KCV Round 4 Race Report: Weekend of Challenges

Trying to Rediscover the Racing "Feelings"

Only a few days after the frustration and disappointment of the last race in Jönköping, it was already time to reload, reset and get into the right headspace for the next one! This is the penultimate round of the Kart Cup West series, and with a 2nd place in the championship going into the second to last round, it was important to bounce back from the previous week’s drop in form.

Hosted by the Gothenburg Karting & Racing Club, Team 13, at their Gothenburg Karting Circuit in Gothenburg, Sweden, on the island of Torslanda, it is a sweeping track with very unique technical challenges. A super fast, slightly off-camber long and sweeping turn 1 leading into the turn two hairpin, and then a tricky and important double apex turns 3 and 4 that lead into a swooping straight and on to a mildly banked turn 6 that is tight at first and then unwinds out to the 2nd hairpin turn 7. Then turns 8 and 9 are another technical double apex combination that lead out onto the long front straight where you are full gas for more than 40% of the lap distance.

A challenging track where the team has not had a lot of opportunity to train previously, so the pre-race testing sessions on Thursday would be vital for learning the fastest way around the 1.1km circuit. Progress was made, but the times the team were putting up were not near enough to the top to give confidence going into race day.

Free Practice | 2x 5min | P8 & P12
Only two 5 minute practice sessions were scheduled for the morning before qualifying, instead of the usual 10 minute sessions, so it was hard to get a gauge on where the times were going to be. The most time was being lost in turns 3 and 4, as well as 8 and 9. The team were unsure how to proceed after these sessions as the pace wasn’t being found and hanging outside of the top 10 was not going to be sufficient to maintain the fight in the championship standings.

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​Qualifying | 10 min | P13
The team went out for qualifying having made the decision to go up a gear to try and help to power out of the corners more, but this is where it went a little bit in the wrong direction. The track had obviously rubbered up and gained grip between the practice sessions and qualifying, as well as the air and track temps rising. This meant that the gearing should have been higher from the start and gone back down for qualifying and not the other way around. Either way, pace was lacking and after a hard fought session, it was only P13 for the sprint races ahead.

Sprint Race 1 | 8 Laps | P13 —> P11
The main goal for the sprint races was to gain as many spots as possible to put ourselves in a better position for the final. Deven made a solid and aggressive start and was able to push himself up into 10th spot during the first lap. He then proceeded to attack the kart ahead and was able to gain another hard fought position during the 3rd lap. Now in P9, he couldn’t manage to pick up his pace to be able to consolidate the position, and was forced to defend, which he did for 3 more laps before getting caught out on the 2nd to last lap and lost two positions back to 11th. He wasn’t able to recover and had to settle for 11th in the end. It was movement in the right direction, but as the field was so tight is was clear it was going to be an uphill battle even on good form to climb into the top 5 or 6 today.

​Sprint Race 2 | 8 Laps | P13 —> P13
This is where the day fell off the rails. Deven’s start was tentative, there was no attacking racing and no explosive start. Lapping at around half a second slower than the previous race, he quickly lost touch with the karts ahead and now was being pressed from behind as well, and had to fight just to maintain his starting position. It was an uneventful and disappointing race, not only from a result perspective, but also from a speed point of view. Scratching their heads, the team tried to find out where things had gone wrong. It became clear that it was just not on mentally for our young driver and that he needed to get into e better mindset for the final race that was to come. It was going to be a hard slog if any positives were going to be taken away from the day.

Final | 12 Laps | P12 —> P9
After the results of the sprint races, our man Deven would be lining up in 12th spot for the final, up one grid place from his qualifying position, but now on the outside going into the first corners. It was a step forward, albeit a small one, and starting on the outside of the gird is never an advantage. He made the best he could of the situation, getting a good aggressive start, but was unable to capitalize on it, gaining one spot but losing one as well in the first lap, crossing the line in the same position he started, 12th. After a good move for a pass into the first hairpin on the third lap, Deven’s inexperienced race craft let him down a bit. He had worked himself into a good position to make his move on the next driver ahead, got alongside and beat him to the apex, but then allowed the other kart to come out the outside of him again and he lost the position back and the momentum he had built up. By the time he caught back up a few laps later, he couldn’t quite get himself in a similar position and was stuck behind despite being clearly quicker. It was unfortunately a familiar tale to tell, reminding us of the final last week in Jönköping. In the end, after some drama in the lead pack, Deven crossed the line in 10th place and was promoted to 9th after a disqualification for unfair driving was handed out ahead of him.

Found our rhythm too late in the day and then couldn't really hold on to that consistently. Showed better pace in the Final, but getting stuck behind when we were quicker was frustrating, especially when the opportunities were there. Improvement from last week for sure, but still not nearly at the level we were at before the summer, so still a lot of work to do, obviously."
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​~ Dan Grabko, Team Principal

It was really tough today, I had a lot of trouble finding a line around the track I was happy with, so felt like I was experimenting most of the day, even into qualifying and the races. This didn't help anything and I was frustrated almost the whole day. Gotta get my groove back!"
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~ Deven Grabko, Race Driver

Summary
It was a day that showed a few rays of light that we are going back in the right direction, but there was much more on the table for the team here that was not taken. It was a decent result but with only one round to go in the Kart Cup West series, it is going to be a very tough challenge going into the final round, which is to be held on the 17-18 of September at the Glomming Ring in Uddevalla, Sweden.

Grabko GP would like to thank its sponsors and partners, without whom we wouldn’t be able to compete at all:
Improx Customs | Profil #461 | The Techno Creatives | Dumpling X Sweden | Elevate: Bespoke IoT Platforms | Weret: Surf Watches from Sweden

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