When we arrived in Thailand late on Tuesday night the first thing we noticed was the heat. Even at 20:00, it was 32 degrees and over 96% humidity. We then had a 2 hour journey, by air conditioned mini bus, to our base at the Sandalay Resort in Pattaya.
On Wednesday morning we went to the Pattaya kart speedway where we got to play in some TKM 2 strokes, which was great fun. It was a bit of a shock to hit the brakes and get almost no retardation, but once you got used to it, it was OK. On returning to the pits I was amazed to see that the 'brake' system was just a steel drum with a metal (copper?) strip round the outside that the brake pedal tightend onto the drum! After another fun session, we headed for some lunch and then it was off to the KR track for some more 2 stroke fun. The TKM's at this track were pretty badly maintained, with my first kart snaping its chain after 5 laps and the second being run way to rich. But this was just a taster for the next session, which was in Rotax/Tony karts. Now this was fun. They only had 4 karts, so Neil, Jack, Ian and Ewan went out together and it was great to see them circulating nose to tail for over 15 laps. Then me, kenny and Craig went out and had a ball. So our first real day in Thailand, and we had spent most of the day thrashing various karts round some nice circuits.
On Thursday, we spent the
day at The Bira race circuit, registering for the race and getting in 3 hours of practice. We had spent some of the flight studying and discussing the race regulations, but this was rendered useless when we were issued with a new set of regulations with some fairly major changes. Firstly, there would be no minimum weight, immediately putting our team of over 40s, at a distinct disadvantage. Secondly, the minimum age had been dropped to 15, which seemed to be for the benefit of Random Racing, who consisted of champion karters from Germany, Switzerland, Holland and Australia. This team were to set pole in qualifying by over 4/10ths of a second, but given that the driver who set this time was a 51kg 15 year old, we weren't surprised. The karts were supposed to be 17bhp, but I'd guess that 10bhp was more like it, as it wasn't as quick as a ProKart which has 11bhp. In practice, all of our drivers were within 2/10ths of each other with me setting the quickest time of 71.287 seconds, over 1.2 seconds off of the sessions quickest and only good enough for 18th place. However, given the fact that all teams were lighter than us, and most teams had at least one sub 60kg driver, we couldn't do much about it. We, in our race wear, are all around 80kg. All of the karts were then fitted with new tyres and we had 2 15 minute sessions to set a time. Neil and I were assigned qualifying duties, with Neil going out in the first session and setting a time of 70.487. In the second session I was out and improved our time to 70.128, which only gained us one place to 16th, which is exactly where we thought we'd be!
Friday was a day I'll never forget. We had a late (9am) beakfast and then went to meet some of the children from the Camillion centre for lunch. All of these kids are orphans with HIV, and we didn't know what to expect. We arrived to find them half way through their meal - what a
wellcome they gave us and it wasn't long before we were all getting to know a wonderful group of young people between the ages of 6 and 15. Then it was back to the KR circuit, where we all took the kids round the circuit in some 2 seater karts - they had pedals on our side only but both steering wheels connected and I was amazed by the ability of these tiny kids to turn the kart exactly where you told them. One 8yo girl in particular was inch perfect and she whooped loudly every time we exited a corner :-) I then took a boy called Ratt out - He lost his sight earlier this year and his English was as bad as my Thai, but he grabbed onto my right arm and we worked out a signaling system to let him know which way the next corner was going to be. It was an unreal experience, which he thoroughly enjoyed. Then it was off to the Elephant safari, which for me, was way scarier than driving anything! It was Sharah O's birthday and
they got all of the elephants in a circle where we could all sing Happy Birthday to her, in English and Thai - I doubt she'll ever have a birthday experience like it. Each elephant had one adult and one or two kids, and like I said, I wasn't too comfortable with it, but the kids loved it. Then it was onto what can only be desribed as a trap pulled by two cattle - Our kids decided we were in a race and asked our lady driver to get to the front, and she duely obliged - what a laugh, and we won:-)Then, it was into a real pony trap and again our driver was happy to push the pace as fast as he could - the kids were really having a ball. One of the group was a downs syndrome boy called Peter, who had taken a shine to me. He looked around 8, but I was told he was 15. We were reminded of just how unwell these kids when Peter sucumbed to the excitement of the day by being pretty sick. But he amazed me by just wipping his mouth and getting on with the days activities. Then it was time to say goodbye, which was extremely tough. Some of the stories behind these kids lives were truely shocking and I don't think we realised how much they had effected us all, until we sat in silence after they had gone. It really made us all realise why we were there, and gave us a common goal for the weekends race. After all, if we could some how win the $12k first prize, the kids would get all of it.
On Saturday we had an early start, ariving at the Bira circuit at 8:30. The race was sch
eduled to start at 12:00, but by now we were getting used to the "Thai way", and it was no surprise that the race was put back to 13:30. Jack started the race and immediately moved us up to 12th, which Neil and Ian consolidated and then I had my first time. I managed to get down to 69.576, but I found it really hard work, mostly because of the heat. We were up to 8th by this point and looking in good shape. Craig then did a great job in his session and like in practice, we were all within a few tenths. Jack and Neil maintained our momentum, but over the last few minutes of Neil's session, the temprature dropped by around 8 degrees, which improved everyone's lap times by 0.5 secons or so. This gave Neil the fastest lap (for our team) of 69.2. Within 10 minutes of Ian's second session starting, it started to rain. I quickly got suited up, and headed out in pretty wet conditions. By the end of my stint we were up to seventh and with Jack, Craig and me nominated to do the wet sessions, it looked like it was going to be a busy night for the three of us. The rain stayed pretty constant for the next couple of hours, but around midnight when I was out, the heaveans opened, and I don't mean UK type rain, I mean torrential - It was like driving in a small river and the lap times plumeted. At around 12:30 they red flagged the race coz about 4 of the corners had over 3 inches of standing water, which made driving dangerous. I'd have liked to have continued, as I seemed to be doing OK, and I couldn't believe it when the leader board showed us second - in the wet I was taking as much as 5 seconds a lap off some of the quick teams. I guess living in Scotland had it's advantages :-) We were then told that the race would restart at 5AM, so everyone, except me and Ian, headed back to the hotel for a couple of hours kip. This is where things started to go wrong. I had been the 4th kart stopped by the red flag, and I was in second place, but at the 05:00 restart, my kart was positioned in 19th place in queue in the pit lane. They then decided to let each kart out with a 5 second or so gap to the next kart, meaning that the first few karts out of the pits were allready coming past the pit exit before I even got back out. We still haven't found out how they decided on the restart line up, but we complained to the race director, who said he would deal with it l
ater. Back on the track, it was still wet, but no standing water, so I finished my session and handed over to Craig who pushed really hard and handed over to Jack who again, drove a really strong and steady session. Somehow, we had ended down in 9th place after the restart and despite our consistent times, we didn't move up, crucially having lost laps to most of the cars ahead of us after the crazy restart. The track dried up a bit and Ian and Neil rejoined the fray, but it wasn't too long before the rain returned, and it was then back to me, Craig and Jack to finish the race. We still don't know where we finished as the result for positions 4-10 are still under review. After the race we spent some more time with "our'kids and again it was heart breaking to see them leave, this time, for good :-((
The idea beind this race is great, but for it to be an on-going sucess, they need to:
1. Set a minimum weight for the kart/driver combination. In my first session (in dry conditions) I was behind a very nice Japanese guy, who went through most corners sideways, but managed to keep ahead on the straights due to his 20kg advantage. It took me 15 laps to get past him. A level playing field for all would be much fairer.
2. Enforce their penalty system. I lost count of the number of people who reacted to being overtaken (cleanly) by hitting me at the next corner. There wasn't one penalty for contact despite the lengthy section on driving standards in the regs. And it wasn't the quick drivers!
3. Sort out the pit lane speed. In the race (when it was wet), more than half the field demolished the tyre wall in the pit lane, again with no penalty. The regulations said there would be severe penalties for infingements.
4.If there is a red flag, restart in the correct order, behind the pace kart.
5.Dispose of the 1 hour driving limit per driver. The fuel tank can run the kart for around 1.5 to 1.75 hours - let that be the guide - It's an endurance race!
6. Ensure that the whole track in illuminated during the hours of darkness. There were 2 corners that you couldn't see and another couple that were marginal.
So, a great week with so many highs and a few lows. I need to thank the folk at F'Sport for giving us all such a fantastic opportunity. We all went out for a kart race, but came back memories of much more. A unique experience.
