Jay Coul took on the final round of the Australian Kart Championship at the Go Kart Club of SA with a chance to become Australian Champion. Coul has been a regular front runner in the premier KZ2 Gearbox class out of the Shamick Racing Parolin Australia stable team.
Jay started Friday practice in positive fashion setting the fourth fastest time of the day. Coul’s Friday unfortunately went downhill due to pace lacking out of his package with Saturday morning qualifying the start point of his final round. Coul went out for qualifying looking to avenge his Friday afternoon disappointment and fight his way back to the front of the grid. The Snap on Tools backed entry headed out on the track but was still lacking the pace and package by the star driver’s usual standards. Jay hovered around the edge of the top ten and threw all his driver ability at the qualifying session. Coul came home in position eleven overall in a hectic and trying session. The Shamick Racing entry was only three tenths of a second of pole position just showing the competitiveness of the gearbox class.
Coul was looking to get his weekend back on track in heat number one, but was unfortunately involved in someone else’s incident, with the bad luck continuing. Jay drove his heart out but due to the earlier incident could only come home in position sixteen overall in what was a tough start to his weekend.
Coul and the team were looking to heat two to try and turn their hard luck story of a weekend around. The Parolin Australia driver settled into position thirteen by the end of lap one. Unfortunately, any good luck for Coul had deserted him as another incident through no fault of his own, put him to the rear of field and out of the second heat.
Due to his results Coul was starting out of position nineteen overall. With his Australian title hopes all but gone, Jay was just looking to make progress forward up through the field. The Midfield Group backed entry got a great jump and moved up three positions on the opening lap of the race. Coul then made another move making his way into the top fifteen race. Jay, making up four spots, came home in position fifteen overall in a fight back to end the day. After an extremely tough day, Coul was looking to Sunday hoping to turn his weekend around.
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Sunday was upon Coul and he was looking to finish his Australian Kart Championship in style and bring home a strong result. Starting out of position seventeen Jay got a great start, leaping up four spots into position thirteen. The Shamick Racing karter made another move in the back stages of the race to be position twelve. Coul crossed the line in position twelve but was relegated to position fourteen due to a drop down penalty.
Position seventeen was the starting point for the final and the aim was to move as far forward as possible. The Parolin Australia backed entry got another lighting start moving up five spots on the opening lap and looking to move forward. By lap six Jay had made his way into the top ten and was making up spots hand over fist. In what was a fantastic fight back to end the weekend, Coul had made his way up the field and was classified sixth overall by the final completion.
Coul spoke post-race of the hard weekend he’d had and the tough COVID season. “Our first practice was positive finishing in fourth but unfortunately we went backwards as the day progressed. Qualifying was disappointing and both opening heats we were caught up in incidents. Unfortunately, we started seventeenth in the final due to our Saturday results. We were able to work our way up to sixth place in the final with a fast enough kart for a podium, if we had track position. Due to this we dropped to fourth in the championship, we hope for less restrictions next year in Victoria to enable us to have a more competitive year”.
Coul will be defiantly one to watch in the 2022 edition of the Australian Kart Championship
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