Entry Level Racing

A few weeks back I had the opportunity to do some real racing. Nearly every top racing driver, especially those from outside the U.S., began his or her career in karts. Karting is a relatively inexpensive way to gain valuable experience in car control and racing techniques.

National Kart News provides this summary of the road racing variety of kart racing:

Sprint racing is by far the most popular. Sprint races are held on road-course type tracks that are anywhere from 1/4 mile to 1/2 mile in length. Sprint karts can also be driven on any of the other types of tracks, which makes them the most versatile of all the karting divisions. This class, depending on engine size, runs speeds in the neighborhood of 45 - 80 MPH and fully prepared, generally cost between $2000.00 and $5000.00. Most Sprint races run short but quick 10 to 15 lap heat races, thus the name "Sprint". Each state usually offers a number of Sprint tracks that run every weekend, which makes it very accessible and the most popular division in the sport.

The typical entry-level race cart has no suspension, no multi-gear transmission, and about 15 horsepower. The stakes rise quickly, with the higher classes of karts sporting exotic chassis and body materials, 4-stroke motorcycle engines, six-speed sequential transmissions and four wheel disc brakes. These are serious machines that can outperform any street car.

I had my day at Adams Kart Track in Riverside. It's a dusty little facility, but the racing is well organized, and the track is challenging. They even give you printouts of your laptimes for each 12-lap sprint race. Plus, you get to wear a driving suit. It fits like Barbie clothes on a Cabbage Patch Doll, but in my mind's eye, I was Mario Andretti in sneakers.

We ran two races, which, as fun as it was, was plenty for a first time. The lateral g-loading and manual steering require a surprising amount of upper body and arm strength to control. Plus, the adrenaline rush of plunging harder into corners with each lap is thrilling, but ultimately exhausting. Racers emerge sweaty from their helmets for a reason.

Weight is the enemy of performance in every racing endeavor. In a vehicle that weighs about 200 pounds, this concept is especially acute. In particular, the power-to-weight ratio changes dramatically based upon the weight of the driver. Let's just say that my sinewy friend who was in his final week of training for the LA Triathalon seemed to have a substantially quicker kart than I did. Despite my extra, um, ballast, I had an absolute blast. I put into practice much of what I've learned through the Skip Barber school as well as countless hours of couch racing (real events and videogames). I discovered that there are limits to my bravery that I would need more time in the kart to explore. I learned that I could discern acutely the handling differences between the two karts I drove, and was pleased to find that I could adapt to their differing tendencies. Karts, by being so elemental, are brilliantly communicative; every physics lesson on car control I've every absorbed could be put into practice, which is part of the reason that karting is such a good training ground for serious racers.

I also suffered the dual humiliations of being slower than a couple of my companions (although still quicker than just about everyone else we had seen in preceding races -- it's all technique) and of spinning off the track and becoming high-centered on the two-inch edge of the asphalt. It was all in good fun, though, and no harm came to myself or the kart. Perhaps the best part of the day was reliving the experience over dinner with the four other guys I raced with, gearheads all.

As an introduction to a couple of pictures below, here is the track layout:



(The long upper bit is not used for the standard "arrive and drive" session we had. Instead, from the upper left corner of the image, the track makes a right-left turn to join the middle long straight. We also didn't use the right-left-right chicane shown in the lower part of the image; you will see it in the second picture below.)

Here are a couple of pictures, which together show just about all of the track. This first shot shows the end of the longish back straight (on the other side of the second line of cones, going behind the light post), which leads into a slightly banked hairpin. Heaviest braking here, right on the limit of locking; the real trick is figuring out the line around the corner and when to start putting the power down again. The "pits" are to the left of the exit of the hairpin; the track goes around the pits in a left-right combination onto the front straight.



This picture shows the rest of the track. The driver in the lower right is coming out of the right hand sweeper just past the pits. Turn one at the end of the front straight can be taken flat out, but I never quite did it. It leads into a very fast left-right-left chicane; the raised curbs can really upset the car's balance, especially if you are carrying full speed through there. If the picture were larger, you could see, out by the hay bales and the couple of guys standing out there, a set of two 90 degree right hand turns. I spun off at the first one as I was still trying to settle the kart down after flying through the chicane and applying too much brake while trying to turn at the same time. The complex around the hay bales brings the karts out onto the back straight toward the hairpin again, between 31 and 35 seconds since the last time you were there. (If you want full size copies of these pictures, let me know.)



Huge fun. Did I mention that these things have no seatbelts?