Sam, Jaydan, Henry, Will and Zain @ Shenny

The team gathered at Shenington on the first frosty morning of the colder season, it’s been a good year for us at the former Oxfordshire airbase and in terms of progress the team has moved significantly since the mid-summer, Sam and Jaydan are now more relaxed and driving closer to the front, top 8 finishes are now regular in the heats but we do seem to luck out in the finals, bearing in mind how long they have been karting it is simply experience to deal with the traffic, Will and Henry are beginning to appear further along the grid now, have to give credit to Dave for keeping them so closely matched although we are unsure how good for the fingernails that will be! the extra seat time at CKC has without any doubt improved all the lads no end, it simply is seat time that will give you the results, 48 weekends and 130k is a touch extreme but despite my dislike for the documentary this week you will get results by being everywhere anytime – that’s how it is, not just how big you can make a generator motor.

Saturday testing introduced the lads to two of our 4 new drivers for 2017, Zain is a brand new starter, just getting his head around the change in pace from indoor ‘chuck it in’ karting he is at the beginning of the journey, and Joe who has been driving for a little while at Whilton but has decided to start racing now, both lads were track walked with the lads who made them feel at home and promptly regaled them with horrendous novice tales from their own journeys…..love this team for promoting confidence.

We elected to keep Zain from session 1, the remainder of the grid went out to play at drifting on the frost and we figured he wasn’t quite ready for the ‘kink’ flat out and sideways with 25 other likeminded little hooligans having fun, the remaining sessions were dry thankfully and the team ‘cracked’ on with a couple of tests shared throughout. The test day was a good day overall, Jaydan certainly is now a feisty little racer and is happy to get struck in, a different lad to three months ago, Sam was possibly slightly off the pace but improving as he went along, Will and Henry were laying down some lap times despite a glitchy M4 unit, Zain a lot slower but using the long straights to increase his confidence, Joe likewise was getting his head around the lines but both lads were returning with huge smiles…..a welcome relief for Zain’s mum!

Race day and the predicted rain and wind was already rocking ‘Jez’s Kitchen’ although only forecast for the morning we had the karts setup and made the best of the conditions, it looked as though only the practice and H1 would be affected so we lit up the coffee and went on a track walk …individually this time!

Following last month’s meeting we were hoping for a better result, with only 2 heats and a final it was a quick day and with generally mid order finishes we were lower across the team than we hoped, the mixed weather was becoming painful as the tyres across the team had taken a battering in recent mixed weather meetings, Will F manged to top the team finish in H1 with Sam and Jaydan 2 secs apart and then Henry.

H2 saw Jaydan involved in an incident where he had been forced onto the grass, in the office he elected to remain quiet and as a result finished lower than what could have been one of his best finishes to date…that’s karting! Henrys race concluded 6 laps in through no fault of his own.

The final saw Henry involved in an incident where he had to compromise his race to avoid a huge incident with a novice at ‘Wilkins’ I watched the incident unravel and the length of time to get him back on track I think was a massive disappointment, his race was 1 lap less but he never gave up trying to catch the guys in front and for me it was the ‘indomitable spirit’ shown that I admired, Henry earned the weekly award in that race, a mature decision which prevented a serious incident.

The drive of the day came from Jaydan, he left determined to prove a point and gaining 6 places in the final, and in light drizzle proved very much that he was not going to be easy to beat anymore, with his eyes on Sam 6 secs up the road he planned to join his team mate in the top 12, Will didn’t have the tyres for the final sadly but held a great battle and is improving more every time, as I write this I have just seen his most recent performance and the Forber bros will not be another couple of backmarkers! They are going to be collecting more trophies in 2017 no doubt.

Sam’s final saw him finish 12th on a day when possibly we could have made top 6, we now know where the adjustment was needed and are confident that Sam will progress from here.

Once again great to see Simon and Will Attreed, as they move on to new circuits in 2017 it’s great to see Will starting to shine, regularly top 5 all weekend it’s evident that Will is fast becoming podium material and will be snapping at the heels of the front runners as soon as the new season begins in earnest – good luck guys and keep in touch, awning always welcomes you at Shenny.

I then left the weekend to sit down and watch a documentary that I hoped would support the generation of cadet interest in karting thereby strengthening the future ………..such a disappointment in so many ways! it did explore the spectrum of course but I feel the numbers mentioned and possibly the recorded verbal tactics may have turned a few people off out there, the sport caters for all of course, I really don’t care who we race against….it’s the racing we turn out for, the challenge of beating others, the challenge of getting it right on the day the development of young drivers…..the future of the sport.

Our team has its critics, it pleases me often that we receive so much scrutiny, I work in an environment where paddock talk is often fatal to similar small teams, where sometimes we push too hard without realising what we are doing, where sometimes ………….we aren’t always correct in our thoughts but we push regardless of the effect or ages involved, karting is what it is of course – our passion, this passion is entirely dependent on the unquantifiable efforts of volunteers who sit in the wind and rain and put up with our grievances etc., theoretically it probably shouldn’t continue to work as it does with changing modern attitudes but work it does, I have had enough arguments with officials to last a lifetime (Ask lee at CKC) but I have to respect what they do immensely even if I have to keep trying to argue the toss, karting is harsh on everyone but a great sport and character building for youngsters and getting these young stars in is vital to the continuity of the sport.