"Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)" (rduncan5678)
01/02/2019 at 12:19 • Filed to: None
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"Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)" (rduncan5678)
01/02/2019 at 12:19 • Filed to: None | 3
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Over my Christmas holiday trip back East, I went go karting with some friends I havent seen since I moved out to LA. They had setup a deal with one of the indoor arenas to open up the place early and do unlimited karting for a group of 12 at $110 per person. This was 100% worth it since we had 9HP gas karts and everyone was semi-competent enough to make the racing competitive. We went to GPNY in Mt Kisco, NY and had about 3 hours of track time to race our hearts out, trash talk in between races, and recover from our injuries from the day. Normally you get pretty beat up just from the hard turns in a kart with no padding but I got extra beat up due to a track incident at the fastest part of the track.
Here is the “SUPERTRACK” map that we were racing on, which was pretty big for an indoor place. I have drawn in green where the elevation changes were which was also a pretty neat feature. The one in the upper left would result in sideways drift jumps if you hit it fast enough and timed your braking just right. And the one in the upper right was kind of similar to the Laguna Seca corkscrew if you scaled it to a go kart. With the 9HP karts, there were some very necessary braking zones and plenty of spots to meet a wall when competition was heated up and limits were pushed. In one instance, I got to experience a nice “eat the wall” encounter and I will go ahead and describe that now.
The front straight goes pretty much all the way from the upper left inside corner (right below the green plus) all the way down to the final tight hairpin in the bottom right. You need to back off a little on the tricky bits in the middle but in a kart it’s straight enough to nearly go flat out the whole way. Meaning you get going pretty darn fast by the time you reach the pit area through the finish line. Well one of the laps as we were going through there with 3 karts in front of me and a pack behind me, the karts in front clip a wall right at the end of the pit, spin out, and come to an immediate halt in front of me at the fastest and narrowest point of the track. I explicitly remember time slowing down in my head and having nowhere to go but two options, staight into the wall or hard braking and sliding most likely sideways directly into the other karts. At the speed I was going, there was no stopping without hitting something. I chose the wall as my split second decision and ended up nice and wedged under the plastic.
It was a bit of searing pain in the quick jolt to a stop and I had the wind knocked out of me for sure. After a second, I took a breathe finally moved a little in the seat and observed that I wasnt dead, bleeding, or otherwise maimed. My side and knee hurt like hell but I got out of the kart after the track was red flagged and they worked on dislodging my kart from the wall. I was just sore for the rest of the day and all of the super tight right turns had me wincing in pain. But I did manage my fastest lap time of the day a couple laps after that so driving angry helped a little bit lol.
Now that it has been just over a week later of healing, my knee feels fine and all of the bruising has gone away. But I still have some rib pain if I lean on it too hard. So its definitely some more healing to do. Surfing the other day didnt help at all with that process. And sending it off of ski jumps a few days before that also probably didnt help either. It feels better every day though so I am not too concerned or feel like I need x-rays. Famous last words though according to future self!
TheRealBicycleBuck
> Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)
01/02/2019 at 13:27 |
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On my last karting excursion, I also hit a wall. The situation was a bit different. The short straightaway led into a 180 turn like the left side of your track map, but without the bulge to force traffic wide and with a solid wall (in black below) instead of a barrier. A friend of mine was trying to show me the fastest way around that corner, so I was right on his tail when we got to the end of the straight. I was braking hard to make the turn, but I ran wide and ended up in the marbles. That put me sideways into the wall, hard enough to kill the kart and break three ribs. I went to the doctor the next day to get it confirmed.
It’s been three years since I had that wreck and I still have issues on my right side. Broken ribs suck.
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Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)
> TheRealBicycleBuck
01/02/2019 at 13:34 |
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Oof yeah that sounds awful and was the main reason I didnt want to go sideways into anything. Not that there was much choice in the matter but I knew it was possible to dorifto to maybe slow down differently. Thankfully muscle memory from autocross always told me “if you are gonna go off, go off straight and then stop ” and that applied here as well but for different reasons. I dont think I broke anything but there is not much to do other than rest anyways for it to heal.
Rico
> Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)
01/02/2019 at 14:32 |
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I went to Gran Prix up in MT Kisco a few years back. A quarter of the way thru the lap my gas kart died on me and they refused to give me free laps or refund me, so as far as I’m concerned they can suck my dick from the back. I prefer the electric karts (instant torque) at RPM Raceway in New Jersey.
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Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)
> Rico
01/02/2019 at 14:41 |
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That sure seems like a shitty response from them! Interesting since the main reason we even go there is just for the reliability of the karts. That place prides themselves in ensuring every kart is actually equal and the track is actually pavement instead of that slippery crap most indoor places have. I wish there were places with faster electric karts, it seems like its always the much slower ones and I hate the auto slow down crap during yellow flags, it just feels annoying to not control the vehicle. But I get why they do it for safety.