KCV Round 3 Race Report

​Have another!

Torrential rain was the order of the day for the third round of the Karting Cup West Series. Held at the Team 13 Track, the same venue as the Gothenburg Grand Prix of only a few weeks ago, this was going to be a much more challenging circumstance.

But it was the same for everyone, and as the team readied for the coming day with the rain pouring down, energy was positive after the first round of the series saw the rookie in 4th spot in this championship coming into the weekend.

With funds and resources running low for the rest of the 2021 season, and this being the penultimate race of the season, it was two sets of worn, used rain tires that were the options for the team. The first practice session revealed the challenge the day was going to be on used tires, as the forecast was not for continuous rain, and the expectation was that the track would be able to dry out a little bit as the day went on.

However this was not the case. Instead of a few showers scattered throughout the day, it was an almost continuous downpour the whole day, with shorter periods of lighter drizzle breaking up the proper rain.

​We still somehow came home with a bit of hardware. Go figure! That is racing sometimes.

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The track was so wet that there was standing water in several key braking areas of the track, and fresh rain tires would allow for much better braking traction. Unfortunately this was not available to our little warrior, and he had to make due with what he had.

​He fought on valiantly, but could only manage a 12th position in qualifying. Things got worse as well, as a start motor casing failure caused a delay in the pre-grid and thus the #14 GrabkoGP machine ended up a half lap behind on the formation lap. The race stewards made the decision to start the race in any case and not take an extra formation lap to allow the kart to catch up to the pack. Then mysteriously the black and white flag was shown on our next lap around the track in last place, with the start finish steward motioning our driver into the pit, which he duly followed, thus ending his race before it even started.

In the aftermath the Race Director made a visit to the team tent, apologizing for the miscommunication, noting that the wrong information was forwarded on to the on-track official, resulting in both the wrong flag being shown to the driver as well as the wrong gesturing to enter the pit.

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The damage had already been done, though. A DNF in the first sprint race meant that it would be extremely difficult to move up the field for the final regardless of the race result of the 2nd sprint race - this especially because on pace the team were already lacking and could only realistically expect a 10-12th place finish at best.

The 2nd sprint race wasn’t quite a best case scenario either. Starting 12th and ending up 13th, running in 11th most of the race and defending well until he lost out avoiding a spinning kart ahead which allowed the kart behind to take advantage and slip through.

So a DNF in Sprint 1 and a 13th place finish in Sprint 2 saw the little man lining up 16th for the final. It was a bitter pill to swallow for everyone, but there was still hardware to fight for and so that is what The Kid focused on.

He got off to a good start, making up two places off the start, and kept his head in a truly testing race of attrition which meant that keeping the kart actually on track was a huge challenge in itself. Even the pole sitter and leader of the final crashed out in the conditions, with others spinning off left and right as well.

​Deven drove like he was on his tippy toes through the corners, making sure he kept himself pointing straight with his almost useless worn out rain tires, and as such lacked the outright pace to take himself further up the field, but due to the conditions found himself halfway through the race running in 12th.

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It was heartening for the whole team to see his fighting spirit, and having taken himself up those 4 positions, he was doing well defending from behind as a couple of those who had spun out earlier were catching up and putting on the pressure.

He was even gaining on the 11th and 10th placed karts ahead when the 10th placed racer lost it in the final hairpin, and the 11th placed driver only several meters ahead of Deven was forced to make evasive maneuvers. He managed to keep himself pointing in the right direction, but right into the line Deven had chosen to take.

Thus he was forced to make a last second correction out to the wide side of the track and lost so much time that even though he went around the spun out kart successfully, he ended up a net 13th as the 2 karts chasing him behind were able to slither by with more time to react and take the much preferred inside line.

Then to add insult to injury, the original spinner was able to catch up Deven and pass him on the second to last lap, meaning that in the end he took the checkered flag in 14th as he crossed the start/finish line for the last time.

It was a bit of a let down given how hard he had fought and worked himself into a decent position.

The Kid was open about his challenges on the day. “I am really disappointed with 14th today, but I just didn’t feel as comfortable in the rain as some of these other guys, and I just couldn’t seem to get the same kind of grip as the other guys out there either. I was basically on ice skates, man! Afraid I was going to lose it and spin out on almost every corner. It was a real fight today just to bring the kart home every session!”

Chief Mechanic, Dan was equally keen to let his feelings be known. “Yeah, our tent broke apart during setup this morning, we had a start motor casing explode on the pre-grid for the first Sprint, we had a miscommunication from the race officials, and we didn’t even have the proper equipment for the conditions today. We still somehow came home with a bit of hardware. Go figure! That is racing sometimes.”

This being the penultimate race of the season for the team, with next week being the 4th round of the KCV series in Skövde! Deven still lies in 6th spot in the KCV championship standings after this round, so there is everything to race for in the final race of the season.

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