Shifter Kart Racing at Rimrock Raceway this past Sunday

Rimrock Raceway

This past Sunday, Joe, Stuart, Ali, and I trekked up to Midland, TX for a day of shifter kart and pitbike racing at Rimrock Raceway. The afternoon temperature was well above 100 degrees so we left at 6AM to get some early track time. Instead of just running practice laps, we decided to run our own race day. We started off with one practice session, then ran a 2-lap qualifying session and 4 5-lap heat races. We kept the races short to help keep our engines cool in the brutal West Texas heat. It was good practice for each of us as we all got faster around the 0.4 mile sprint track. Joe set the pace with a blazing 34.02 lap in qualifying. I reset my personal best around Rimrock with a 34.7 lap and Stuart was running competitively with high 34s lap times. The races helped each of us hone our passing and "not getting passed" skills as well as working on our standing starts.

In the heat races, I had good starts and was able to jump in the lead and win the first 2 races. In race 1, Joe and Stuart running 2nd and 3rd had some contact which sent Joe into a spin, but luckily everybody and their karts we unscathed. In Race 3, I got the lead at the start, but Joe got under me in Turn 2 on Lap 4. He slid up the track right after the pass and we both almost went off, but we kept going and had a good scrap for a few corners before I had a big slide trying to avoid contact and lost all of my momentum. Joe got the jump at the start of Race 4 and stayed their for the victory.

Ali on the Front Straight During our PitBike Challenge

After the we packed up the shifter karts, we had a fun lap-time battle in the pitbike and learned that I need to pick up the pace on 70cc race bikes! All in all, it was a fun day and we got out of Midland before the heat got unbearable. See below for some GoPro video action from the shifter kart races: