Testing Day- Winton 28th April 2006

It's times this this I will regret choosing the road racing path instead of the busy world of sprint kart racing. At least with sprint karts you can drive down the road and find a track to practise on, instead of head bush for a few hours. For some reason there just aren't many full sized road racing circuits next door to your local servo. I was about to find out it would all be worth it.

After all the pain of making the little Rotax Max CAMS eligible, I needed a big playground to make sure everything was all working before the VSKC round 3 at Phillip Island on May 6th.

So, after helping out some of our valued customers at the shop in the morning it was off to Winton in Ned Kelly country to grab some precious track time. Perfect day for it too. I went up solo but John and Dean Crooke from Hyperracer.com were there to provide some help. Naturally, they were shaking down their new weapon, the HyperMax kart. It's quite a machine with it's lowdown aero and sexy bodywork, and seriously quick. That's the last thing I wanted- a carrot in front of me when all I need to do was learn the machine and the track.

The competition. This little sucker (the kart, I mean) goes way too fast and needs to be beaten!

This was also the day that John Crooke, former Australian F2 champion and 1987 Bathurst team-mate to Peter Brock, decided he was too old for this caper and hung up his helmet to focus on helping Dean.

Anyhow, out onto the track. At Winton the trackday organisers must groan when they see superkarts. You can't let them out with cars, so letting them out with bikes is the lesser of two evils. Cars would just run over us...that is, if they were faster. Most of them aren't :). So, instead, they would just get in our way and wouldn't see us as we nipped at their mudflaps.

It's a sluggish takeoff. The stall speed on the clutch is fairly low so it drags all the way up the hill. It's the only frustrating part of this non-gearbox category. However, once the powerband lights up it's all worth the wait. It's like Clark Kent jumping out of the phone box with his superman cape on.

Apart from the new nosecone bottoming out over the bumps, there were no major problems. Well, no problems with the machine itself. Physically speaking, I reckon I would expire before the kart does. It is very hard work.

Once I got the confidence monkey off the back it was time to remove the Phillip Island gearing and put on a sprocket more suited to the tighter, challenging Winton layout. Here's some track indulgence for the motorsport initiated:

The old turn 1 and 2 is great fun, you can trail-brake right up to the apex. Turn 2 you don't brake at all, just feather off slightly. The big left-hand sweeper is taken flat and the best spot to overtake bikes- (around the outside), but there is a big bump near the exit which gets your attention whilst on the limit of adhesion. The old "tank" complex down the back is a little slow and hard to pick a line. It's way off-powerband onto the old main straight. The left-hander into the new section is deceptively slow- outbrake yourself (which I did, once or twice) and the protective barrier comes up rather quickly. Off the new back straight into the double right-hander, you brake at around 30-50 metres depending on bravery. You can run it right out onto the flat kerb at the pit entry lane, then barely feather off for the second right onto the new pit straight. Here the outside kerb is one of those nasty scissor ones, best to avoid unless you like losing teeth or a spleen. At the end, where the new straight covers the old, are some crazy bumps which almost threw me out of the seat. And the left-right esses- frighteningly good fun, with braking way past the final marker, trail on the brakes right up to the apex. Then bury it all the way through up the hill.

It was hard to get a clear lap with all the bikes. They brake and corner so slow, yet accelerate so fast. The mental imagery of my nose cone scooping up their rear wheel kept me reasonably well behaved. Although, when you can gain 100m under brakes and turn in, it's tempting to have a jab at them. Whilst it was annoying to get held up, it was good to see them having a go, especially the petite woman on the big GSXR750.

The last time I was at Winton, on the correct side of the fence, was Easter 1988. I was in a standard Austin-Healey-Sprite which I drove from Adelaide on a very eventful quest to compete in the Sprite Clubs' national challenge. That was a defining moment in my life, so this little trip was quite nostalgic. How the circuit has changed. It's 800m longer, and yet my lap times were probably the same as they were in 1988!

This little machine is impressive. I've always wanted to drive something that scares me, and I've definitely found it. With 30hp powering 160kg, the power-to-weight ratio is similar to a Formula Ford. The only handicap is the amount of air being pushed. Being a converted sprint kart, the driver sits up in the wind like cocky on a perch, so we'll have to work on this. The HyperMax is probably the benchmark on aero efficiency. It will kill everyone at the 'Island. The brakes are surprisingly good, being only rear axle, and can carry you right up to the apex with loads of grip, providing you're careful...

Around medium-fast corners it still behaves like a sprint-kart- twitchy and nervous. This gets your attention at twice the speed of sprint karts. We'll have to work on getting some rear-end grip also.

It's hard not to get cocky about the scale of speed vs. cost compared to a fancy road car or race car. This thing hasn't got doors, a roof, a slick paint job and big wheels. It doesn't have suspension or a gearbox with a smooth, silky gearchange. It cannot cruise down Lygon street and pick up chicks. It doesn't cost the price of a small house.

But it laps any circuit faster than all of that. I have always wanted to drive one of those great little Formula Vees, and I still do, yet this thing is faster than one of those.

Roll on Phillip Island.