First Race of the Year

After what feels like a really long winter break, last weekend saw Max take to the track for the first race of the year. It was the official shakedown test day for the Daniel Ricciardo Series, with the series joining Rissington Kart Club for a race on their first round of the season the following day.

The weather for the weekend was far from ideal, with Storm Jorge said to hit during testing on Saturday. Being an old RAF base, the circuit is very open and the 60mph gales that were blowing though were certainly a test of people’s awnings, as much as they were a test for the guys on track.

Max’s engine had just come back from a rebuild by DRS, so the first session was needed to run the engine in, before he could push. He seemed to forget this when he went out for the first session, hitting the front and started to enjoy being back in the seat again.

Along with the wind, the weather gave us driving rain, sleet, snow and then perfect blue skies. It really was a day of four seasons, apart from the temperature which was showing at a real feel of -8 degrees Celsius. All the morning sessions were wet and Max was just under a second off the pace, which he said was down to the fuel setting on the engine. An adjustment of the settings was made and we finally got a dry session in on slicks. Max was flying and by the end of the season was the second quickest. That turned out to be our last session of the day as the heavens opened and we weren’t going to learn anything from going back out in the winter showers.

Race day arrived and for nearly the whole hour drive to the circuit we had perfect blue skies. This of course changed when we got within a couple of miles of the track and it started snowing again. The forecast was for a mixed day, but there was a chance we would get some dry running in.

The first heat was wet and saw Max start on pole. He got a great get away, giving himself some breathing space to enable him to settle down. Unfortunately he got a bit over excited, out braking himself in to the hairpin and spinning. This allowed the pack to come through and he left himself with a lot to do. He got back going again but the pack had gone and he ended up a lonely 9th

Heat 2 came and everyone was trying to decide which tyres to go for. The seniors race before had all but two driver on wets and those on slicks were really struggling. Max got to make the call and with the weather app stating the rain was coming , he decided to go with wets.

We started on P7 and as the race got underway, it was soon evident that something was wrong with the kart. As Max crossed the line to start the second lap, he pointed at his engine. He got the OK signal and told to get his head down. It was clearly going to be a bad race, but he kept his head and defended well to cross the line only having lost one place.

With two poor heats, Max had qualified P9 for the final and he knew he had it all to do. With karting, overtaking on the first lap is so important. It’s where you can make up the most places, before everyone settles down and it then becomes about race pace. We had looked at the engine and just couldn’t decide what adjustment the carburettor needed, so we took the decision to change it to one that had been rebuilt but not tested. It was a gamble, but we had to try something.

Starting a race in the middle of the pack can always be hard work at the start of a race and as the lights went out, this race was to be no different. There was contact ahead of Max at the first corner, resulting in a spin which Max came so close to avoiding, but in the end got collected by the spinning kart, dropping him further down the order.

In young drivers it’s easy for their head to drop when things go wrong and the mental strength side of racing is something we have worked hard on over the last year. Max soon got himself going again and he was fast, really fast!! He was setting fastest lap after fastest lap in his attempt to catch up the pack.

By lap 5 he was 5 seconds behind the leaders and still closing. His overtaking, which last year had been a bit hesitant, was much better (something else we have worked on over the winter with simulator time). When the flag dropped he had taken another 3 seconds out of the leaders to cross the in 4th place, which was then upped to a podium and P3 due to a jumped start by his friend Connor, who had started in P2.

This was Max’s first podium in cadets and one against a group of driver who are up to 3 years older than him. It was a great way to finish the weekend and will give him a confidence boost going in to the season.

As always none of this would be possible without the great support of his sponsors. We really couldn’t go racing without their help, so massive thanks to Applied Diamond (the diamond tool specialists), Lavender Hall Autos, Millennium Security Services, Acorn Printing, JLF Designs, ATR Team Brask and of course MHR Teamwear.