Easykart UK 2014| Round 6 Llandow | Race Review

Round 6 of the Easykart UK championship was held in "sunny" Wales at the Llandow Kart track. Not to be confused with the car track next door. Having arrived back from France on the Thursday we left for Llandow on the Friday, something I hope to not have to do again as it was a quite a rush. We arrived mid afternoon to set the awning up before getting to the Premier Inn for a hearty dinner and some much needed sleep.

Slow exit as we are just running the engine in

Saturday - Practice day. We arrived in sunshine and got setup, signed on and sat down by 9 o'clock roughly. With 2 hours to wait I went for a track walk to familiarise myself with the track again. First session was at just past 11am and, having had a top end rebuild between G-y-G and llandow, I was having to run the engine in. This was the same in the second session as well. I was able to really go for it in the 3rd session, just before lunch but still felt uneasy with my lines and braking points. The fourth session after lunch felt better as I was able to keep up and overtake a few people, meaning I wasn't the slowest. By far the best session for me was the last session where I was able to keep on the rear bumper of Jenson Murchison for pretty much the whole session. Rather than make a rash move and cause expense for both of us, and I wasn't really quick enough, I stayed behind him trying to see how my line could be improved. I went over 2 tenths quicker that session than I had all day.

Slightly too later turn in for the hairpin

Sunday - Race day. Bertha hit. All these people wondering where ex-hurricane Bertha was at the weekend. I can tell you it was over Llandow for most of the morning, with the wind coming later on! We got to the track in the pouring rain. The meeting was in danger of being cancelled but, after 15 minutes and some furious sweeping of the track to clear the water by the marshalls, the track was drivable and we were ready to go.
The warm up wasn't great as I felt my rear end grip was appalling. I was sliding all over the place, not just aquaplaning. Turn in? Fine, Engine? Fine, Rear grip? Not fine. We reduced the pressures for qualifying and just as we were about to go out the heavens opened. I could feel the wind and rain pushing my head and helmet backwards away from my body. Qualifying felt ok, good grip all round and the engine felt fine, but I only managed 8th place out of 10, so not great.
The heat was nothing spectacular but I still managed to gain 2 places into 6th.

Top hair pin - pretty much the right line

Lunch saw the rain ease up and the track start to dry, by the time it was our turn to go out the track was completely dry. I was starting 6th and not looking forward to having to weave my way through the field, but I was ready. The start wasn't brilliant and I think I dropped 1 or 2 places. But I was on brand new tyres, so it was almost expected. I was up to fourth by the 5th or 6th lap when Jenson's chain came off, handing me 3rd place - although I didn't realise it at the time. The race finished with me ecstatic to have finished in the top 3 for the first time, even if it wasn't the main final. I got onto the weigh bridge and my heart stopped. I was 1.5 kilos underweight. After a re-weigh I was only 0.9 kilos underweight, but that didn't matter. All I knew was that all my hard work to get into 3rd had been undone, simply because we had forgotten to top up with fuel and we were running lighter with a dry setup. Points - gone, 4th in the championship - gone. But mistakes are made and I just hoped I could make up a few places in the final.

Andy checking the weather...

The final, starting at the back. On the first lap I made up 3 places before I saw the false start flag, luckily everyone in front saw it at the same time so there were no collisions. Second start - I floored it slightly too early and to avoid a crash before the start line I locked up my rear tyres, "Great - 6 kart lengths behind ALREADY." By the end of the first lap I was up with the group again, and was in 9th by the end of the second. Up to 8th by the end of the 4th lap and 7th by the end of the 6th, things were looking up. Now I just had to catch up with the next group. 6th place by the end of the 12th lap and closing on the next racer. Unfortunately I couldn't quite catch them by the end but I got close.

Looking forward to Whilton Mill, lets see if I can get a podium!
#Videos to follow hopefully#

Shenington Testing 2014

Behind 2 drivers, closing in

Thursday 17th of April was a test day at Shenington, I went to it. I don't think there is another test day between now and the Easykart race at Shenington, so we went to simply get used to the track again, allowing us to focus on set-up during the race weekend. We arrived at just gone 9:00 expecting to start around 10:00, and the junior session did start at just after 10:00. However, as usual, we didn't get out for the first session. The gearing for shenington in an easykart was 78 teeth last season, but has been changed to 76 teeth for this season. As we hadn't got a 76 tooth sprocket we decided to put the 77 tooth one on, if only for the first session as the Spellfame shop was there.
The shop was open when we got to the track so we decided to quickly change the sprocket to the size we would be using on the race weekend. This took longer than expected so we missed the first session, but that didn't bother me.

Looking to overtake at least 1 of the trio

Having overtaken all three attempting
to pull away from Jordan Sanders

Throughout the day there were about 7 sessions for each class, each session being 8 minutes long. We put on the tyres that we had used at the e-plate, Whilton test and Buckmore practice day, so they were well worn, but still had a bit of life left in them. As was expected, in the first session, the easykarts - Jordan and myself - had the top speed over the TKM's and were about the same as the Rotax's, but the acceleration that the Rotax engines have is phenomenal. I forgot to set the mychron up for the first session so I got some 20 second laps... then set it to a pre-made Shenington and I got the same times, this didn't seem right. I checked the setting and there were no settings made for it.
Come the third session we put on the newer tyres that had only been used during the Buckmore race day - this gave me a lot more grip and I was getting times that were in the low 45 seconds, my quickest being 45.01 seconds. I gradually got quicker throughout the day finally getting a fastest time of 44.6 seconds. To put this into perspective the lap record for Easykart on the old tyres is/was 45.7 seconds, over a second SLOWER than my fastest of the day!
There are still a couple of corners that I need to work on but I feel very confident that a good finish is on the cards in 3 weeks time!

Recently I bought myself a Contour Roam2. Below is footage from the final session, more to be uploaded to both youtube and the blog soon.