We were back to Blackhawk Farms for races 7 and 8 of the Championship Enduro Series (CES).  We had pretty high expectations for the weekend now that we had the kart set about right and Jason is pretty familiar with the track.  We expected better times and faster laps.  We were also joined by my wife and daughter and my dad.  My Father and wife had a great time watching all of the racers and meeting our kart friends.  My daughter, not so much.  “Not enough horses”.

Karen joined us for two reasons.  First, to watch Jason race.  She has not yet been to a CES race, yet.  Second and most importantly on Sunday she ran the 5K foot race on the track, placing first in her age group.  We could not be more proud and excited for her.  (Karen’s edit:  I was the only one in my age group!!  But you can’t win if you don’t race, so I beat everyone who didn’t come out!)

Saturday’s race brought some friends from Concept Haulers and a real test of everything we had learned over the summer.  Jason’s start was difficult.  He got hung up behind his friend Joey and was not able to accelerate into the first corner as he usually does.  He battled his main rival, #118 John, a few laps in and swapped positions for a couple of laps.  After a little bumping and grinding John pulled ahead and moved on.  Shortly after that Jason caught up with Pete Johnson and they swapped spots a few times until the end when Jason pulled ahead again at the finish.  This is one of the great things about this series, it is not always about racing your class but who you actually race.  Pete shook Jason’s hand when they were lined up for post-race tech, and said “that was the most fun racing I’ve had in a long time!”  It was a great race to watch from where we were at the finish line but the video tells a better story.

Saturday night after the racing Jason talked to all kinds of drivers and took in their advice and encouragement.  On Sunday, he put all of his seat time and newly acquired advice to work.  His start was great.  He accelerated hard at the green flag, passing 5 drivers and was the third kart to the corner.  Most of this race was folks catching up to Jason.  First Pete managed to get by Jason but that did not stick.  A lap later Pete, Jason, and Seth went three wide down the stretch and they went Seth, Jason and Pete into turn one.  In lap 4 Jason was passed by #251 and in lap 5 passed by #118.  From that point on, he was on his own except for lapping the novice class.  At some point #251 dropped out and Jason finished 5th.  His top speed was 73 mph and his best lap was 1:39.079.  Definitely a great end to a strong weekend.

Our next report will be on our last Concept Haulers race.  

Thanks to Katie for coming to the track and putting up with her dad and brother and pushing the kart around.  Our friends the Losch’s and Johnson’s for being great sports and racers.  My Dad for sharing his love of cars and has asked about a kart for him.   My awesome wife who runs like a mother.