After two years of anticipation, finally cars hit the track at Thornhill Racing Circuit today for the IFMAR 1/8 Offroad World Champs.

Let's be clear, It is far, far (add a few more commas and far, far) too early to draw conclusions, but it's sure ok to make some observations about what we saw on Day 1. And as usual, my caveat - I'm watching from a long distance, not trackside - so if you know more or better, or saw different things - then jump in and correct me.

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LIME STARTS SHARPLY

For sure one of the stories of Day 1 has been the bright start of Camden Lime. Not only was he the fastest US driver today, but fastest of all in Round 2 and well in the mix in all three rounds of open practice. I hope Lime stays locked in and focused on improving and moving forward, not resting too much on a good practice day - you have to know the others in the top five will be working hard at being faster again on Day 2.

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PRO-MOTION MAKING MOVES?

While pre-race focus from a tyre perspective was naturally on the big names of Matrix, Hotrace and JConcepts, THE Pro-Motion shod Lime has put the spotlight on the US manufacturer. VP-Pro was another less-fashionable tyre brand with good speed today on the car of Berkan Kilic (P7).

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CLASS FINDS A WAY?

Davide Ongaro looked slightly uncomfortable in FP1, got with a whisker in FP2, then went fastest of all in FP3. I was particularly interested in FP3, when it seemed like he paused mid-run after a steady start, then came out and was immediately faster. Radio adjustment? Car adjustment? Tyre change? Mental reset? I don't know - only that he came back out in the second half of the run and was immediately on it.

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THE TRACK IS A STUNNER

I'm going to admit it, my first thoughts on seeing the track reveal video and pictures was "man that looks so hard, I'm glad I'm not racing". And that back double had "trouble" written all over it - but as grip has come up, the track, to my eyes at least, has just looked better and better. I was watching the right-side five-pack on a Live RC fixed cam at one stage, and noticed drivers starting to double-triple that section. Lots more to be unlocked as grip comes up further.

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CHANGING CONDITIONS

The big question for me is just how much more will conditions change over the next couple of days? The Warmup was only a three-day race, and I went back and checked lap times. They tumbled by 2.5 secs per laps from seeding to Q1, then stayed pretty consistent right through qualifying. We've seen times tumble today - is that the major improvement, or is there still more to come from this track? (There's definitely more to come from drivers/cars/tyres).

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WHO'S WORRIED?

Nobody would be panicking just yet, but there might be a few people just a little nervous after Day 1. The likes of Phend, Maifield, Nguyen, Boots could have had a smoother start. There's plenty of social media posts around tonight saying "More to come from my driving" - which is always a slightly uncomfortable place to be.

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WHAT CHANGES TOMORROW?

Three more rounds of open practice tomorrow (surely this race is too long, let's go straight into quali right now? ;) ), and that of course begs the question: what might be different by Monday night? Will Lime's bright start continue? Can those who've been a little off pace find enough to make a big leap up the order? Will the track surface evolve such that the tyre balance-of-performance changes?

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WHAT DID YOU SEE?

What did you notice today? What caught your eye about the track, drivers, chassis, tyres or more?