The Universe of WipEout

[NeroIcaras]

*Retrieved from: Sublime And Delicious: The Purest AGRC Monthly Datasheet, issue 925 (printed March 22, 2219)*

2219 FX400 League Championship race reports
by Barton Milligan-Kronski

The 2219 FX400 championship season is the 142nd running of the Anti-Gravity Racing Championship, and the thirteenth season of the FX400 league formula, which sees 12 teams and 24 pilots compete over fifteen rounds of the championship.

Dagur Stefansson of Anti-Gravity Systems enters the 2219 season as the defending world champion, ahead of Piranha's Sabrina Martinique and Nadia Elenova of Qirex. AG-Systems are likewise the defending champions, fending off a close charge by main rivals Piranha in 2218. Pre-season testing at Metropia leads many to believe AG-Systems will take the title once again, with Stefansson leading the rankings and Elenova close behind. Further down the field, there were all manner of shake-ups: Goteki 45 were fifth-quickest on aggregate team speed laps while FEISAR and Icaras posted furiously close times. EG-X seem to have dragged themselves out of the doldrums this year, with lead pilot Guowei firmly entrenched in the top half of the field.

Nadia Elenova has won at Moa Therma three times, including last year: the Russian pilot calls Moa Therma her ‘most successful circuit’. We shall see if Qirex’s lead pilot can carry on her successful run…

Round 1: Moa Therma (Sicily, Italy)

The 120,000-strong crowd were abuzz with excitement as the teams and pilots lined up on the grid for the season opener. Sabrina Martinique had scored pole position by three-hundredths of a second from Elenova, with Kate Partington’s Triakis a surprise third. Stefansson had to settle for fifth, while six-time champion Connor Kelly was ninth for Harimau - a surprisingly low grid position considering he was third here last year. The Goteki 45 craft really impressed, with Farrell sixth and rookie Ilukyhina eighth, right behind Walter Lahtinen’s Assegai.

The race got off to a relatively muted start at the front: Partington passed Elenova through the Synchro-Logistics dynamo, and the three leading women remained nose-to-tail throughout much of the first laps. Stefansson passed Gonda’s Piranha for fourth at the Arial Tower banked curve, and began to gradually reel in the leaders. Elsewhere, the grid was a flurry of chaos; an unfortunate plasma bolt, followed by a barrage of rockets and an unfortunate scrape of the wall at the 01 Hotel section saw Luka Rautio’s EG-X as the first elimination of the season, followed shortly by Porter in the Icaras courtesy of an errant missile.

A prolonged battle for tenth place emerged between Holtman’s Auricom, Nystrom of FEISAR, Qirex’s Diego Gomez and Triakis’s Theodore Roland on lap 29: Nystrom led the four craft into the 01 Hotel complex, but his FEISAR’s lower top speed allowed Roland and Holtman to streak past. Gomez fired a trio of rockets at the pilots ahead, but all three missed: Nystrom dropped back to squabble with him, while the two rookies pulled away, entering the Corig mag-strip practically side-by side. A well-timed bomb from Holtman allowed the American to pull away however, and the battle quickly dissolved.

Also of note was the race-long battle between another pair of rookies, Dakota Harding’s Harimau and Samara Ilukyhina’s Goteki 45. Harding had qualified a dismal fifteenth thanks to coolant problems in Saturday’s qualifying session; nevertheless, a phenomenal start saw the New Zealander vault up the order to eighth, by lap 15, right on Ilukyhina’s rear thrusters. A well-timed missile from Harding saw her take the position, only to lose out seconds later as the Goteki pilot slammed two rockets into her rear right canard. Throughout the next hundred laps, the two pilots were never more than three seconds apart, changing positions amidst a flurry of weapon fire. With Farrell’s sister Goteki well ahead in sixth and Ling Guowei’s EG-X holding station in ninth, the battle raged until the very last lap, with Ilyukhina leading Harding home by just eight-tenths of a second. The two women embraced in the paddock afterwards, with Harding stating “...I couldn’t have asked for a more exciting first race in the FX400. Samara was very fair and a fantastic opponent; it really was a brilliant battle. Great work by the team at Harimau to put me in eighth place on debut; what a race!”

By lap 174, it was Triakis’s Kate Partington who took the race win, leading home Nadia Elenova by just over three seconds. The two pilots, already great friends, celebrated wildly on the podium, with Elenova making a grandiose show of kissing her Australian competitor on the cheek: the stoic-faced Stefansson clapped politely, even as a shower of champagne blasted him in the face. Walter Lahtinen was fourth for Assegai, followed by Martinique, Farrell, Ilukyhina and Harding, Guowei, Holtman, Katanosaka and a battle-hardened Gonda took the final points position. There were seven retirements: most notable of which were Diego Gomez of Qirex and Roland of Triakis, having taken each other out of the race in a spectacular simultaneous missile/bomb hit on the Arial Tower banking. All in all, a fantastic season-opener which saw nine of twelve teams score points - surely one of the most varied results published in the FX400 era. Next week, the FX400 heads to New Kyoto for the Japanese round of the championship at Metropia.

Race Results (points-scorers):
1. K. PARTINGTON (AUS) - 20pts. | Triakis
2. N.ELENOVA (RUS) -16pts. | Qirex-RD
3. D. STEFANSSON (ISL) - 14pts. | AG-Systems
4. W. LAHTINEN (FIN) - 12pts. | Assegai
5. S. MARTINIQUE (FRA) - 10pts. | Piranha
6. C. FARRELL (GBR) - 8pts. | Goteki 45
7. S. ILUKYHINA (MKA) - 6pts. | Goteki 45
8. D. HARDING (NZL) - 5pts. | Harimau
9. L. GUOWEI (MRP) - 4pts. | EG-X
10. I. HOLTMAN (USA) - 3pts. | Auricom
11. S. KATANOSAKA (JPN) - 2pts. | AG-Systems
12. L. GONDA (HUN) - 1pt. | Piranha

Eliminations (in chronological order):

L. RAUTIO - EG-X
A. PORTER - Icaras
V. ZAMFIRESCU - FEISAR
N. LARSEN - Icaras
D. GOMEZ - Qirex-RD
T. ROLAND - Triakis
C. KELLY - Harimau

2219 FX400 League Pilots’ Championship rankings (top six) Rd. 1/15

1. K. PARTINGTON (AUS) - 20pts. | Triakis
2. N. ELENOVA (RUS) - 16pts. | Qirex-RD
3. D. STEFANSSON (ISL) - 14pts. | AG-Systems
4. W. LAHTINEN (FIN) - 12pts. | Assegai
5. S. MARTINIQUE (FRA) - 10pts. | Piranha
6. C. FARRELL (GBR) - 8pts. | Goteki 45


2219 FX400 League Teams’ Championship rankings (top six) Rd. 1/15

1. TRIAKIS INDUSTRIES (AUS) - 20pts.
#15 K. PAR / #39 T. ROL
2. QIREX RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT (RUS) - 16pts.
#8 N. ELE / #53 D. GOM
3. ANTI-GRAVITY SYSTEMS (JPN) - 16pts.
#91 D. STE / #6 S. KAT
4. GOTEKI 45 (MKA) - 14pts.
#49 C. FAR / #35 S. ILU
5. ASSEGAI DEVELOPMENTS (UAN) - 12pts
#80 W. LAT / #64 K. OGU
6. PIRANHA ADVANCEMENTS (BRA) - 11pts.
#22 S. MAR / #45 L. GON