Today I had my first karting experience. Admittedly they were only downtuned 160's on an indoor circuit but I have NEVER had so much fun! Naturally the moment I had my overalls off I was in reception booking up another 2 sessions!

No matter how puny the engine there's something about the noise that really puts a smile on your face. I suspect it's because they were running rich to ensure cooler more reliable running, but still, lift off BANG BRAKETURN GAAAAAAAAAAAAS really sets you up for the day.

I'm still 2.58s off the lap record (although I was held up by a lot of other drivers, consistantly fastest driver there thank god, would've been embaressing otherwise!! think I can knock a second and a half off that without any real effort with a clear track) does anyone have any tips for indoor circuits? So damn twisty, and I WANT that track record. I'm having trouble deciding which line to take on the hairpin, I'm fairly confident the high speed entry followed by massive oversteer is slowest, but what's the correct controlled line?

Anyone else got suggestions for good places to go, I went to Team Sport's Crawley Center, student rate 14.80 for two 15 minute sessions, thought they were pretty good there, but then again, i'm a n00b.

Final word, anyone who's never been karting, even the rubbish you can rent at a tiny circuit is amazing fun!

Dave

i love karting, wish i had the money to buy one though

Im hoping that next F1 season, the kart track in birmingham (Teamworks Karting) will host another F! Karting championship. Its like a normal open gran prix at your local track, so like practise, heats, finals, trophies. Then after everyone is ushered into the bar to watch the F1 on big screen. And the winner of the series gets the title, Midlands Kart driver of the year Its a well known circuit, the stig has had a few laps there!

http://www.teamworkskarting.com

Looks awesome, looks like their west sussex crawley - indoor 250m track. is the shortest one they have, might have to get some driving somewhere to get some distance tracks, although this one did have a flyover into hard left that was bliss if you got it just right... although the lack of any kind of straight did make it exhausting! I'd hoped to find a scale drawing on their site so I could autocross the track on the greatest driving sim on the planet, no such luck tho....

Quote from evosports :

i love karting, wish i had the money to buy one though

Im hoping that next F1 season, the kart track in birmingham (Teamworks Karting) will host another F! Karting championship. Its like a normal open gran prix at your local track, so like practise, heats, finals, trophies. Then after everyone is ushered into the bar to watch the F1 on big screen. And the winner of the series gets the title, Midlands Kart driver of the year Its a well known circuit, the stig has had a few laps there!

http://www.teamworkskarting.com

never been there will have to check it out Ive done indoor single engines at speedway (which burnt down haha) and outdoor twins at birmingham wheels which where both fun but i got to say i prefer out door karting, but that may have been due to the twin engines lol.

Best time ive had was outdoor karting one twin engined karts and started to rain lightly and wet the track sooooooooooooo much fun on slick tyres that really brings a smile to your face

Single engines on ice with slicks. That's fun

You live nowhere near me by the sounds of it so there's no point me suggesting places

Last time I was in an indoor kart place was a friends party about 6-7 years ago (sparked off my whole step into karting). tbh no indoor karting track I've been to with them little singe engines have ever required much braking if any at all. Since they are little 4 strokes smoothness is the key to keep the momentum up, slide and you'll just start bogging down and lose out. Those karts indoors are very weight dependent though, you can easily gain a good bit of time being light so some young kids will kick ass of any decent adult.

Quote from keiran :

[...]
Those karts indoors are very weight dependent though, you can easily gain a good bit of time being light so some young kids will kick ass of any decent adult.

Although I can beat a cadet driver who goes to the track near me a hell of a lot more than me If you've got enough skill you can keep up with littler ones.

Not if the little ones have the skill

When I last went to a hire place about 6 years ago I was racing cadets and by this time was half way through my first season. One of the track workers came on the track with us and I just dived down the inside of him and pulled away. He was so cocky before we got in the karts I was determined to kick his ass. The reason he was all cocky was because I had my own gear so he seemed to think I was just some person with too much money and no reason for a helmet, race suit and boats. He actually pitted on the very first lap as I passed him into T1 and my Dad said something cheeky to him, can't remember exactly. Eventually my Dad told him that I raced in Cadets and that he shouldn't feel to embarased.

This Sunday I'll be taking part in a NON MSA event all be it I'll be renting one of the clubs big heavy pro-karts which are like a brick compared to what I've been used to My biggest worry is having someone who is on the minimum age taking part as he has just had to give up karting due to money issues. He has been practing in a kart since 6, started racing at the minimum age of 8 and is very small. He'll just kick everyones ass unless we give him a weight penatly

I love karting to
I even got one

Yeah the little kids are a pain, I'm only 5ft11 myself so it's none too terrible, but I almost lost fastest lap to a 14 yr old.... I had to drop a few seconds on the lap after my fastest by not braking for the hairpin after the finish line and getting proper sideways, the .03 seconds was worth it tho! cheeky sod. Less cheeky when I sat 2inches behind his bumper tho, just waiting for his next mistake.....

Really livin' the dream number 12, i'm terminally jelous.

Well, my size isn't the perfekt for karting niether,
Im 1.92 cm tall :P
So i got that against me :P

Cool, you guys run the small rear bumpers?

I really wish thats what we ran here, okay it minimises wheel to wheel contact but I think it would stop some people who just dive down the inside with no chance in hell of making corners if there was a risk of flipping.

Some pictures of mine, a different class for every year I raced . Can't find the picture of the aftermath of my Dad's big engine blowup. Just picture in your head T1 of a demo LFS server and you'll get the picture. My Dad was sitting 2nd with about another 10karts behind him, piston broke went through the casings and throw water, oil and petrol on the circuit all at probably the heaviest braking point in the circuit. What a mess, I'd never seen anything like it. Can't remember how many karts missed the restart due to damage

yeah, guess it'll make winnin' all the better tho!

I really wanna read up some more about technique etc, I was improving steadily on the track but I can't wait to get back there so reading is the best I can do while I fix my logitech pedals.... ahem :|

does anyone have any tips on how a racing line differs between the usual and for karts? I've heard a that cock James Allen going on about taking a "karting line" during the wet, is that the going wide and turning in late thing?

*racing widthdrawl*


edit:

those are some awesome pics keiran,

would've loved to seen that engine blowup.... bet that shook a few people up!

I wish I had the cash to do it properly, but I couldn't afford it back when I should have started or now for that matter, bloody studentness, university kills your cash flow, I ride a 16yr old motorbike an hour to brighton and back daily to keep the costs as low as possible, and I still can't afford even a crap car to take to rallies, and definately not a karting career at the same time as owning a car!! got any tips for use on slow karts and small crap circuits?

small bumpers? no, all round wheel covering plastic, perfect for wedging on my inside on a hairpin where they have no chance of getting through, taking me down to minimum forward momentum and some fat ponse wandering round my outside at a dawdlepace making passing him an arse cuz he's all over the track with a different line every same corner......

I had to stop due to cash as well. My Dad has shown an interest in getting back into hill climbing so may go down that route and share a car probably in the road going category.

The karting line in the wet is just avoiding the racing line as you enter the corner as the buildup of rubber becomes slippy. Although I wouldn't say you'd do that all the time in the wet as some times you just lose more time than you'll gain well in my opinion. Through fast corners I never made the line any narrower. More down to personal preference in how you drive in the wet.

Smooth is the key to doing well. If you can find an outdoor circuit you'll probably get to use something a bit more meater. My local club have the slightly more powerful prokarts and I'm quite surprised at the speed of them. Still pretty quick for something any old person can get a shot of.

Anything you learn from hire karting will prove to be handy in a racing kart as the only differences really are engines size and lighter probably more developed chassis.

The thing with the wet is the fastest line changes constantly, and it does matter just how wet it is too.

Quote :

does anyone have any tips for indoor circuits? So damn twisty, and I WANT that track record. I'm having trouble deciding which line to take on the hairpin,

I hate indoor track hairpins, basically I two pedal them - but dont tell the marshalls... they usually stick them at the end of a long run and because of one wall being longer than the other you typically get a flat out kink before it and a short straight afterwards, so it's usually pretty much a case of taking the classic line and just trying to keep as much mommentum as your body weight allows.

Keiren speaks the truth, a half competent 8st kid is going to beat the 13st competent adult every time. It can be frustrating, but after years of karting i've got to the point that for me it takes an 85% competent kid at least to start giving problems ... but I am still never happy with my line through those blasted hairpins.

Anyway i'm glad you enjoyed it, but really - go outdoor karting as soon as you can. It's leagues and leagues better than cadet karting, and you dont *have* to own one, in fact, unless you want to get into serious racing i'd recommend against it.

I'll say it for the record, if you are racing on a budget you may aswell rent - you'll get more track time and more trophies. Unless you dream of being the next Alonso or have just reached a point where rental karting championships just do not challenge you at all, then there really is no reason buy a kart, it's a lot of money for comparatively little racing.

Hillclimb is the nutz, there's a load of country roads I drive the speed limit up, ahem, locally on my rubbish bike, s'good after work for clearing the brain.

I had hoped you might post here Becky, so thanks for taking the time. I've seen your karting site and yer posts always seem to be informed and sensible. I might as well mention I'm much in debt to your LFS addons as well, that companion is damn good

The exit of the hairpin on this track leads onto a very steep incline onto the flyover.... so if I don't have the momentum up real quick the kart bogs down like a moped hitting quick sand. Thankfully the flyover dismount hits the long str8 (no overtaking.....) followed by the openest corner, the downhill gets you fast enough on 8hp for even the biggest corner to be a challenge at full throttle.

I will look at renting an outdoor kart for an even as soon as I'm on the pace at this indoor thing, as it's bloody cheap for a student there.

Thanks everyone for your advice, learnt a lot, and seen some wicked pictures.

Regarding lap records on rental karts:
Almost all rentals tracks I know or have been to have seen lap records broken ONLY when two or more of the following conditions are true:

A) It's a really hot day and the surface temperature, even indoors, is high.
B) The rental fleet is new
C) The driver is damned fast
D) The driver is Damon Hill who popped in because he was passing and fancied a blast...

u wont be fast if it is only your 1st time, just be smooth!!

here is me.

Quote from evosports :

i love karting, wish i had the money to buy one though

Im hoping that next F1 season, the kart track in birmingham (Teamworks Karting) will host another F! Karting championship. Its like a normal open gran prix at your local track, so like practise, heats, finals, trophies. Then after everyone is ushered into the bar to watch the F1 on big screen. And the winner of the series gets the title, Midlands Kart driver of the year Its a well known circuit, the stig has had a few laps there!

http://www.teamworkskarting.com

Just checking that site out looking at a map of where it is. I go to uni at millenium point and lived in bham all my life and never knew that karting place was there

Since we're posting photos of karting, here's me.

I see you both have a collection of tyre marks on the front bumper ...

mwahaha, you just wait until you see me in a rental cart with a yellow and red suit i got of eBay for a tenner!

EDIT - which it now appears i have convieniantely deleted

Quote from z3r0c00l :

small bumpers? no, all round wheel covering plastic, perfect for wedging on my inside on a hairpin where they have no chance of getting through, taking me down to minimum forward momentum and some fat ponse wandering round my outside at a dawdlepace making passing him an arse cuz he's all over the track with a different line every same corner......

I was meaning Shaguar. In his picture the rear bumpers look to be the smaller ones. Over here by MSA rules we have to run bumpers of a certain width which cover the rear wheels quite a lot. In my opinion makes people less scared to cause contact but then I suppose it's all about safety. Still see many karts flip with wheel to wheel contact so I suppose this would be a reason against having smaller bumpers .

Keiran

Those are some stunning photo's!

Smoothness is damn difficult to work on when you've got a yellow flag every 2 laps and a red one every 4!

I'm praying for chassis flex/solid tyres to be doable in LFS sometime soon, I've tried digging around for things that might help the problem, but the CPU requirements seem to be somewhat crazy.

Excited about going tomorrow already, I'm going to nail thair hairpin, cut a lot off my laptime as the section of acceleration up off it is 1:2 at it's steepest up. Crazy, time to loose a stone, get my skinny on!

Thanks for all you're pictures and advice, they're certainly something to aspire to

solid tyres?!?!

good luck man