So, here we are Round 2 of Club100 at Buckmore Park and a circuit that I actually know so I was hoping for a decent result. This was also being Live-Streamed by AlphaLive and I made the cut!
Where I live no matter where I am racing, it's generally upwards of an hour to get anywhere, so me and my mum spend a lot of time in the car chatting about goals that I have for the day and what I think I can improve on from the last outing. Being in my Rookie season at Club100 99% of the tracks I have never raced at before. But Buckmore is a different story, I have tested Club100 karts there earlier in the year and I also race in their Junior Championship there. My goals for today was to improve on my PB & wanted to get straight into the A Final.
So heading out for Practice and the kart felt OK, I made some decent overtakes on people, but some out there were much quicker than I was. As the session progressed I was climbing back up the table but in the end had to settle for P10 out of 26, not too bad & to date my best finishing position in a practice in Club100, so I was pleased with that & hopeful of better results in the Qualifying.
In Qualifying my kart felt like it had more grip than the practice session & I beat my PB going round Buckmore in a Club100 kart with a lap time of 46.506 and qualified 6th on the grid, I was made up with that result, again my best qualifying session to date in a Club100 kart.
Once all the points were tallied up between us and Group 2, my practice session & quali results was making me start P12, straight into the A Final, therefore I had already checked off both of my targets for today, so that I could go home happy..... or so I thought!
Next up was the Pre-A Final and I was starting out P12 (or should have started P12, that was until someone pushed in front on the formation lap and was left to take the position). On the start it was utter chaos and I was left on the outside of the track which is somewhere you don't want to be going into Hairpin 1.
What happened going into Hairpin 1 was one of the scariest moments I have experienced to date in a Kart. I was hit from behind and someone made a ridiculous move that was never in a million years going to end well for someone (that someone was then me) where there was 4, possibly 5 wide going into the hairpin & my kart was launched into the air. I then landed on a kart that was below me before hitting the barrier and spinning back round onto track. Luckily the person I landed on was fine, but his kart was not and had to retire from the race. No penalties were given for this incident.
By the time the yellow flags were cleared I had caught up to the pack and was hopeful that I could at least pull something back from this. Yep, that didn't happen, after that the kart was 1.5 seconds a lap slower than what I was putting in in quali and it just had nothing left to attack with, so I finished at the back of the grid in P22 with the only other people behind me being the retired kart and someone that incurred penalties along the way. I was devastated.
Surely the A Final must have got better? Well, not really! Again the kart that I had was not as good as the quali kart in terms of pace and it just took so long to get round people. I started out P22 and in the end the best I could manage was climbing up 5 positions to P17. After what I felt was a really positive start to the day I was going home really deflated.
My Race Director at Brentwood always tells me that Motorsport is 99% disappointment & rubbish and 1% glory. Today was 100% was of them days were you started off on a high, hitting those targets and by the end you just wanted to go home, but that unfortunately is Motorsport, you can't win them all and need to dust yourself off and come back stronger for Round 3 which is Whilton Mill in a few weeks and another new rack for me.
This currently has me sitting P18 in the Championship out of 57 Drivers on 437 points.
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