Karting - Season officially opens this weekend |03 March 2022
The karting season officially opens this weekend with the introduction and selection of newcomers who have registered to join the Seychelles Karting Association’s karting academy this year.
For the past two years the Seychelles Karting Association (SKA) was unable to fulfil its plan of taking in new groups of youngsters annually due to the Covid-19 restrictions at the time, and now with their approved standard operating procedures (SOPs) in place, they plan to start rebuilding their classes that laid vacant during that period so that by the end of this season all the different categories will be back to nearly full capacity.
On Saturday March 5, 17 new members will take part in the ‘Introduction to karting’ session at the Champions Park Raceway, Roche Caïman from 2pm, the majority of them range from the ages of 8 to 16 years old, whilst there is another group of over 18s who will be selected to join the various senior classes after completion of their training course. This year the association has introduced three classes in its karting academy, these being the bambino class for the small and very young drivers, the academy cadets and the academy juniors. They will begin their kart training soon after the selection process has been done which will go on for six to seven months before sitting for their racing license exam which will then allow them to join in the competition classes thereafter.
The SKA has made a special effort to take in a slightly larger group than normal as it is still experiencing the lack of equipment to accommodate the large numbers of youngsters who are still interested in joining the sport but could not be added to the list this year. With the cost of fuel and spares rising over the past months, and a necessity to resurface the now worn out circuit at some point soon, the association has still kept its membership fees the same in order to give every young Seychellois an equal opportunity to be able to participate in this sport, and also make it one of the smallest associations to be able to offer the most affordable form of motorsport in the region.
On the 2022 National Karting Championship front, the regular racing classes are set to kick start their racing season with round one of the junior class on Saturday March 12 from 2pm, and then the senior classes, the masters and the intermediates, will contest their first round on Sunday March 20 from 8.30am.
This year the association has programmed a 12-round championship for all their classes.
Contributed