Lithgow's Big Week
from Russell Grimson
The annual big week of karting at Combined District's Lithgow track did not start on the Sunday of the Ladies race meeting, but commenced the weekend before where the members and friends got together for a massive clean up of the facility, including the repainting of all the tyre barriers and the repair to the club sign over the grid area. Work went on all day and into the dark and at the end of the day a great deal was achieved by all and sundry.
Wednesday dawned with champagne weather and 59 kids turning up to the camp along with their keepers. After the opening ceremony and group photos, the training team carried out instruction including kart skills, kart set up, the rule book, starts and flags, sports rage, first aid, fitness and technical. The program included a few novelty events including karting Olympics (a cross country running event) and a visit from the local police department (a talk on road safety). The police brought along the local highway patrol car for the kids to inspect and crawl over. At the end of the day, a mock stewards hearing was held for all the kids and parents to be made aware of how the AKA judicial system works.
Day 2 dawned with great weather. This being the on-track day, further tuition was carried out on track skills and tactics and several mock race events were held so the kids could be accessed and at the end of the day the certificates of achievement and gift packs from Dunlop were presented to all participants. The consensus from all was that it was an outstanding camp.
Friday was for the Junior classes and, as traditions prevailed, a Midget “P” class was included with 13 starters. This year the enduro format was chosen in a different way with teams being chosen by the officials. The duration for each enduro was: Midgets - 30 minutes, Rookies - 40 minutes, Juniors - 50 minutes. All had a driver change and compulsory pit stop. The races were a great event and went off without a hitch.
The results for the Enduro’s were:
Midget “P”: Calvin Drury & Dylan O’ Brien
Midget: Cody Browcznski & Cludia Sousa
Rookies: Jayden Butler & Tyra Maraik
Junior National: Darian Scott & James Hadfield
In the normal race for juniors only, the results were:
JNH: Joshua Siefert
JNL: Stefan Stankovic
Rookies: Jayden Ojeda
Midget “ P”: Michael Kane
Midget: Cody Browczynski
Saturday dawned bright and shiny with perfect weather. The program included the annual “MUGS CUP" event for the dads who push their kids all year. David Raddatz won the class after 3 heats and a final.
The results from Saturday only were:
SNL: Brayden Pritchard
SNH: Shane Colambrita
CL: Alexandra Whitley
CH: Jason Varley
TAG: Kelly Bunt
After lunch Saturday, the girls got down to the series business of getting ready for the ladies race meeting on Sunday. At the conclusion of practice, the club committee, along with the canteen staff, put on a great dinner in aid of the National Breast Cancer Foundation A great deal of money was raised and the auction for several items of interest was held under the hilarity action of compare Glen Egan and his side kick Craig Harradine. Over $2,500 was raised from the fun night.
Sunday dawned a perfect day for kart racing with the numbers growing slightly from previous years and the surprising entries, after all the problems in Queensland, were the girls from Queensland. It was a great effort with members from Victoria proving the event is gaining status on the karting calendar.
Rracing was hard and fast and the hard luck story for the day had to go to 4-time winner of the pink plate, Cheryl Harradine, who broke a chain when leading. The celebrity challenge was won by Filipa Guina from V8 Super Cars ahead of Donna Mahony from AKA NSW. At the presentation Filipa presented breast cancer survivor Kerrie Friar with the flowers.
It was great to see several lady competitors from earlier times coming back to racing after long periods away from karting. Former National class Australian Champion Linda Moore, after a long break due to chronic sickness, was back in the seat and was a very creditable 3rd in the Ladies Over 35 class using the very engine she had used to win her Australian championship all those years ago.
With out a doubt the outstanding performance for the weekend went to Alexandra Whitley from Toowoomba. Just a week after the disasterous floods in that city, Alexandra not only won Seniors Clubman on Saturday, but also the Ladies Clubman class, National class and the Nicole Franks Memorial trophy for the outstanding performance for a lady over the weekend.
The results for the ladies events were:
Ladies Clubman: Alexandra Whitley
Ladies 125 R: Katelyn Hawkins
Ladies Over 35: National Kim Becker
Ladies National: Alexandra Whitley
Ladies 125 Open: Elle Brydan
Midget: Courtney Prince
Rookie: Briana Wilson
Junior Girls: Alexandra Lawrence
Canteen Ladies Cup: Courtney Brewczynski
Celebrity Race: Filipa Guinia
The prestigious Nicole Franks Memorial trophy: Alexandra Whitley
It is great to see the amount of girls now racing. It goes to prove a point that girls will race in their own environment in NSW. Since the interest was sparked about 5 years ago, we now have ever increasing numbers of girls racing across all classes.
