Hayden McBride’s German Adventure
Thursday, July 15th, 2010Day 3
After qualifying 26th and feeling a little down, the first heat got off to a good start with Hayden battling through to 18th.
The second heat started in the wet, which evened the playing field somewhat and Hayden was interested to see how he would go up against the guys in the wet and he did fantastic, driving from 26th through to eighth position. Unfortunately, at the same time a motor gave way, so he headed into the finals down an engine.
Ahead of the finals Hayden reported that he was battling with the weight, with the rest of the field on average running at 162km max weight while Hayden is at 166kg, with a compulsory rear bumper and front brakes – which he says you have to have around this track – adding a lot of the weight.
To counteract the weight issue the team tried moving the seat forward, back and down but due to his height they can no longer lower it any more or it just rubs on the grip that has built up on the track! The team are reporting that the grip is nothing like what is seen in Australia and even the local are saying its more than what they have seen at this venue before.
To put it another way, Hayden has said in the roll up laps if you go too slow the kart bogs down in the slow corners like its stuck! “I can stay with them in slow corners but the fast corners my kart just bogs down, they keep telling me that we need to free the kart up but you are too tall,” he said.
So the team headed into the first final, and it went okay with Hayden finishing 19th, and while he was disappointed with the result the team were quick to remind him that he should be proud of what he is achieving as he has never driven on this track before or in these conditions and he is racing against some of the best the world of karting has to offer.
From here, there was only the final race to go – and the heavens opened.
Hayden’s weight and height worked to his advantage in the wet, and he reported that he felt he had the pace to run at the front right from the beginning (he started 19th), with times 2 tenths off the lead pack as he worked his way through the traffic passing karts each lap.
Unfortunately Hayden ran out of laps before he could challenge for the podium, instead finishing 7th, a great result given the struggles encountered across the weekend.
Now that the racing is over, Hayden is looking forward to eating – saying he has lost about 6kg since arriving in Germany as he has been trying to get his weight down, but he is now looking forward to eating some nice food and he can’t wait to get home.
Day 2
Today has been all about practice and qualifying.
The team have been very helpful with Marco, Hayden’s mechanic, the best they have! Hayden ended up about three tenths off the pace at the end of practice, with grip a major factor throughout the session. As the day wore on more rubber went down on the track, seeing the grip and as a result, the set up, having to continually change.
Given Hayden’s weight and height, the team decided to change the position of his seat as his centre of gravity was starting to become a factor, given that he is about 5kg heavier and taller than most of the other racers in his field. The change didn’t have as much of an affect as we expected, so for qualifying we went back to the original settings.
In qualifying, the grip continued to be full on, with the team commenting that when you stand on the ‘in grid’ the track is so sticky that you can stick to it if you stand still for too long! Hayden was sure to talk to his team and Marco to get points on driving on the rubber.
He was able to qualify 26th out of 34 contenders, and he reports that he feels he is struggling, but the team have faith and are telling him he can do it, he is up against the very best in the world who race in these kind of conditions all of the time, while it is very much foreign to us Aussies!
The team say the grip is like nothing they have ever seen before, but it’s not over yet and there is a long way yet to go – racing is still to come!
Day 1
Hayden McBride and Paul Gallo with a Gillard representative at the Amfing circuit
We had our first full on day today ! We got to the track at 8.30am had to wait for the truck there was a massive traffic jam on the autobarn ! So the truck was delayed by 2 hrs.
When it finally arrived we got straight into setting up the marquee it took about 2/3 hrs, its an awesome set up, there are 7 drivers in the tent all have 2 karts each one of the drivers won the last round of the german championship so we are in a great team. We also found out today that in Hayden’s KF2 class is the new euro champ in KF2 Moller Madsen (Energy/TM), so he will be tough to beat.
The pics are of us getting Hayden’s 2 karts ready, one of the pics is of Hayden’s team mechanic Marco. Myself and Marco will be working together on the chassis. The team has there own engine tuner at the track with us.
Tommorow we get to the track in the morning at 7.30am to fit the engines. The first 20min session will be to run in 2 fully freshly re-built KF2 parilla engines. Also Hayden has been talking to Jack Hawksworth he is part of the team but in the other brand PDB team has Maddox. He uses this chassis in the KZ2 class. So that helped to get some track info.
