Ben, Jack, Luke, Noah, Kiera and Alex @ Forest Edge

Forest Edge Round 2

The team wish to thank the following companies for their ongoing support, this enables the team to provide services and focus on the main ingredient – the driver!

Team Pelfrey (Indy Series Team USA) – team-pelfrey.com

Cummins & Pope Ltd (Refurbishment Contractors) - www.cummins-pope.co.uk

Walker Bros Electrical Engineers - www.walkerbrotherselectrical.co.uk

Sawmills Garage Ltd (Wiltshire) - www.sawmillsgarage.co.uk

Following a busy week of training with Honda’s, Easykart and Bambino at Shenny and other locations the team were looking forward to the 2nd round of the Hampshire circuits championship, with Ben following up a great second place at CKC we had high hopes for the rapidly developing Junior Rotax who since being powered by DKR Racing Engines has gone forward in leaps and bounds.

With Alex, Kiera and Noah training in the unlicensed we had plenty to keep an eye on, all three performed really well and with Noah driving the Forest circuit flat out for the majority his development is nothing short of amazing, we have done two training sessions and he is placing the kart well and showing pace that will put him very close to Jonathon at CKC. Alex and Kiera had a great time gaining confidence and begun to get into the mix, the youngest Preston is beginning to show signs of following in his brother’s footsteps.

The teams concentrated effort of course was with Ben on the Saturday and with Jack beginning a 14-hour journey home from skiing we spent the day experimenting with various settings, we are looking for just a few consistent tenths now to put Ben firmly in the top 5 at Forest, the Junior grid is a tough challenge and with them so evenly matched its vital to have the right setup on the day, with a good progression through the Saturday we shut the shop happy we had the ingredients for a great day.

Sunday saw Roger and Jack arrive nice and early for the track wander with Ben, we made our way out to the points of interest and looked forward to the day ahead.

With a 10th, 8th and 17th from the heats we had done well and qualifying 9th on the final grid we were pleased, eventually finishing 8th overall this was the result we had been looking for early in the season, Ben’s efforts and attention to detail are now producing rewards and with so much more to come we look forward to the remainder of the 2016 season.

Jack had a 19th, 23rd and 12th in heats from a mixed 25 kart grid, we had some line issues but we know that Jack who is conversant with 5 circuits now will get into it as he has shown elsewhere, his engine showing well now we were happy that he had shown pace when needed or able, having taken some unnecessary knocks in H2 we were happy to achieve a P16 start in the Final, Jack finished up 14th in the final, not where we had hoped for but given the previous few weeks activities for Team Clements we were happy to walk away and look forward to the next test at Thruxton.

Luke maintained his top 4 role with a highest third place in the heats, a terrible piece of driving in H1 resulted with the offending driver being excluded and Luke demonstrating his recovery from last place to 14th with some great driving, finishing 4th overall Luke was happy with the points but a little disappointed to not get on the podium.

Some great driving moments from all this weekend, certainly some have had better days but that’s motorsport, at the time its painful but we regroup and crack on as always, a bruised but comfortable Noah did well as did Luke.

If anything for me it’s the arrival of so many people to our little awning to say hello, I personally enjoy the comfort of our awning to discuss race matters and options which can be difficult if we are inadvertently holding a party for half the Honda or Junior grid! It’s hard to ask people to leave the awning if we are shouting at each other in there about ‘tat’ setups or who bashed who with the awning J, we are all polite amenable types who are incredibly competitive, we do however like to argue in the solitude of our little 6x3. Feel free at the end of the day or the beginning but during the races it’s like a war zone in there so please leave us to squabble amongst ourselves.

Onward to more training and testing, keep it flat out there