The Go Kart Club of SA – 26/5/2017 to 28/5/2017

We had everything going for us for this round of the national series.  It was a short trip to the track, as the racing was to be held a Jim’s home track – The Go Kart Club of SA at Monarto in South Australia.

The race meet started off OK, with practice on Friday.  Jim was 16th in the first practice, and 22nd in practice 2.  We made a couple of changes and Jim was 3rd fastest in practice 3 and 7th fastest in practice 4, giving us a good indication we had the setup pretty right for the rest of the weekend.

….and this was where things started to go wrong.  Jim qualified OK in 14th, but he had lost a bit of pace.  This showed in heat 1, where he could only move forward 1 spot to finish in 13th.

Jim was involved in an incident in heat 2, which pushed him to the back of the field at the start.  He worked his way back to finish in 29th, but still lacked the pace from Friday.

Jim still lacked pace in Heat 3, and finished in 15th.

I think you can guess where this led to on Saturday night.  Start the inspirational music, hit play on the montage scene, and experience the thrill of world class mechanicking.  We diagnosed an engine issue, and made some changes on Sunday morning.

Jim was again involved in an incident which dropped him back near the rear of the field.  This also bent his steering.  He recovered and worked his way back to finish 19th.

Jim started the final in 18th, and we looked to have sorted most of the issues.  He got a reasonable start, but had no drive on the back straight, and dropped to the back of the field.  The problem seemed to come good, and Jim worked his way forward.  The problem returned – Jim fell back.  This happened through the final with Jim going from the rear of the field up to 22nd then finally finishing in 34th.

A post mortem showed a failed spark plug had caused the issues.  I’m sensing the hand of Christine, but this seems rather subtle.  There is a pattern developing of some wierd things happening to Jim during the final races, so this could be the Christine curse in some other guise.  I am considering some form of blood sacrifice at the next race in order to give Jim a fighting chance though.

The current score:

JP -> 3 (Survived 2 weeks without hurting himself, use of Angle Grinder Persuasion, Ancient Spirit Mumbo Jumbo)

Christine -> 8 (Burn by exhaust, Degreasing of the eye, Magical Goggle Piercing Metal bit, Special Combo, Epidermal Peel, Degrease, Rinse, Repeat, 98 Octane Eye Wash, Inappropriate Tool Grabbing).