When Sam started his karting adventure, the ambition was always to get to proper MSA racing. With Sam having passed his ARKS test and with 2017 MSA Licence in hand, we were keen to get to our first MSA meet. Kimbolton always had a facination for me because of the history. The Hunts Kart Racing Club venue is one of the originals, established in 1959 on the site of the base of the 379th USAF Bomber Squadron in World War Two. It is also the closest kart track to us but only open one weekend a month for the race meetings, no corporate karting aspect at all.
The HKRC Chairman was very welcoming when I enquired about going for our first taste of MSA racing. We made our entry, booked a pit bay and turned up on the Saturday for practice. Our first error was not getting there early enough for a track walk. The error became apparent when Sam failed to find the pit entry after the first session and spent extra time on track looking for it! Tears followed and I got a roasting by the officials. The later sessions were better and Sam quickly got up to pace. The weather helped as temperatures reached over 20ºC with clear blue skies. Sam’s practice lap times were eventually down to 51s a real achievement for his first time at Kim.
Our next error was not doing more time on the harder MSA LS2 tyres. We only shod the kart with these for the final practice session and they really needed more heat cycles and laps on them before race day. Having said that the qualifying session on Sunday morning saw Sam just 0.3-0.4 secs off Sam’s friends Charlie and Ollie from Red Lodge who are also novices but with previous experience at Kim. Sam started the first heat in P11 in a grid of 15 and immediately dropped a place to Charlie, which was to be expected as he totally missed the start as the start light sequence is different to RLK. Sam held 12th until the penultimate last lap where he span thanks to a tap from behind. Then in 14th Sam passed two stricken karts to finish in 12th. At least we could say Sam was on the pace with other novices, no shame there.
Heat 2 was red flagged first lap after a collision saw Ollie tended to by paramedics on track but fortunatley walking wounded. Unfortunately that turned out to be a bad omen. The re-run heat 2 saw only 12 karts start and Sam played a blinder passing Charlie and Macie to move into 9th. Sadly a coming together with Macie saw Freya and Charlie pass Sam and eventually 11th was the best he could do.
Heat 3 was where our real drama came. Sam made a great start again to pass Freya and with kart 86 off Sam was into 10th. He tried to hold on to Charlie but couldn’t and with Freya, Macie and 86 closing he went into lap 5 looking back and defensive. For some reason Sam span in Kestrel and hit the tyres hard. The first I knew was he didn’t appear as expected down the start/finish straight. Waved yellows and then a red flag heightened my fears. Running down to the far end of the circuit I could see Sam being attended to by the medics. Eventually I was let onto the track and saw Sam taken from his kart, immobilised on a spinal board and then onto a trolley. I joined him in the ambulance for the short trip the medical centre at the circuit. That was to be the end of our racing for the weekend. A later ambuklance ride to Hinchingbrooke A&E confirmed all was infact okay, spinal X-rays all clear. But this was a real scare for a time, unfortunately our cadet drivers often forget about the dangers and show little fear in the heat of the race.
I need to take this opportunity to thank everyone at the HKRC for the care Sam recieved after his crash and the reassurance they gave us. The marshalls, medics and officials have my utmost respect and thanks. We will be back I hope, with a new suit (previous one now a trophy, Sam having been cut out of it!) and a checked kart (no major damage obvious).
Result: 13th of 15 on the day…without the drama in Heat 3 and spin in Heat 1 Sam would have had sniff at 9th and the novice trophy. But congrats to the girls (Freya and Macie), it was their time to shine!
Next Month: Club2000 and the East Anglian Trophy meeting at Kimbolton??