Aussie Karting's Most Gruelling Event Just Two Weeks Away
press release
On the same weekend that teams race against the clock for 24 hours at the world famous Le Mans 24-hour, competitors from each of the Track Safety International ProKart Endurance Kart Championships in Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and the Australian Capital Territory converge to contest their own 24 hour race widely considered the most grueling event on the Australian Karting calendar.
Above: The KnK Karts team machine in action
For the 3rd year running this event will be contested over 24 non-stop hours of racing at Willowbank Raceway, near Ipswich and only 45 minutes from Brisbane.
With 24-hours of non-stop racing, strategy can often change the race and with variables including driver changes, refueling and safety cars, it is likely teams will be faced with a variety of conditions and weather to further complicate the challenge of winning Australia’s only 24 hour Motorsport event.
With the race a little under 2 weeks from now on Sunday 12th and Monday 13th June, teams are frantically undertaking their final checks to ensure that their machinery is meticulously prepared to ensure reliability across the full 24 hours.
Above: Phantom Racing's Simon Ham and Steve Thompson
Given an expected entry list of over 20 teams and with most teams comprising at least 5 and often more drivers, it is likely that over 100 individual karters will tackle the toughest Endurance Karting event in Australia.
In the past, the key to success in this event was a solid driver line-up, sound strategy and arguably most importantly; strong reliability. This changed in 2010 however when the winning kart from JETS Motorsport competed the event in record time, essentially running at full-speed from start to finish and ultimately winning comfortably as teams around them ran into a multitude of technical issues.
Whilst the ‘JETS’ won’t be there to defend their title this year, there are a number of race-winning teams ready to win including Horsepower Racing, KAOS, Phantom, Team5150R, KW Racing, BF Racing, KnK Karts and PDS Racing among many more.
Above: KW Racing
This race has significant championship implications for many teams as it comprises Round 2 of the Australian Championship and Round 4 of the Queensland series; marking the half-way point of both.
With both championships finding a number of teams in contention, it is likely this event will go a long way towards determine who will ultimately succeed in taking both the Queensland and Australian ProKart Endurance Championship in 2011.