Words & video by Kev “The Noise” Davies
Well what a race day we had once again at Ipswich kart club last weekend, 149 racers showing up for the last round of the 2018 championship! It was run smoothly, efficiently and gave the watching crowds some of the best racing possible.
KA4 Junior, Yet again these juniors were all super competitive. Having shown really good speed early on, Oscar Targett just came up short and brought it home in 5th. Having started on the front Ryan Newton was a favourite to bag a podium finish but he too just failed to get there and finished 4th. From a second row start it was Corsa apparel driver #58 of Annabelle Rolfo that came through to 3rd. After starting from pole the relative new comer to the class the #26 of Ethan Feather very nearly got a win and came home second! But what a magnificent drive from the #57 of Kurtis Tennant to eventually hunt down Feather take the lead and the win!
TaG Restricted Light up next and yet another dominant performance by that familiar #25 kart of Ashley Davis. He was in unstoppable form all day and came away with a comfortable win. Doing his level best to challenge all day was eventual second place finisher #27 Dallas Oksanan just 0.894 and also recording the fastest lap. Bringing it home in 3rd was the ever present #97 of Liam Moyse who was competitive all day. Having started the final in 18th, Jeremy Glover drove the wheels off the #48 kart to just squeeze past Melanya Rudd and finish 7th but even though he caught them he could not quite get past Mitch Campbell in 4th, Jared boys in 5th and Harrison stock in 6th.
In the KA3 Senior class, Jai Brown could do no wrong all day and got a clean sweep, winning the final by almost 2 seconds! Doing his level best all day to hold to Brown was none other than the turkey man Lachlan Nichols, and they seemed to be battling all day for the final podium position, and it was the blingy man Dale Zimmerman just getting it from Lewis Herwin!
This weekend saw the return of the Open Performance class to Ipswich and all day the battle raged between Harrison Hoey in the #97 Energy kart & #6 of the iceman Sammy Houston. It wasn’t quite half way through the final when Hoey made his decisive move for the lead and never looked back, coming home third. But just not able to go with the pace of the front two was Brendan Nelson, the DD2s of Dustin McKenna & Nathan Waldon came home 4th & 5th.
Then it was time for the Cadet Beginners to shine as they were given another 4 demonstration runs with dummy starts. Leading them home was little Angus Hare, Raphiel lafaele came over the line second and finishing 3rd was Clare Twigt, all three of them giving it there all!
What a day of racing again from the Cadet 12s and you would have been forgiven for thinking the Ormeau flyer “Welzie” would romp away with the win having put the #25 JC kart on pole and won all the heats, but the visitor from Singapore #45 JC Kart of Yevan David posted the fasted lap time in the final and won it by 3.021 second from the hard charging “cool hand “ Luke Trost, who just got the better of Jack Wells by a second. Great drives also from Beau Bromhead & Jordan Ensby that saw them get 4th & 5th respectively.
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The KA3 Junior saw another epic battle between Jack Hotter & Tommy Cooper. It was Hotter who put it on pole in qualifying and won 2 heats but Cooper’s relentless dominance of this class came to fore again as he won a heat and the all important final! Coming home third was the super fast Ryan Newton and Jacinta Hoey bagged 4th.
Moving onto TaG Restricted Masters and “Straughney” Phil Straughen demolished the opposition! Gary Payne in the #45 kart just had no answer and settled for second, finishing third was Mike Warren.
TaG Restricted Medium had a much bigger field and many more dramas. The pace at the front from Ashley Lester couldn’t be matched by anyone. His closest rival Gregory Hines was almost 2 seconds behind in second and in third it was Andrew Gilliam. It was a case of close but no cigar for “Kimi” Angus Mathers who just missed out on a podium coming home 4th.
In Cadet 9, ya have to feel for “Dima” Basilio Micale who qualified quickest, won a heat and was second in two more but just fell short in the final and came home 4th. A great drive from James Cittolin saw him home in 3rd and driving just as well Jake Santin got a fabulous second but what a fabulous win for yet another JC kart, this time Paddy Buckley!
TaG Light once again proved to be super competitive and Eryn Osborne just missed the podium finishing 4th. Just beating her to the podium was Ben Jurczak and he just lost out out to the latest recruit to team JC kart of Scotty Sorensen. But none of them were a match all day for the speed of Marc Tulloch, winning by 0.5 of a second!
TaG Heavy was one of the most bizarre finals I’ve ever seen. After starting from the rear in the heats, Brendan Nelson made his way to an eventual front row start in the final. From there he proceeded to pull away from the field and looked set for an easy win – until the Commentators Curse struck and his exhaust came loose forcing him to retire! But the drama didn’t stop there – Clem O’Mara and Christopher Williams just needed to continue to get 1st and second but for some unknown reason they pulled into the pits after the white flag! Rudy Farkas continued on, as did Ben Edwards and Ben Rodgers and they ended up the 1,2,3. Quite extraordinary…
- Results can be found HERE
Kev “the noise” Davies
Signing off
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