Fun meeting
Awful weather – fabulous entry! Just short of 100 entries on a wet, cold and foggy Sunday morning was surprising. I believe that the split start for WF and Prokarts worked well (once Mark Reay cottoned on!). How ever in the last few days John Dryden from Prosport has proposed a Championship for WF with support from Prosport and Zoom. We will separate the WF karts from prokarts which will keep everyone happy. Full details available on request or from the website.

The Cadet final ended under a cloud as the Starter got confused. He correctly put out the last lap board to the leaders but then missed them on the next (final) lap with the chequered flag. Having realised his mistake he let everyone pass him then flagged the karts next time round. Unfortunately two or three karts pitted before the flag went out meaning that the result was incorrect. Peter took the decision to declare the result as it stood at the end of the correct lap (i.e. lap 12). Apologies to those who feel robbed.

Transponders are crucial to accurate timing and lap scoring. As it does appear that large grids are to be the norm at the Fun meetings I have sourced another 30 transponders for use at future meetings. This will allow competitors to hire them at
£10 a time rather than buying them at £145. As from the next meeting on 5th June we will be timing all Cadets as well as the Prokarts with no manual lap scoring. This means that the cost of taking part will now be £ 40 for Cadets and Prokarts unless you provide your own transponder. As you know large grids are difficult to manually lap score so I am certain that you will appreciate the reasons for taking this step.

Many thanks to Malcolm & Marion Fell and the committee at Cumbria Kart Club for helping us out with the loan of their transponders.

Visors
Visibility is crucial for safe racing. Poor conditions i.e. rain & fog can render tinted visors useless. If you insist on using a tinted visor make sure you have a clear visor available as and when conditions deteriorate.

Practice for the fun meetings is now in sessions due to the large entry. Please arrive early and give yourself plenty of time to sort out your kart. It is unlikely that we will have more than 2 practice sessions per class as we intend to start with Drivers Briefing at 10 am.

World Formula
Zoom, Prosport and Karting North East have joined forces to offer a WF Championship. It will be run as part of the Fun meetings but as a separate class with 3 heats of 12 laps, a Pre final and Final. Prizes are on offer so please visit
the KNE website or ring Emma for full details.

Kevlar Seat Protectors
Gavin Kirby has developed a seat protector to fix under your kart seat to prevent damage caused by kerbs etc. Made from Kevlar and tested for many months it is cheap and effective. If interested contact Gavin on 07979 522233 (Senior Max 666) Cost £10 each.

Intro To Karting for Junior Drivers (10-14 years old)
We are starting a club for juniors at Warden Law who do not have their own karts. We have provided initial training or Inductions for some time. This will be the next step where we will provide training and structured practice. Once a junior is competent they can enter a monthly race night. This is likely to be on Sunday evenings starting with the 10 – 14 year age group. The format will be three heats of 6 karts followed by a Final for each driver. Talk to Quinton, Don or Ian if interested. A promo email will be circulated shortly.
Ps. why not tell your friends about this easy way to start kart racing.

Warden Law Kart Club
We welcome three new faces to WLKC committee being John Johnston, Bob Shipman and Alison Johnston as secretary.

Sadly the May meeting got off to an unpleasant start on the Friday evening with the unpleasantness continuing throughout the weekend. KNE has employed a nightwatchman for several years who felt so intimidated by the abuse he received from karters that he left. All he was doing was sticking to the guidance given to him as regards parking up. KNE staff stayed until 7.30 pm with the intention of returning at 7.30 am on the Saturday to park up those who arrived during the night. Three competitors arrived at 9 pm with two more at 2.45am and one more at 5
am i.e. hardly enough to keep anyone from the committee at the circuit to park up. The driver held to blame for the verbal abuse was asked to leave the circuit on Saturday morning which he did.

On Sunday we had two senior Max drivers involved in a fight resulting in them having their licences suspended. Two more (junior) parents were also involved in ongoing verbal abuse towards each other that required a lot of time from the Clerks in trying to keep the peace. Add to that the usual grief directed at the Clerks from parents who dislike decisions made by officials on the circuit and you now understand why it is so difficult to persuade anyone to officiate at club meetings.

At the next club committee meeting on Tuesday 31st May the committee will consider a proposal to ban 5 drivers and / or their parents from club events for a specified period. Any decision by the WLKC committee will be extended by KNE to a ban from the premises for the same period. If any one has a point to make about one or more of the drivers / parents involved please let Anne Laws have them in writing before the committee meeting. All letters will be kept confidential. The committee would prefer that all communication on this matter be in writing
thus avoiding any misunderstandings arising from the content of a conversation being misconstrued.

On a brighter note the grids were good and the racing, by and large, excellent. There was an unacceptable level of contact and damage in Senior Max which can only be blamed on the driving standards of the drivers involved. High
repair costs will deter drivers from taking part. Pushing the kart in front into a mistake i.e. first lap on the Dog Leg is a good example. Please give this point some thought. Overall the meeting went well. Sadly two Cadets fell foul of the technical regulations and were excluded from the results. If you have a Trulli Cadet kart please talk to Nigel at HRS to avoid falling foul of the regs regarding side pods.

Caravans
With Super 1 coming on the first weekend of July can I ask that all caravans are moved off site as soon as possible after the June MSA meeting. If it causes you a problem talk to Ian Lawson.

Remember that we keep Tuesday & Thursdays from 4 – 7pm for Junior testing plus every Wednesday for any / all owner drivers.