Round Three of our FKL Pro Series season resulted in Kylo taking his first P1 podium finish, but it was not without a bit of excitement. Sorry for the long read!

.

This is Kylo's first season of karting, but we were asked to step up to Pro league based on his pace. The Pro league the Cadet class is smaller and faster, with a bit more race craft required to win. Through the season he has been trading fastest laps with another driver that has been karting for a few years. Creating a greater challenge for Kylo to progress. He is also learning the passing rules, requiring the passing driver to present more than 50% before entering a braking zone. Also if you damage your kart, you are out for the race day.

.

On this particular race day Kylo was off the lead pace, but was consistently faster than he has ever been on this course. He struggled through the day with appreciating his own growth due to not getting the fastest lap every session. Even I wondered about his desire to win as we progressed into the qualifying session with P2 secured. We had some good discussions about where he was at, his increase in pace, and small changes to make. Let me tell you, I never should have doubted him.

.

At the start of the Pre-Final, Kylo nailed the start to take P1 and lead the race for about 4 laps. Kylo eventually got passed on a turn to the inside mid corner, but he committed that move to memory. During the Final, Kylo nailed the start again and took the lead. This time taking a more defensive line to hold the inside quite effectively for about 3 laps. Unfortunately, another late move to the inside mid-corner occurred and the other driver tracked wide to force Kylo off the course. Kylo was able to get recovered, get back into the drive, and pass another driver to regain second place before the end. Kylo came off the track quite upset with being forced off mid-corner based on the rules for the passing kart, but I told him to remain calm and wait for it to be reviewed. 

.

A penalty was ultimately given to the other driver for the late lunge and forcing Kylo off the track, which provided Kylo with the P1 finish. We were both super excited for the win and both kids didn't hold any hard feelings towards each other at the end. I was more impressed with Kylo not giving up on the drive, racing to win, learning how to adapt to the race craft, and avoiding an incident. Although Kylo and I were happy with the result, the kiddo said he still wants a win based on pure pace and crossing the finish in P1. Super excited with his mindset, planning to read some driving books, and ready for the next race at Sonoma in a couple weeks.

.

IG: Chocolate_Motorsports

A fun battle for position! I could see literally nothing at all. Rotax Senior Evo at OVRP

I’m looking into a cadet kart for my son to get into the sport. I want to buy a used 206 because from my understanding there’s less speed differential and he’ll learn to drive lines and develop racecraft. I also understand he’ll probably be…hmmm…not great for the first year. so a used kart seems the way to go until he’s sure he’s gonna stick with it. anyway, my question and poorly drawn example photo shows what looks like bending to this metal bar by the nose one/bumper. however this bar looks bolted on and not structural. is this a deal breaker or is this just a bar to support the aero pieces? In the picture it’s the chrome u shaped bar bolted on by the yokes. Thanks for any info you can provide.

Shopping around for my son's next kart chassis and have come across a used Nitro kart. Being a smaller brand is there any concern for chassis parts or spares? There's no local Nitro vendor as far as I'm aware at our local club. Any other feedback on these chassis?

Hey everyone jusy brought myself an arrow senior kart to start racing dirt karts it has a rotax 125 engine non evo engine

I've snapped a chain and it has gone through the plastic chain guard and destroyed my radiator

All the replacement radiators I can find are for a layer model engine with a straight lower water neck my engine has a 90° elbow out of the engine

The radiator also has a 90° elbow on the bottom so I just use a straight water hose to connect them

From what I can figure out my engine must be an older one that had different style water necks like the second pic

P.s I have since made an alloy chain guard to avoid this pain in the ass

My Father In Law passed away last year and he was once very into NorCal kart racing. It was over 20 years ago but we still have a lot of kart stuff, including 2 complete frames and body, several engines, and a pile of new tires. Apologies since I am not sure what class the karts are, but they are lay down style and very fast. The goal is to get them to someone who may put them into service again or can use the parts. Any ideas on how to get these to someone who can use them?

My son just started go karting and is ready for a next step. We are considering buying a Tony kart EVS mini + TM 60cc we found on a second hand site.

The ask price is €1.850; the owner describes it as:

"Very neat and beautiful OTK Tony EVS (best frame for the minis) from 2023 + a TM 60cc!

Piston has been replaced, total hours of the engine are at 20x hours, so you can still go a long way in the coming hours!"

Since we are fairly new to karting, I don't know if this price seems fair. As far as i can judge from the photo's, the kart looks in good shape (apart from the tires and the brake disk needs cleaning).

Since the owner hasn't put any photos from under the kart, that's definitely something I'll check.

Would really appreciate some help/thoughts/ideas.

I see this question a lot from people considering the jump into owner karting: is this going to bankrupt me? Short answer, no, not if you go in with realistic expectations instead of just looking at the sticker price of a chassis and engine. I want to break down where the money actually goes, because once I understood the shape of it, the whole thing felt a lot less intimidating.

Quick background: Used Rotax Senior Max on a Used Formula K chassis, about sixteen hours of track time this first half-season across fourteen days at a handful of circuits.

The entry cost

Chassis plus a used Rotax engine ran me about three thousand euros. Add basic gear on top, suit, gloves, rib protector, a trolley, some tools, and you land somewhere around three and a half to four thousand euros before your first session. That number gets thrown around a lot and it scares people off, but it is a one time hit, and it is also the easiest part to plan for since you know it upfront.

The part that actually adds up

The bigger surprise for most people is not the entry cost, it is the ongoing spend. Over the season, track fees, tires, fuel, and the constant stream of small maintenance items, chain spray, oil, brake pads, bolts, a sensor here and there, added up to roughly three thousand euros as well. Individually none of it feels like much, five euros here, thirty there, but a season is a lot of individual purchases.

Here is the thing though, once you know this bucket exists and roughly how big it is, it stops being a nasty surprise and just becomes a line item you budget for like anything else.

The tire lesson I learned the hard way

I started out buying new tires because that is what seemed normal. I stopped pretty quickly. Unless you are actually chasing lap times in competition, cheap, lightly used tires are a massively better deal for casual track days. If you go to the track after a big event, you'll find whole piles of free, lightly used rubber. A used set that still has plenty of grip left costs a fraction of new rubber, and for turning laps and having fun rather than shaving tenths, the difference in performance is not worth the price gap. New tires are where a lot of new owner karters bleed money without realizing it, and it is one of the easiest costs to cut without giving anything up.

What track time actually costs you

This is the number people really want to know, and it is also the number that is easiest to get wrong. If you just take everything you spent this season and divide by your hours on track, you get a scary figure, in my case just under five hundred euros per hour. That number is misleading though, because it dumped the entire chassis and engine cost onto my first sixteen hours, and those parts do not disappear after half a season.

A more honest way to calculate it is to split your spending into two buckets. Big durable items, chassis, engine, suit, tools, get divided by the total hours you realistically expect to get out of them over their whole lifespan, not just this season. Everything that gets consumed as you go, track fees, tires, fuel, maintenance, gets divided by this season's hours, since that part scales correctly year to year.

Once I ran the numbers that way, factoring in that my chassis will probably need replacing sooner than the engine and my engine should last several seasons with proper maintenance intervals, my real cost per hour dropped to less than half the original number. Track time is genuinely a lot more affordable than the raw total suggests, you just have to stop pretending your chassis and enginegets used up in one season.

Question for people further into this than me

I would love to hear from people who have been doing this longer. What else do you do to bring the ongoing cost down beyond buying used tires? Do you batch order consumables, do more of your own wrenching, share parts or costs with other karters at your track, or is there some other trick that made a real dent in your yearly spend?

If you are on the fence about starting, my honest take is that the entry cost is the least of your worries. Budget for the ongoing stuff, buy used tires without guilt, and think in terms of cost per hour over the lifespan of your gear rather than per season, and this hobby is a lot more approachable than the scary total at the bottom of a spreadsheet makes it look.

My full cost overview, including graphs can be found here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1O1KIz36E8MzEdJWK5fzks_x3DTUtrN5ddA5vFOPHQVw/edit?usp=sharing

Me and my friends have been getting into karting a lot lately and I wanna get my own custom gear, I mainly wanna get the same Gear that Nico and Gabi wear at Audi, the Jumpsuit, Shoes and Gloves and I would like to find somewhere that will make custom helmets as I wanna have my own personalised Helmet. Many Thanks

Just very new to the sport and I feel comfortable on the track, but looking back at the pictures my knees seem a lot more bent than in pictures of other drivers that I see.

Hello. Over the weekend I picked up a used Tony Kart and it came with a Mychron 4. I am still learning (a lot) about karts and such. As far as I can tell, the Mychron doesn’t have the gps sensor. I’m not even positive it works for that matter as the battery is dead and I’ve not swapped it out yet.

I suspect the GPS is a fairly necessary item, no? The track I’ve been playing on (with a friends kart) most likely doesn’t have magnetic sensors or the beacon.

I’d rather not have to buy a 5 yet as I’m still licking my wounds from the kart purchase, but I want to be able to see some lap times when I take the kart out in a couple weeks.

What are your thoughts on what I should do?

Thanks in advance.

So I've always absolutely adored motorsport, problem was 10 years ago I was 150kg (189cm) so proper fat and as such never been able to kart, I'm down to 115kg and decided to go and have a go at indoor karting and have never had more fun in my entire life, it's the best thing I'd ever done until I went on the GX carts at my local kart track. Since then I've done maybe 10 more indoor events and 5 or so more outdoor events (just open track arrive and drive).

Long story short, I'm in love and I want to do this more, obviously at my weight I'm never going to be competitive even in a super heavyweight class but I don't really care about that I just want to race.

I don't have any friends who are in to this or know anyone who knows anything (hopefully that will change) but I guess my ultimate aim is to do some kind of owner driving and being honest a life long dream of mine is to race tin tops so maybe end up there.

But for now my vague plan is to stick to arrive and drive and maybe spend next season doing the EKS series on rental karts. Does that sound like a sensible starting point? Is there any advice you'd care to impart on a total rookie?

Hi Everyone, I am thinking about joining that track but seeing if anyone here has raced there?

Also seeing if anyone knows if they do any just unofficial predator ghost racing or if all just do the LO206 for the 4 stroke series?

Looking to get my kid a tad more into it and something me and my father could do with him.

the GFC Tm R1 at K1 Circuit is so fun

I'm 22 and finally, after 13 years of playing the Gran Turismo series on a controller (around 2k-3k hrs) and around 300-400 hours of simracing on a wheel, I finally decided to do a 30-minute session on outdoor Karting. And while it was amazing, it also hurt BADLY.

I didn't crash, but I was literally jumping in the seat like a fish in a dry.

I wasn't scared, so I was pushing really hard, but like... the G-forces were so strong for me. I'm 175 cm and ONLY 53kg. So I'm extremely light. And I kind of bruised my back from the seat so many times and so hard that I can barely move my torso...🤣Like, I have at least 5-6 different spots that hurt badly and are actually big.
I also wanted to do 30 minutes in one go but... I had to take a break after 20. I have NEVER felt so exhausted in my life before. I felt like I was gonna faint lol.
I also found it so hard to keep my feet on the pedals... because of that, I wasn't able to trail brake at all. Like bro, how tf do I even do that while cornering?? They just kept sliding away bro... Like motorsport is so EXTREMELY physically demanding. I knew it was difficult, but this is SO MUCH. But maybe it's because I'm a goddamn skeleton and 0 core muscles, eheh... And because I was barely able to keep in place, I wasn't able to be quicker, because I felt like if I pushed harder, I would not be able to physically withstand it. xD

Anyway, do you guys have any advice for future sessions? Like how to not hurt myself, and maybe advice on a position/posture how to sit better so that I get better control of my pedals?

Also, I know there are these rib protectors, but man, I wanna do karting only like once in a year or so, and spending 100 euros on that is not worth it imo. Or maybe there are some cheaper ones ideal for rental karting?

Is my engine cooked?

Hey all,

The stock seat on my Birel DD2 has got some cracks and it’s time for a new one.

I was thinking of the T11VG as a replacement. Likely the ML as I am 185lbs and 32 waist.

Just considering the Silver 20 and the Jecko units. Has anyone used those on a Birel?

Any suggestions or comparison on comfort and fit?

I’ve done two test days in a T4 and my calf keeps pulling it as im on exit or going through turns, so while im braking. Both the throttle and brake being pushed ruins clutches, and it’s getting expensive and on top of its ruining laptimes. Any advice?

Hey Everyone,

There is a Facebook business called Tracksjde Kart Supply that is based out of Quebec.

Anyone bought from them? Reputable?