DIRT NATION
It ’s long been said you can learn more from losing than from winning. A good pummelling by a rival can teach you to observe their strengths and weaknesses so next time you run up against the lat ter, not the former. Some of the next crop of off- road racers have been learning recently, especially here in the south where our small pool of youngsters is now growing and getting faster and faster. Sometimes the only problem with getting faster and faster is you occasionally find yourself into a corner too fast and watching the horizon shift over 90 degrees or so. That happened to Kelan Keith, the south’s newest recruit to the Kiwitruck ranks, at the 2018 GT Radial NZ Endurance Championships, held at Golden Downs forest near Nelson. With the adult racers all busy getting ready for the big event, i t fell to Mad Mike Whiddett and I to help with the Kiwitruck races. We ended up having huge fun with Kelan, young Jack Brownlees and the northern raiders – Mad Mike’s son Lincoln in J123 and Harry Hodgson in M12.
The old new panel curse
Kelan’s been quick all year, and he came to this round with a new body panel set on his truck. He fell victim to a fast corner and ended up sitting in his truck wrapped up in course marking tape. Isn’t it always the way? New panels, greater probability of a fender bender. Now I know adult racers who’ve packed a tanty and gone home in similar situations, but Kelan recovered with real maturity and with the help of a dedicated pit crew was back out the next day to take a wellearned second overall for J class. I know it ’s not easy at that age, and the best advice we could give him and the others is to stay the course and be strong. A crash at this level just means you’re racing hard after all. It’s great to see Kelan and Jack out there going quick, and they by no means gave away position or pace to the northern drivers. Now we need a couple more racers down here and the category will really start to perform.
Mov’n on up
So far, the kids coming out of the Kiwitrucks have moved up to class seven ( VW or Toyota four banger, minimal suspension travel), Challenger ( VW, slightly more suspension travel), or UTV ( NOW we’re talking). The first t wo are a backward step for the kids after the relatively plush Kiwitrucks. They can be a tad expensive too, especially once you dig into the rules and start blueprinting everything to make it run better/ faster/ more often. So at the risk of causing a massive north-south groan, I was wondering why we wouldn’t look at the Kiwitrucks’ big brother the 450 Trophy Kart? These trucks are dimensionally bigger, the engines are ‘proper’ and relatively easy to monitor for rules compliance, and they are relatively cheap to import from the good ol’ USA.
What’s not to like?
Leaving aside the VW classes, at a time when a UTV starts at $ 25K before safety modifications how about a turnkey, ready-to- race 450 for USD$ 7,000? Add freight ( piggyback on a friendly hot rodder’s container maybe) and you have it here for NZD$ 15,000. That’s a lot of race capability for the money. More suspension travel than the VW classes, cheaper than a UTV. What’s not to like? Maybe someone should bring one in just for fun. Hmmm, maybe someone already is!