Henry @ Thruxton - Pre-Arks Training

Walking around the amazing Hampshire corporate track in minus 8 degrees is certainly a ‘waking’ experience, our newest driver Henry has only been out once previously with us and is going to be seen with the team for the foreseeable future.

Henry is at the beginning of his journey in karting, having only really driven Bambinos till now he is transitioning into the Honda class well, still building his confidence he is very aware of the extra power available but is controlling the kart well, usual early stage mistakes such as turning in way too early, double pedalling, and brake control are prominent but we spent a lot of time discussing his first session at CKC and we were both determined to get the times down to an acceptable level but more importantly consistent.

A strong lap time for a Honda at 103kg with DEP would be 47’s, a novice driver experiencing the numerous turns for the first time would be looking for 65’s after the first visit, the prime reason being the level of grip and the age of the driver – they don’t last long here on a dry day, 60 laps is normally enough for a novice and that will equate to around 30 miles of driving.

Henry’s first session was simply a sighting session to get the line in his mind, with some reminding from myself at the important points he was certainly able to stay in the right place, after several sessions we were improving our times but at 79’s we needed more throttle so a track walk was instigated and we chatted about the power and where the best place would be to try the throttle a little more, not long after this Henrys dad gave in to temptation and hired one of Thruxton’s 390 karts, having Richard driving around on his own allowed Henry to gauge the application of throttle and as we sent him out on his own it was obvious he was going to push a lot harder, the sessions concluded at 1pm with Henry in the 58’s, he had given his all and was working harder to hit the marks on track, his consistency had closed to within a few tenths so we really only have to work with his commitment in the corners on his return.

This was a great session, in Henry we have the makings of another young and very able racer, track time of course is everything but we expect to have his ARKS complete in January and given that time on track have every confidence of producing another Veneno star for 2017.

The Thruxton National track is only available to 4 strokes and contacting them beforehand is paramount, the track availability is listed on the Thruxton Karting website under ‘What’s on’ on the National layout but you still need to contact them first before attending. The circuit do not permit mixed owner driver/corporate grids for safety reasons. The team have always used the track as an origin and development base for all its drivers, we hold the lap records for Honda there in full MSA race trim and continue to push all our youngsters on the technically demanding circuit.