When I first got into RC racing in 1988 (after getting my first car at Christmas 1987) until my semi-retirement in about 1993, the best cars at the club/regional race meetings I was going to in the UK were ALWAYS Schumacher CAT's, XLS to start with, then Pro-Cat, then BossCat. A few very good drivers locally ran the Kyoshos of the time (Optima Mid/Lazer) but the vast majority of people were quicker with a CAT.
2wd didn't really exist in my world at that time, RC10s were pretty rare I think, there were quite a few Schumacher TopCat and Cougars, maybe a handful of Traxxas TRX and Losi cars.
Ever the stubborn individual, I decided to run Tamiya from about 1990 onwards - Avante 2001, Madcap, Top Force Evo. In retrospect, were these the best cars on the market. NO. Would I have run something else? No, I liked the cars, still do!
What I do remember though is that the Schumacher was pretty dreadful quality compared to the Kyosho's. I looked at my brothers old ProCat a few years ago and was shocked at how ropey the mouldings were and how inefficient the drivetrain was - no wonder anyone worth their salt fitted loads of different parts.
The Kyoshos were about the same as they are now in terms of quality - ie good. The Tamiyas were not built for racing though and you used to get these niggling breakages all the time, thankfully they now build their race cars properly!
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