Post by Tommy Vandergucht on Feb 24, 2015 5:24:36 GMT -5
Yesterday I went karting with some friends on an indoor track in Amsterdam. We did 2 sessions of 10 minutes with cheap rental karts. The last time we went karting I was much faster then my friends but this time in the first session I was about a second of the pace. Something I didn't like and I blamed the kart. It understeered like hell and I locked up the brakes every time and there was not top speed. For sure my friends were laughing at me. Then we had a break and after a while we would go for a second stint. I remembered talking to Olaf Mol (F1 commentator of Dutch TV) a long time ago at another karting track where he was with his son and he told me to always have a look when there is a break and see if the employees go out in a kart, because they mostly go out on the fastest one to set it up for a race or something. So in the break I had a look around and saw a guy doing very fast laptimes. When he came off the track he parked it on the other side, not with the normal rental karts and they started talking about the setup. So I asked them if I could go on that kart and at first they hesitated a bit but then I got it. Damn that was a lot of fun!!! This one was much more balanced and would actually oversteer on the longer turns which was great fun. Also the engine would rev up much higher giving a lot more top speed. Now I had beaten my friends and also the guy that works at the track and they started asking me questions about what I would improve about the setup so I gave them some feedback on the brakes, because I locked up the fronts again. Later on I found out I drove the second fastest time of the week, and all my other laptimes were withing a tenth. I was really surprised and also happy and the knowledge gained in iRacing really helps in real life.
I just have 1 question. My arms and fingers were falling off after 20 minutes, the steering is so heavy and it takes so much force to turn the steering wheel. Is this normal in karting or is it just the rental karts that are setup like this? John "Badoer" King
I just have 1 question. My arms and fingers were falling off after 20 minutes, the steering is so heavy and it takes so much force to turn the steering wheel. Is this normal in karting or is it just the rental karts that are setup like this? John "Badoer" King