New Chassis to arrive early in the new year (18.12.06)

We are pleased to confirm that after a few key conversations last week we have now ordered our new chassis's for 2007.  After great deliberation over the last few weeks we have decided on a manufacturer and hope to be on the grid at Kimbolton in January ready to go. James is looking forward to getting in the new Kart and said "If it goes as well as it looks it should be better than last years". Come and pay us a visit at Kimbolton to see which way we went!!

Nearly perfect end to the season (04.12.06)

James started Saturday morning's race meeting with clear intent on stealing second place in this years championship. Qualifying on pole in very wet conditions, a clear 0.6 ahead of second place and a further second ahead of the rest of the pack, things got off to a good start picking up 2 bonus points for qualifying on pole.

James lead from the front in a wet heat 1 and picked up another two bonus points for fastest lap. Helen finished in 5th giving James 8 points from the heat.

Heat 2 saw a reverse grid and James at the back. James drove well on a drying track and progressed through the pack to take second place on the last lap passing Helen on the way. Helen finished in fourth giving James another 3 point gain. This meant we had a 13 point advantage after just two heats.

The tables started to turn in heat 3 however. With a track now dry, everyone changed to slicks apart from Helen who at this point had nothing to lose. Wets were the tyre to be on and Helen came through the pack and ran away at the front picking up fastest lap aswell. This gave her back 5 points plus 2 for the fastest lap, cutting James' cushion back to 6 points.

This all meant that James needed to beat Helen in the final by at least 2 places and pick up the fastest lap too. This wasn't to happen and to compund our change in fortunes James' carb let us down and his lap times suffered. James dropped to 5th, his worst result in 6 months with Helen taking 2nd place.

So after 12 months of racing and some mixed fortunes along the way James finished the Red Lodge Club 2000 Championship in Third Place. We would all like to contragulate Helen on her second place not forgetting Kasia Nicklin who won the championship last month with a round to spare.

Many thanks to all at Red Lodge for a great years racing. Visit www.redlodge.co.uk for some great karting over the christmas holidays.

Close finish this weekend (30.11.06)

We visit Red Lodge this weekend needing to score 11 more points than the driver ahead of us to take second place in the Championship. First place is beyond reach and third is safe so we will be going for maximum points on Saturday as the Club 2000 Championship reaches its climax.

James finished 6th in the Championship last year and is looking at Second place to compliment his Championship victory at nearby Wildtracks.

With confidence high after last weekend's win at Beccles, James is confident he can come up with the goods but knows it's also down to a bit of luck. Current second place driver Helen Horner needs to finish more than one place behind James in all the heats for James to leapfrog her into 2nd place. Watch this space for details on how we got on.

Final Round at Beccles results in first MSA victory! (25.11.06)

We visited Ellough Park on Saturday for the final round of the Beccles and District Kart Club Championship. This is the second time we have raced here this year with James winning best novice and gaining third overall earlier in the summer.

With a wet start on Saturday and the slicks staying in the truck all day, James showed great skill in the first two heats, taking 2nd in heat 1, following Club Champion Thomas Stanway over the line and managing to beat Thomas to the line in heat 2 by 0.01 of a second!

After an hour long break waiting for a flooded track to clear, James lined up in 5th place on the grid in heat 3 knowing that because of the delay the final looked unlikely to be run. He moved into the lead by the end of the first lap only to spin and drop down to 3rd on lap 3. He then drove the race of the season catching up with the leaders and pushing them hard for the last 4 or 5 laps.

He caught and passed 2nd placed Thomas Stanway across the start finish line on the final lap and then passed leader Teddy Harvey in the centre section holding on through the hairpin and chicane to cross the finish line 0.29 seconds ahead.

To finish off a great day James was awarded the Marshalls Driver Of The Day award. A lovely trophy and a bottle of Champagne. It was a brilliant day, even with the rain and James is looking forward to competing in the Championship next year.

We would like to congratulate Thomas and his family on becoming 2006 Cadet Club Champion. Good luck next year in TKM. 

James to Race in Motors TV UK Karting Challenge. (20.11.06)

James has secured a place to race in the 2007 Motors TV UK Karting Challenge. The 5 Round event takes place at different tracks across the country and is televised and shown throughout the year on Motors TV. Full details to follow shortly.

First Championship Secured. (19.11.06)

James drove in the final round of the Wildtracks Club Championship on Sunday and secured the Championship with a heat win, 2 second places, a fastest lap and a second place in the Final. He beat runner-up driver Michael Green to the title by 51 points.

His second place in the Final made it 40 heats and finals in a row without a DNF for James, which over the course of 10 months proves great consistency. It was a great finish to a brilliant week with James receiving confirmation of his Motors TV Place on Friday.

With only a few other Club rounds left untill the end of the year James is looking forward to a break over Christmas. " Its been a very busy year. If you look at my Results Archive you can see that we haven't had many weekends off, but I'm looking forward to next year. We are going to be racing at other Clubs and I can hopefully compete for other Championships."

For a full calender of next years racing click on the 2007 button on the left.

Novice Licence arrives (15.05.06)

We received James's Novice MSA Licence today and can now race at any track we choose.

ARKS Test at Whilton (03.05.06)

With James celebrating his 8th birthday on Monday we travelled to Whilton Mill Kart club to spend the day with Protrain. James' instructor spent the morning going over racing lines, braking techniques and general driving instruction culminating in a written test in the afternoon. To pass your ARKS test you have to show the ability to lap within a certain time and you need to show you are familiar with the controls of a kart. James was given a target time of  50 seconds on a Whilton track we had never seen before. On his 5th lap of his first session he lapped in 49.51 improving this to 46.06 at the end of the day. James then sat the written/verbal test and got 10 out of 10. This earned him the neccessary stamp and now allows us to send off for his first MSA novice licence. Once we have this we can race at official MSA circuits. We would like to thank Protrain and Adam in particular for making James feel at ease throughout the day.

Dissapointing Weekend ends with James as Championship Leader.(16.04.06)

After a good days practice and 2 second places in the first 2 heats an engine problem pushed James to 5th place in the last heat and 6th place in the final. After the final the carb was blamed with James saying "It just wouldn't pull out of the two hairpins." This cost James over half a second a lap and his team were just glad to finish all the races to maximise James's points haul. The 104 points James gained has put him on top of the Cadet Championship. The 2 early second places in the heats seem all the more important now! Hopefully we can return to better form next month. To follow the championship position visit the Wildtracks Website.

Another 3rd Place (19.03.06)

Another 3rd place followed a hard weekends racing at Wildtracks today. James was satisfied with the result but still wants that elusive Wildtracks win. His points tally continues to grow with continued reliability in the heats allowing him to score more than some of his rivals who may finish above him in the final.

Podiums Continue (19.02.06)

James managed a third place today at Wildtracks after a very hard fought final finishing just 0.04 seconds ahead of fourth place. He managed a 2nd place in Heat 1, 3rd in Heat 2 and 5th in Heat 3 after spinning to last place and fighting his way back through the field.

His team have said that this was his best drive so far, as six months ago he would have just driven round for 8 laps following the pack. He drove very hard and even managed a fastest lap in heat 2. 

In what was a very cold day James drove consistently managing to improve his laps times each time he went out, each time being a personal best for the circuit.

In the Final he started in 3rd place and was demoted to fourth after a terrible jump start from several of the other drivers. After finishing in third place he said it was the hardest race he has had so far.

We have a two week break now before returning to Red Lodge on Saturday 4th March to see if we can follow last months win with another good result. See you there!!  

First Win At Last ! (05.02.06)

We visited Red Lodge for the second round of their club Championship on Saturday.

After qualifying in second place James held this position at the start and took second place in the first heat, his best ever result. Starting second in the next heat he took the lead at the first corner and stretched this lead to 12 seconds at the flag. His first ever heat win.

Starting from pole in the third heat he got away again, this time winning by 14 seconds!!

He started from pole in the final and led to the flag, again winning by some 12 seconds.

When asked what was so different this weekend he said "The kart just feels really good" We had made changes to the set-up of the kart and had taken notice of some advice given to us by Sean Pitts of Pitts Racing. Many thanks Sean!!

It has taken us a year to achieve this first win and it makes all the weekends worthwhile that we have spent standing at the side of a track in the freezing cold. James would like to thank his mum for her support and putting up with not seeing us at weekends.

Our next race is Wildtracks on Sunday 19th February and we're hoping to continue our current form. Come along and see us.