Under 18 World Champs - A New Zealand Model?

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Permalink Reply by Steven Gaskell on June 17, 2011 at 12:58

t's the best recipe to promote good competitive racing. In the UK, the Universities have a championship, and all the karts are supplied by Club 100, identical chassis and engines. They take it a step further and don't allow you to even tune the setup, you race it how it comes. It's the only karting championship I know where base rookies are up against European K drivers, Formula Renault drivers, and your Joe Club Karter. And the differences are less than you might think.

 

However, it does not run under the jurisdiction of the MSA or CIK. A similar series under that jurisdiction would take some doing.

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Permalink Reply by Greg Neaves on June 19, 2011 at 17:01

The concept of a fixed development chassis and a common 'crate' engine is probably our best bet for a suitable replacement for Junior Restricted.

 

There are already a number of similar classes in concept set up in different places around the world.

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Permalink Reply by Steven Gaskell on June 19, 2011 at 18:24

It's much easier said than done...

 

How do you get a fixed-chassis class? You need the manufacturers to come forward with tenders to effectively underpin the series. And what happens when the chosen manufacturer withdraws? Not only do you have to find a new manufacturer, everyone in that class needs to buy a new chassis. If not done properly, it can easily get more expensive than the current system. Even phasing in a class like this would be expensive as everyone involved would need a new kart and engine. You don't need me to tell you the economic climate.

 

A second option is for a business entity to set up the class, and they underpin the series. The karts are owned by them and leased by racers. They can chop and change the karts as they feel, but then we run into maintenance - who pays for and what happens to damaged karts? If a couple are written off, then two new chassis are brought in, which are 6 months / a year newer than the rest of the series. How is this made fair? With this option you also lose the 'my kart' side of things, it becomes a lot less personal. When I was little, my own kart was a very big thing. I cleaned it, I looked after it, it was mine and nobody else's. Economic climate thing equally applies.

 

And one thing both of these options means is... most manufacturers are going to miss out on selling karts, and someone is going to be selling loads, you could be undermining someone's business or worse case put them out due to a reduction in sales. Karting isn't just getting expensive for the racers, reduced karters means it's harder for our karting-dependent businesses to keep going as well.

 

In my opinion, such a system would only work where there is a tangible reward for the kart manufacturers. It needs to be worth their while, and by that we're talking bottom line figures. There is no point them tendering a kart for a class which has no guarantees or doesn't get them a profit. Especially in this economic climate. If you can get 20 drivers to put fair money on the table for a single chassis / engine 'JR' series, we might get somewhere.

 

It's a tricky situation - a change like this is looking to produce good low cost competitive racing. Unfortunately the change itself will be expensive for those already in the class who will have already spent significant costs to get where they are, and suddenly have their gear with no resale value. What do you do, run it as a hybrid class to begin with? Run it as a hybrid class where you can use old gear at club level, but need the tendered kart and engine for any B rated meetings?

 

Anyhoo, someone else can talk.

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Permalink Reply by Aarron Cunningham on June 20, 2011 at 9:22

A great idea in theory but we all know that every chassis and engine is not created equal. All of a sudden people start looking for slight variations in motors and those that can afford it buy 4 and choose the best one. Same goes for chassis all the way down to the most mundane part. How do you police this or is it even fair to stop those that have money and are motivated from doing the testing? 

 

Someone smarter and with more balls than me can deal with this.

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Permalink Reply by Graeme Moore on June 20, 2011 at 18:10

Ahh in Mr Gaskell's post above regarding when one considers a fixed standard kart is probably the key to why this idea may as well be shut down: "most manufacturers are going to miss out on selling karts"

We simply don't have the scale I would think to make a stand alone work: The closest you get as you guys rightly point out is commercial hire options

 

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Permalink Reply by Steven Gaskell on June 20, 2011 at 18:46

This would be the other option... 'importing' a series.

 

http://www.easykart-usa.com/concept.html

 

But again you'd need someone to take on a substantial responsibility and be willing to p off the rest of our karting economy . Couple this with us not really having enough karters in New Zealand to fill out the series we have already have, never mind adding another, and we run into problems.

 

What you could do, maybe, is formalise the schools championships. However, I'm not sure how that works at the moment, or how much appetite there is for change.

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