Promising Australian debut for Team DR Kart

The pair of DR Kart drivers in action during Round Two of the CIK Stars of Karting Series. Pic: photowagon.com.au

Round two of the Stars of Karting series marked the debut for the Daniello Rossi Kart in Australia campaigned by Jordie Lindstrom and Lee Mitchener in the Pro Gearbox (KZ2) class.

Both drivers had there very first drives of the karts in Friday practice. Achieving just over 30 laps each before racing started ment the team would have to push hard to find the correct setup in time. Progressing each outing and going faster and faster, ultimately both drivers were very happy with there results.

Jordie’s weekend began with a solid qualifying effort, this setup a progressive run to front for the rest of the weekend. Heat races saw Jordie progress through the field well enough to start inside the top five for final one, however a misjudgment of the start in heat three and Jordie was handed a five position penalty for jumping the start. Final one was both promising and disappointing, Jordie ran fourth for majority of the races, racing hard with Kyle Ensbey as the two pushed hard to chase down Troy Woolston, however with just eight laps remaining Jodie’s spark plug cap came off his Maxter engine, ending his strong run to the flag.

Final two presented very similar performance with a great run and hard fought battle with Matt Wall, Kyle Ensbey, Jason Pringle and team mate Lee Mitchener who all of which were fighting for third position a chaotic race long battle. Jordie in the end crossed the line in fifth position.

“My weekend was very consistent and solid; I feel we can gain significant time after completing a few setup test days before the next round. We had realistic goals coming into this event of achieving fast laps and too race in the top five, we certainly achieved that goal,” said Jordie.

“We will now work hard in testing and certainly learn the best setup for the karts which have proven to be very responsive and positive to changes. We also hope to gain more performance from our motors at Eastern Creek which should suit the Maxter motor more than Ipswich, we will see.”

Lee Mitchener’s campaign in Ipswich was also a progressive one, he was fast straight away out of the box and was unlucky not too record a much better result. Lee progressed well through the heat races showing some great speed in each race. Final one for Lee was halted early after he was blacked flag for problems with his radiator.

Starting from the rear in final two, Lee was caught up in the chaos at the beginning the race and had a come from behind drive to the cross just ahead of team mate Jordie Lindstrom, through the duration of the race Lee consistently put down fast laps times that would arguably have had him challenging the front runners.

“The karts were super responsive to changes and very noticeable on the track making them very user friendly for us, I think after some testing in between rounds we would expect to be challenging for top spot on the podium at Eastern Creek”, said Lee

The team expects to complete its first full test day with the chassis this weekend and is very much looking forward to round three of the CIK Stars of karting series.