[Fot] Firebird Main Race Report - November 25

[David W. Riddle]

The son, Tyler, had an endurance race on his 125 shifter kart this afternoon.

The kart had run well at the last event so we have not made any 
changes to it.  Then this morning just prior to the practice session 
Tyler decided he wanted to try and adjust the throttle cable to help 
the kart idle better (well, actually to idle at all).  Adjusted the 
cable and off he went to the grid but the kart was activing odd so he 
asked me to take the tension back out of the cable.  Thought I 
did.  He heads out for the track at increasing amounts of 
throttle.  When he approached he first corner where he would need to 
lift the throttle did not want to cooperate and he had to kill the 
engine there in the first turn.  Missed ALL but about 100 yards of 
practice.  Not real helpful for dusting the cobwebs off.

Got the kart back to the paddock after the session and made sure to 
get rid of the tension in the cable.  Gave the rest of the kart a 
once over and pronounced it ready .

Head out for Qualifying with some sticker tires mounted.  Not sure 
how many karts but it was a lot.  Not as many as last months 48 karts 
but certainly more than 30.

Qualifying went well except for a short black flag incident where 
another kart also had a stuck throttle and did not end as well as 
Tyler's incident.  First reports we heard on grid was a "broken 
ankle".  Turned out to be a broken axle. Big difference!  The kart 
did flip and the driver did play superman but other then some bruises 
he was ok.

I was blown away with Tyler's qualifying effort.  No practice laps, 
just 7 full laps run in qualifying and he ended up third!

The really amazing thing however was seeing the times posted by the 
top four karts.

Pole:	1:06.507
2nd:	1:06.692
3rd:	1:06.865
4th:	1:06.870

Beat out fourth place by 5 one thousands of a second!  That's close.

Feel good moment.  The top 6 places were all filled with karts 
running purpose built ICC motors other then us running our Honda moto 
125.  Definitely hitting above his weight today.

The really warm fuzzy was the fact that the fourth placed kart and 
driver took 2nd in class at the SKUSA SuperNationals this past week 
in Las Vegas (over 400 kats!).

The race.  Not so much.

The only thing we changed was the plug.  Put in one that is a step 
hotter.  Were that close in qualifying I think that maybe that might 
help.  Don't want to change too much.

Supposed to be a 45 minute endurance race which will require pit 
stops for a splash and dash of fuel to make the distance.

Got a bad start (yet again - need to have him work on that) and he 
dropped back to about 11th.  Started working his way back up and was 
making up places.  We could see him driving the wheels off the thing 
as he came around the Tower Turn.  Hugging the inside line to 
decrease the distance around the turn and fighting to catch the kart 
with handfuls of opposite lock as it skipped and bounced across the 
bumpy exit.  On lap 17 (about 18 minutes) into the race we don't see 
him come back around.  We figure we missed him so we kept 
watching.  Nope.  The group he had been running with came back around 
and he wasn't there.

Figure something is wrong and he his back at the paddock.  Lug the 
fuel jug and the water bottles back to find him he's not there.  Walk 
over to the fence.  See three karts off in the dirt (nowhere near 
each other however) and we see a complete front spindle, wheel and 
brake rotor lying in the dirt.  He's not there either.

Get in the truck to drive over to the "Looper" to se if he's off over 
there.  Yep there he is.  See two other karts off in the area 
too.  Also not anywhere near each other.

Tyler said the kart bogged and sputtered on the start and took 
another lap before it started to feel ok.  The downloaded data from 
the kart bears that out.  Pace lap 2:02, Lap 1 1:22, Lap 2 1:10, Lap 3 1:08...

He pulled off with what sounds like a problem in the transmission 
with no power getting to the wheels.  Hope it's not too bad.  It's 
got compression, the plug looks good and it rolls in neutral without 
hearing anything that sounds like a "bag of marbles".  We'll clean up 
the kart this week and pull the motor to get it over to our engine builder.

Hope to fight another day.