Preview
DO Racing will tonight be taking part in the Max Coates Racing Karting Challenge at Teeside Autodrome, an event organised by Renault Sport UK Clio Cup driver, Max Coates.
Max has another two rounds to content this season in a Championship in which I aim to compete at some point in my racing career and this evening, 25 teams of 3 drivers will demonstrate their support for his campaign in this one off race.
Being held on one of the fastest go-karting circuits in the UK, Teeside Autodrome, the endurance race is open to all and will be running two classes, a "pro" and an "am" class in order to accommodate drivers of different experience levels.
This evening, the ironically named "OLD Farts" will compete in the Pro class, with all 3 drivers having competed in the SG Petch Sprint Championships earlier this year. The 3 drivers being:
- Owen Burton (2016 Rookies winner)
- Liam Slikstone (Regular Race winner)
- Dave Oldacre (2016 Rookies runner up)
With the full entry list yet to be confirmed, our chances of taking the win are currently unknown, however keep an eye on the DO Racing Facebook page from around 6pm for updates from the circuit.
Post Race
Wow, what an event! Great work from Max and his sponsors to bring this to life in such a short space of time. The evening started with picking up one of our team from Leeds with rush hour traffic to contend with, the journey then consisted mainly of trying to understand our chances of winning.
To be fair we eventually concluded that we had no idea, apart from the SG Petch team, we didn't really know much about the other teams entering. We left it at "let's hope for a good kart and see what we can do.
Turning up at the circuit we realised there was going to be a healthy turnout (28 teams at the final count), the car park was filling up and Owen had already arrived so at least we were all there! Shortly afterwards, Max's Dad turned up with his race car and it's fair to say turning it over seemed to grab everyone's' attention, the race tuned engine roaring into life as the car was rolled off the trailer.
Once changed and singed in the paddock started to busy up, quali got underway and our kart seemed okay, loose on the back end but we weren't sure if this was knackered tyres or a cool track. P11 for the start wasn't where we wanted or expected to be.
You might have seen the Facebook live stream of the start, it wasn't as good as I wanted it to be, the autofocus seemed to have a ind of its own and the light was fading fast. I recall Liam in the car driving up saying "I want to go last so I get a dark stint", well Liam, we all got a dark stint!
With the race underway, Own managed to get tangled up in a first lap incident dropping us further down the order. This really wasn't going well and I could see our chances of placing falling off already, however Owen threw down a cracking stint to drag the kart back up to P4. With a mix of rookies and serious competitors out on track there were overtakes happening in corners and braking points we didn't know were possible, exciting but risky if drivers were surprised.
30 minutes in and time for a pit stop, Teeside had made us move round the other side of the paddock for driver change to prevent drivers stopping on pit entry (seriously, who stops on pit entry?) and there was quite a crowd of drivers gathering. As team mates started entering the pits there were some shocking change overs, with some drivers pulling in without a driver waiting to take over, one guy even went back out on circuit to come in again 5 minutes later and another kart got abandoned in pit lane. For us, the change overs were a god send and we moved to P3 through the stops, making slick driver changes and not getting stuck in traffic.
From here on in, the race pretty much stayed status quo with myself and Liam unable to make any ground on the two teams in front and holding off the teams behind. Not too bad considering the two teams in front had clearly been racing karts for significantly longer. Come race finish we had managed to maintain 3rd, much to the confusion of our driver on track when we were going crazy on the pit wall!
Trophy secured and much to our delight, we each took home a Dunlop 3rd Place Podium cap, not something which many people have one of! Congratulations to the two teams in P1 & P2, thanks to everyone for their support through the race and Max & his team for organising.
