July 29 Points Race

Third race of the month and there was a slightly smaller crowd at the track this time.  In the Junior Sportsman class, there were only eight.  Some of the classes had only two!  This race had plenty of excitement though.  Fortunately, there were no injuries or serious damage to any equipment but dad will be doing some bodywork in the coming week...

Lian wanted to go to the track and practice the day before when the track was open so we went there and let her get some seat time away from the pressures of a race day.  Talking to some other "crew chiefs" with some more experience, I found that the pursuit of higher top RPMs may not be the optimal.  Looking back at lap times bears this out - plus the news that some of the fastest racers were running lower RPMs than we were.  With this new understanding, I went back to the 62 tooth gear.

Lian drew a fifth place start in Heat 1.  After a few laps, she was well positioned to pass two karts that were slow entering the hairpin.  She made her move to the inside.  Unfortunately two karts stacked-up behind her as she slowed at the apex and bumpers met bumpers, karts were turned and when the dust settled, she lost two positions.  On the next lap, she was following another pair of karts that tangled in the sweeper leaving one spinning in the middle of the turn.  Lian tried to steer around him but clipped his back tire, rolled over it and lofted her kart on two wheels briefly, landing with a thud back on all four.  She complained about her butt hurting but got going again and managed a sixth place finish.

In Heat 2, she started fourth and there was no passing or other drama on the track.  Lian finished fourth.  The combination of these results got her a sixth place start in the Feature race.

The Feature start gave Lian another opportunity to pass and exited the sweeper in fifth place.  Much of the race was without any passing action until after the halfway point.  Lian found the track blocked by two slow moving karts exiting the hairpin and had to bail out on the grass.  She managed to get restarted but not before the kart she had passed at the start, passed her back.  She finished sixth.

The race day is not over until you get home and unpacked.  Unfortunately, we blew-out a trailer tire on the interstate and waited about an hour to get help mounting the spare.  It was violent enough to tear the fender off but no one was hurt and we made it home.  Amen!

No racing next week.  If I can adjust my work schedule we'll be doing the night race on August 11th.