Senior Pro Kart Part 5 - Lydd Kart Circuit

This was it... This is what I had been aiming for since the age of about 17/18, after having got my first taste of karting when I was 16 in my friend's spare Honda pro-kart. To head back to Lydd with my own kart and thunder down the back straight, re-living the thrilling experience of having the sound of my kart's twin engines revving in my ears and the feeling of speed that you get when only a couple of inches off the ground...

July 1998 - Lydd Kart Circuit

So I had finally got myeself in a position where I could take my own kart back to Lydd. Latest updates on the kart had been another £330-£400 spent on replacing the rear axle, two new rear hubs, both engines fully serviced and dynoed for improved performance (new gaskets, new valve springs, new spark plugs, oil change...), and just in case, my Bridgestone wets were fitted to a full set of rims (requiring the purchase of two new rear rims).

I was therefore completely ready for my return to Lydd... and to top it all, the friend that had got me there in the first place agreed to come back with me on my return. Thanks Lee! ; )

September 2015 - Lydd Kart Circuit

Chasing the pack...

Needless to say it was another great if nackering day out in the kart and I got to achieve a dream I had held for a long 16 years - life seems to want to teach me patience... I was never good at being patient...

 

What it takes to get to F1....

I recently saw this video on the BBC F1 website all about Max Verstappen and his Dad, Jos, and what it took to get Max to F1 in terms of the investment in time and money just in the karting phase of Max's career. Admittedly, karting has formed the majority of Max's racing career, having only raced in F3 before entering F1. But this is still very impressive and quite touching to see the commitment of Jos for his son and his career.

Link here.

Midnight Rambler | Magnus Walker in L.A. | eGarage

I need to get me one of these... ; )

Nico Hulkenberg - Diamond in the Rough???

Nico Hulkenberg 1st on the right celebrating his Le Mans win,
the first of Porsche's since their return last year to the historic event.

With Nico Hulkenberg's recent LeMans 24 hour win he has reminded everyone in F1 and the wider motorsport community of his potential and talent. I have been a long time fan of Hulkenberg's given his ability to take whatever F1 car he is driving and deliver its optimum potential plus more as shown by his consistent outperformance of every team mate he has raced against. Witness his current 24 points versus team mate Sergio Perez's 15 points - it doesn't seem a huge difference but when you are racing for the second half of the points paying positions (6th gets you 8 points, 7th: 6, 8th: 4, 9th: 2 and 10th 1), it reveals a wider gap in performance between the two drivers.

I have never understood why the likes of McLaren would plump for an overly expensive option such as Button when you have both experience and greater potential in an option such as Hulkenberg (plus he would be a great deal cheaper!) Being one of only three drivers to win the GP2 championship in their debut season (the other two being Rosberg and Hamilton), you would think greater stock would be placed on Hulkenberg. But the F1 fraternity has a notoriously short memory (who is talking about Robert Kubica anymore?) and an outstanding performance is often needed to remind them that a certain driver even exists.

Considering Hulkenberg's dominantion of all classes of motorsport outside of F1, it makes you wonder what the missing ingredient is that would give him the success he deserves in F1?? Comparing Nico to the likes of Hamilton and Vettel I would almost say that Nico is too nice and lacks the aggressiveness and a bit of drive to want to get ahead at all costs. Perhaps this makes him a better all round driver with consistent points finishes but a bit of aggressiveness is needed sometimes to secure a good result. Take his closest chance at a win to date, the 2012 Brazilian Grand Prix, a bit more aggressiveness could have fended off Hamilton (Youtube video here) and secured his first F1 win and gained the extra confidence needed to secure better performances subsequently.

Now there is an article about Hulkenberg being happy to bide his time before moving to one of the top teams and I think this illustrates a lack of drive - compare his comments to Senna who would have tolerated running in a midfield team as much as Alonso would tolerate having Hamilton as his team mate... 

Come on Ron, kick out the past Champion Button and hire the future Champion Hulkenberg before someone else does!!

The mystery of Kimi Raikkonen's Performance

I believe that despite being called 'The Iceman', Kimi Raikkonen is not such a cool cucumber after all. Like a lot of F1 drivers (particularly those at the very top), I believe Kimi needs to feel like the real star of the show within any team that he is driving for. I believe this partly explains his relative performances with the likes of Alonso and more recently with Vettel. Deep down, Raikkonen knows that with such teammates, the focus inevitably is not all on him and perhaps his performance suffers as a result...

I say this because you can't help but compare the Raikkonen we saw in his 2 years at Lotus, where he was undeniably the clear focus of the team in terms of ensuring that his every concern and request was met. This was inevitably because the team knew that he was their best bet of getting the best out of the car and producing some eye catching performances. Lotus therefore had to keep Kimi happy otherwise they knew they would very quickly lose him (inevitably they lost him anyway).

As a result of this clear focus and attention, Kimi's performances improved and he became a real 'dark horse' threat come race day for a surprise win as he did in his now famous Abu Dhabi 2012 race win and as he almost achieved  in Bahrain 2013 against Vettel. This ominous, looming threat was always associated with Kimi as in his McLaren days - who can forget his last lap win of the Japanese Grand Prix after scaring Fisichella out the way?

There is an argument that the atmosphere / culture of a team also has to fit the driver and it could be said that the Ferrari 'family' atmosphere doesn't quite fit with Kimi as can be seen during his tenure with Massa between 2007-2009. McLaren's precise and almost clinical approach seemed to help Kimi during his time at McLaren between 2002 - 2006, when the Iceman was quickly feared up and down the grid. At Ferrari, both past and present, I can't help but get the impression that Raikkonen gets quite comfortable and as a result, loses some of his sharpness.

Either way, Kimi's current performance against Alonso and Vettel at Ferrari has been somewhat disappointing particularly compared to the promise shown during his performances at Lotus. It could be said that at Lotus, Kimi was motivated to drive at his absolute best in his attempt to impress and join a larger team to obtain a real chance to win. With a new Ferrari contract now being dangled in front of him, will this help him in his performance as again Kimi fights for the continued survival of his F1 career and once achieved, settle back into the comfort of the Ferrari family...?

F1 Female World Championship...

I think Bernie Ecclestone's recent statement with regards to setting up a separate all-female F1 championdhip is quite sad really as I believe there must be women out there who have the ability to compete with men on equal terms and beat them.

I learnt this first hand when I recently competed in an arrive and drive, 40 minute endurance race at Daytona Milton Keynes. Before these events, looking around, you can tell those drivers that are regular karters and who may actually be good, from the fact that they come along all fully decked out in their own racing gear. So it was the case when I saw two drivers present at the event, with the one wearing the more impressive kit (i.e. more complete and expensive) actually being a girl. Now when I see a girl dressed in proper racing gear I know that they must be half-decent because girl's egos aren't as big as blokes who may be fooled into thinking that just because they look the part, they are the real deal (this tends to happen a lot in life actually). Whereas if a girl has bought decent kit, you know she has done so because she is serious about the sport and probably has invested a lot of time and effort into it, part of which is the purchasing of proper racing gear. To be honest, when I see blokes coming all dressed up, it actually makes me more determined to beat them and I often do... (that's my ego talking now!)

However, this girl I raced was in another league as once the race started (I qualified 3rd), I  could see from just the first 3 or 4 corners that she was already able to start pulling away fairly significantly. Now when you go to an arrive and drive event, there is no equalisation of weights through the addition of ballast, which is something I normally benefit from being a smaller bloke and this girl was undoubtedly lighter than me (so was the guy who qualified in 2nd), thus benefitting from a weight advantage. But even so, the performance difference was too large to be just that! Needless to say, for the first time in such an event, I was actually lapped and the girl in question actually obtained the lap record during the race... Very impressive Stephanie!

There is Danica Patrick in America who competes with the boys and regularly beats them and we have Susie Wolff and now Carmen Jorda in F1 as test drivers. Surely someone can break through into F1 and show that it can be done?! A recent article about Stirling Moss' sister caught my attention too (link  here) who regularly beat her male competitors in rallying, which again highlights the point that it can be done and should be possible if the right lady were to come along...

The Amazing Vettel...!!!



Sebastian's win in Malaysia has turned a potentially disastrously boring F1 world championship season into something that potentially could be much more interesting. No one would have predicted that the Ferrari would beat the Mercedes in a straight fight so soon into the season and whilst recognizing the unique conditions under which the Malaysian GP is run, with high temperatures and humidity, it bodes well for the rest of the year. For not since the like s of a certain Michael Schumacher has a driver been able to achieve 'the impossible' and it is fitting that it is another German in a red car that is now doing the same.

Hamilton was undoubtedly thinking that his stiffest competition in the race for the title this year would again come from his team-mate and, like Alonso, has openly claimed that Vettel's dominance over recent years came more from the benefit of driving an Adrian Newey designed car than any innate talent Vettel may have had. It looks like both drivers will have to start re-evaluating how good the German is and, just as he did at red Bull, it is clear he will be the one who may well achieve 'the impossible' and drag the Ferrari team back to the front of the field.

All I can say is - I can't wait now to see how the rest of the season unfolds because if anyone can beat Hamilton, Vettel can. The creaking of Lewis' self confidence can almost be heard as it comes under the weight of this new, unexpected and very real threat to his championship ambitions.