Pwllheli Sailing Club Fun Events : Summer Series
Tuesday 16th - Friday 19th August 2011

Sprint 15 Go-Kart Grand Prix  2011

 

The Go-Kart Grand Prix has become firmly established as a feature of the Sprint 15 Nationals and it is contested almost as seriously as the sailing. This year we got 12 drivers taking part at the Glasfryn Track a few miles out of Pwllheli on Tuesday 16 August. The Shanklin youth element, who have so often dominated this event in the past, were not here this year but Shanklin true-to-form sported the biggest team of 5 drivers ( Stuart Pierce, Paul Grattage, Liam Thom, John Shenton and Tina Roman). Carsington ( Ray Gall and George Love), Grafham (Mark and Jacob Aldridge) and Seasalter (Kevin Dutch and Martin Searle)  all were represented by 2 drivers and Kevin Parvin was the sole representative of Penmaenmawr Sailing Club as the Roberts men folk seem to have left early this year. With 2 ex-champions ( Mark Aldridge and George Love) and many other fancied drivers taking part it was all to race for.

The competitors got 1 practice session followed by 3 heats. In each heat the drivers started on a grid and raced hard from the off. The choice of kart and positions on the grid were left to chance and quite quickly it was established that cart 25 was a dog but karts 14, 5 and 1 were much liked. Both Paul Grattage and George Love had a turn in kart 25 and were not impressed but the fight for cart 14 was intense. On the track Kevin Dutch and Mark Aldridge both had turns in pole position and led heats from start to finish. Jacob Aldridge had the same hunched-over-the-wheel posture as his dad and proved a demon at steeling the inside position around the corners, but he was prone to looking sideways at his competitors whilst driving flat out round the corners – I think he was trying to psyche them out!  Both George Love and Ray Gall we fast and fiercely competitive and were usually dicing with Jacob somewhere near the front. Martin Searle perfected the ‘look no hands’ posture for the camera as he passed by the spectatators.  It was all good stuff to watch but it was hard to determine who were the winners of each heat as the winners were determined by fasted lap times – not first place on the track. Tina Roman had worked this out and so she was banging in fast laps on clear bits of the track without all the bravado of the 4-abrest stuff round the corners of team Carsington!

When the 6 fasted for the final were notified it turned out to be Kevin Dutch, both Aldridges, and 3 from team Shanklin – Liam Thom, Tina Roman and Stuart Pierce showing that his tractor driving skills are still there. The shock result of both George Love and Ray Gall failing to qualify shows that it is hard to get fast laptimes when you are 4 abrest! After a bit of argy-bargey getting cart 25 relegated to the scrap heap the final got underway with Kevin Dutch leading the charge but Mark Aldridge’s kart packed up after less than a lap. A couple of laps later Kevin’s kart also packed up leading us to believe that they were running out of gas. This left Jacob Aldridge hurtling in the lead aided by the fact that he had no team Carsington to take his eye off the track. Both Mark and Kevin got replacement karts (as it was fasted lap time that mattered) and Tina was once again was quietly putting in fast laps on quiet bits of the track.

In the end the official came out with the results and it was Jacob Aldridge who was the winner from Kevin Dutch and Tina Roman. Everyone agreed that it was great fun and super value (5 x 6 minute goes in the karts for just £20).

Thus we have a new Go-Kart champion – Jacob Aldridge as well as a new National Champion

Bob Carter