Lucas Ellingham Racing - Honda Cadet  #99

 

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Another weekend of poor weather

Saturday practice was in torrential rain so we limited running to 5 runs just to try and dial in the kart. Unfortunately most of the team were tied up with prior engagements so major changes were restricted to dialling in the settings we already had. We noticed another new competitor running on Saturday who was on times similar, if not a bit quicker than Lucas, so noted that this may be 'interesting' on Sunday.

Sunday arrived and the rain had abated only to be replaced with sleet and snow. We hoepd the rain would return but it would prove to not be the case.

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Heat 1

Lucas headed out for Heat 1 in P2 hoping for a good run. There were some new drivers (to TKC) on the grid in mid and end positons and they soon joined Lucas at the front and proved to be the main competition (Lucas did race against one of these guys at Club 200 last week where they placed 6th in the final!).

After a hard, wet, race Lucas secured a strong 3rd position but the team identified a drastic lack of grip in comparison to his peers.



To address the grip issues the team made some radical changes to chassis setup between Heat 1 & 2 and waited to see if these would be good or bad.....

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Heat 2

Starting from P4 we were hoping that the chassis changes would help Lucas......The changes worked!!

From struggling with lack of grip in Heat 1 we found grip which put Lucas in P1 from lap 2.

Enevitably the new guys came through to pressure Lucas for the 6 of 8 laps and although Lucas drove hard got passed on Lap 6 by the eventual Final winner. It was nip and tuck between Lucas and the other newcomer until the last corner of the last lap where Lucas was hit from behind to spin him out and the other guys cross the line in 2nd.....the matter was referred to the Clerk of the Course who ruled that a place should be deducted which placed Lucas in P2.

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Heat 3

Like Heat 2 Lucas started Heat 3 from the second row P4 with his main competition in P6 & P9. Lucas executed a textbook start once again but it was soon the same 3 way fight with Lucas under pressure for all 8 laps finally finishing in P2 , which all considered was a great performance against older, more experienced competition.





















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Final

P3 start in the final could have been better but we were feeling confident that we should reach the podium. On the pre-grid it was announced that tyre selection was free so at the last minute we decided to change form wets to intermediate tyres as the track was virtually dry (apart from a couple of places).

The lights went out and by lap 3 it would seem that we had made a major mistake. The leading pair started to gap Lucas from Lap 1 and it soon turned out to be damage limitation.

By mid race we had been caught by the 2012 main competitor and although Lucas tried to hold them off they passed him and like the leading karts gapped him.

Into the closing stages of the 10 lap race Lucas was coming under pressure form one  of the mid field runners who has been steadily improving and was passed on the final turn. Lucas tucked in behind down the straight and re-passe dhim into the hairpin at the end of the straight to finally take P4 and a valuable points haul.



Not the best meeting and a disappointment not to come home with silver-ware but a much needed points haul.



next....Red Lodge Club 2000 on the 1st weekend in April.

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