordable option. Turns out most of the GB racers had the same idea, with due respect to the Colchester club groups who drove there and back.

With my experience of flying around Europe and the world to race, Rob got his kit in the right bags and weight limits. He picked me up early Wednesday for the drive to Stansted, and our travel worked like clockwork. Bags arrived. Hire car got a welcome upgrade. About 80 minutes on one main road from airport to the AirBnB I’d booked for us in Trenčín. Which it turned out was not only immaculate but was close enough to the race venue to be able to hear Scotty Ernst’s race commentary from my bedroom window!


Quick check in and to the track to get our pits set up. We politely evicted a couple of Team Norway racers from our assigned spaces: all done with smiles and handshakes. A bit of catching up with good friends, collecting practice tyres and our handout motors and we were done. Into town for my two favourite spots: a local brewery for food and drink, and an excellent ice cream show in the town square.

Practice

Thursday was a damp start after overnight rain. With FWD being the first class the track had to dry and a coat of sugar water applied then allowed time to dry before practice started.

With the size of ETS entries, the time for practice runs is limited. The delay meant two practice runs of four minutes in pre-assigned heats, and two five minutes seeding runs of which the fastest three consecutive laps set the qualifying heats.

Practice 1 was low grip. My used tyres from Apeldoorn didn’t bite into the track, so I had both understeer and some snap oversteer. The rest of the team reported similar adventures.

We had planned to do the Hudy Arena factory tour around the first schedule, then the rain moved our FWD heats to that time slot. We managed to rebook for the afternoon, and wow what a mind-blowing factory and facilities. No photos allowed understandably.

It was a stop – start day with more showers and delays. Our FWD bodyshells were weighed and marked. Practice 2 had better grip, and the understeer in my tyres was more noticeable. I knew new tyres would bring both steering and traction, so got my new practice set collected the previous evening ready to run.

Seeding run 1 was later in the evening with more rain delays. My car came alive on new tyres and I effectively re-learned how to drive the track. With a clear track around me I put in good consistent laps to seed 28th.

Harder rain stopped play, so we headed into town for another great social evening. Word of the brewery and best ice cream shop was spreading from my personal Facebook updates!

Friday

Rob and I had a later start as other classes needed to finish their first seeding practice runs.

Seeding run 2 had we thought less grip. I was expecting to go slower on second run tyres, so tried a different bodyshell. That proved to be too flighty, but with everyone getting slower times I stayed 28th.

Before qualifying I got good pit photos of all our IRIS racers and posted that on the IRIS ONE Facebook page. I’d also been updating the event section of the IRIS Discord with words and pictures and continued to do this.

For practice Rob and I were in the same heat, and with seeding Rob has one heat before me so I could put his car down and go back for mine. I have enough ETS friends to find someone to put my own car down when my wonderful wife Fran isn’t with me.

Round 1 and everyone was on new tyres (first of two sets in FWD). I got a good steady run with no major dramas for 30th in Round. Marshalling and watching the top two heats, I saw Chris Grach get 11th in round and Loris an excellent 7th in round.

Moody skies but staying dry we got to Round 2. My car was starting to push a bit mid corner so the pace wasn’t quite as good, and I was surprised to be only two seconds slower over the five minutes. Another decent round score but faster would be needed to get into the top 30.

Playing catch up after rain delays the schedule had Round 3 for FWD in the early evening. I made some set up changes to get turn in and rotation, which on track worked very well with a cooler track. Shame I rolled it over a curb as the car was noticeably quicker.

Overnight Loris and Chris were in with a shout of making the FWD A-final with the right results.

We had hoped to get an IRIS team meal this evening, but the later finish meant that didn’t work out. Rob and I headed straight for our usual stops for food and beers, but sadly too late for the ice cream shop to be open.

Saturday

Qualifying rounds take longer at ETS as it is a full 5-minute run with finishing times and marshal switch over. This mean that Rob and I had an even later start. We still got up to head to the track and get the excellent value breakfast deal in the Hudy Arena canteen.

The FWD overall scores were not online overnight, so when they sorted out I was 34th and a good last run could move me into the top 30 in points. That made my choice of new tyres in Round 4 or use them to try and bump up in final leg 1 an easy one: go for Round 4.

New tyres with the changes I’d made felt ok, but not quite the sweet spot from seeing run 1. I found the same curb after being careful and pulled in after a roll to save the tyres. Rob had an excellent round and qualified 37th overall and one place ahead of me in 38th place.

Loris had a good Round 4 and straight into the FWD A final in 10th. Chris was a bit unlucky but happy to be 13th in such a strong field. Matheo pulled out a 5th in round to make the top 20, wishing an earlier round had been there to back that up. Marc de Witt had great qualifying straight into the 40+ Masters B final.

ETS usually heads straight from Round 4 into finals. I saw a 15-minute break in the schedule on MyRCM, so suggested we get our team photo to Andreas during that gap. Not only did we get everyone ready for that, but the awesome Christian Sander from the ETS media team rushed over to get us an official photo. Team Manager brownie points earned!

Scotty’s commentary goes into overdrive with the first final legs seeing the winner bumping up to the next final in class. Unfortunately, Chris had a decent chance for the B to A FWD bump but got caught in dramas between other racers.

Rob and I made a deal to keep it clean between us in our final. Our FWD D main was full of friends I’ve raced with before, and I made the most of Rob (thanks!) and others rolling in front of me to finish 5th.

Last evening and by now the world had got round about the ice cream shop, and we were joined by the Colchester groups and the EWS gang to compare notes.

Sunday

Another warm and sunny day, and thankfully a bit cooler than a scorching Sunday. Rob and I packed up our things and checked out of the apartment and drove to the track.

The remaining final legs for me were full of smiles and close racing with good friends. My bags needed things moved around, so I did that as the pits cleared.

I had a good catch up with Andreas before he left ahead of a busy week of off-road Euros and more.

We had an IRIS final winner with Markus winning our FWD D-final, and Loris an A final trophy finishing 10th overall in FWD. A couple of Team Manager photos after prize giving, then it was time to say goodbyes and head for the airport. Not before I said thank you to Mrs Hudy and the canteen team for being such amazing hosts.

Wrap up

It was a smooth trip home, and Rob dropped me off around 01:30 Monday morning.

After sleep and rest I spent Monday sorting things out and writing final summaries on both the IRIS ONE Facebook page and the event page on IRIS Discord.

I will say put "racing at Hudy Arena" at the top of your bucket list.

Andreas and I were super proud of how positively we represented the IRIS brand this weekend. For a small team we were so close to multiple IRIS FWD A finalists and found excellent pace without any pre-ETS running on this challenging track.

Overall, this had been one of my most relaxed ETS in some time, and even better to see it through Rob's eyes as he lapped up his first ETS and the amazing Hudy Arena

I hope this longer article walking through an ETS event from inside the IRIS team has been interesting. The subject for next month’s article depends on a few things, but if the cards fall right could be very exciting. Watch this space.

Photo credits: Christian and the ETS Media team, https://www.rc-cars-pics.de/

Mark Burgess
IRIS UK Team Manager
August 2026