Endurance racing - advice please

[Lorna]

Hi guys, my first posting in the karting forum!

I have been karting a couple of times before but in a couple of weeks time I'll be entering a 2 hour race with myself and 3 other members. Has anyone got any tips as we are a bit new to this?

[marcus]

welcome to the forum Lorna.
firstly i would say try and do plenty of exercises to keep yourself a little fit , i know it is only a few weeks away but fatigue will be the main contributor to making a mistake ..and i would say even just a little more fitness than you are now will help alot.

tell us more about it if you could..i have never driven in an enduro but have always fancied it ...what kind of kart is it ??/ and what kind of track will you be driving on ???

and of course how do you think you will go??? and when it is over come back and let us know how you did.

how long will your driving stints be ???
try and practise your driver changes if you can ..alot of time can be made up here ..easier to make it up in the pits than on the track thats for sure...and it can also work the other way by losing alot of time in there.

anyway good luck and i look forward to reading all about it

[Lorna]

Well Marcus, it seems that they think I'm the flipping expert cos my interest is motorsport. Haha is what I say to that!!!

The track is Daytona at Milton Keynes. http://www.daytona.co.uk/venues.htm

I have no idea what karts they use but I remember they were fast!

I only managed 1 minute 19 secs when I was there last when more experienced drivers were banging out 1.10. It will only be my 4th time out on the track so I am still learning. Have been taught racing lines and stuff in a car but not a Go Kart - it is so different! Had a go with work mates last night at Northampton which is what I class as a fun track - it's a 30 second track. My team came second though and I was one of the fastests drivers in my team.

It's a 2 hours stint so we guessed that we all do 30 minutes each. Is that too long to stay out for?

[Warwick]

Providing you are fit enough 1/2 hr is no problem,the less driver changes you do the better,
four drivers for a 2 hour race is doing it easy,when they run our annual 2hr we are restricted to 2 drivers,
I only attempted it once.
Linda drove the first 1/2 hour then I went out for 1/2 hour and the kart died at the 65 minute mark just after she got back in,I have never been so knackered in all my life or so glad to have a mechanical failure.
The fast guys did one driver change at the 1 hour mark and made it look easy,
some of them now use water bottles so they can drink on the go.
If you get the chance try driving a 1/2 hour stint and see what its like and good luck!

[woodyracing]

ive done hour long non stop stints a few times, and boy is it hard work! my legs were like jelly when i got out. some training definatly helps!

[marcus]

sounds like alot of fun Lorna.
unfortunately i couldnt get the link you posted to work so i couldnt check it out.
are you sure that it is correct?

any track with the name Daytona in it has to be pretty good I reckon

[philneast]

We have regular 2 hour enduros at our local indoor kart centre, in their hire karts.

One thing we do is put the quick driver out first, then as the field spreads out the slower, usually less experienced, drivers can take a few laps to get into rhythm without being in the middle of the pack.

[mac]

I raced in one 2hr race a couple of years back. We did one hour each. Our goal was to take it like a bit of a test session. Try and qualify as well as possible. Then take your time getting into a rhythm. That is, if someone is pressuring you hard, and they have a couple of go's at you, let them go, and concentrate on rhythm and saving your tyres a bit. Hopefully, by the end of the stint, your tyres will still be in good nick, you'll be in a nice rhythm, and you'll be the one on the attack. Of course, if you start losing huge amounts of time early, it's time to get back on it. It worked well for us, we finished second.

[Lorna]

Thanks everyone for your advice! I think we are all pretty fit (I'm probably the worst, actually!). I did 15 minutes at Daytona no problems but never stayed out there for 30 minutes.

Marcus, the link worked for me. The url is http://www.daytona.co.uk/ and then click on Venues and then Milton Keynes.

Good point about putting fastest out first. Will remember that! I was weighing up driver changes and leaving people out there too long which means they get tired and their lap times fall. One of our drivers has changed now and he is a more experienced driver so we should have a better chance now

I suppose you lot want a race report after the event!

[marcus]

yes 1000 words would do fine thanks

and the link works now...cheers

[Rache]

Hi Lorna

Is it another Media day, if so let me know if you have a free space if anyone drops out! I was at MK again on Saturday with bookatrack.com, we did a 40 minute sprint and I kicked 21 male arses and won by 6 seconds heheh, best lap time 1:11.076

Good luck!!!

Rache

[Kelvin]

I wanna race next time too!!

Kelvin

[Lorna]

Thanks guys!

Unfortunately noone dropped out so we couldn't accomodate, although, Rache - we could have done with you! The best lap time that my team did was 1.13. My best was 1.18 which was one second off my last (and first) attempt at MK Daytona.

The evening did not bode well for me as I am full of flu . There were teams turning up in their race suits and my colleagues thought that they were gonna do well but I tried convincing them that there would be teams there who have had just a tad more practice than us! Their enthusiasm became deflated after 30 minutes into the race! The kart we had in practice had a fuel supply problem which wasted a lot of our time. I went out for 10 minutes in the race (starting from the back of the grid) and was too ill and tired to carry on. Then Rakesh went out and did some okay times. Ben went out and did some even better times and then David went out and managed to move us up to second from last! We still had fun and will be doing it again. If anyone is interested then I will post in here and if we can make up more than one team then all the better!

It cost £130 ish for the four of us.

Thanks again for all of your words of wisdom and encouragement!

[marcus]

hardly 1000 words Lorna
but i forgive you seeing as ya have the flu and all.

as long as you had fun thats the main thing..so you finished 2nd then did you ????

not a bad effort ..now you know whats involved next time you will do alot better by being a bit better prepared and maybe even not having the flu.

sounds likes ablast to me ..wish there was something like that around my area.

[Lorna]

Tut! I failed my essay assignment, Marcus

It was a good laugh and I hope to do it again when I am better. Yes, I am still suffering