Summarize

A spectacular, flowery and fresh Cape’s early spring Saturday greeted the Western Cape karting fraternity to the Killarney Kart Track for the penultimate seventh round of the WP Kart championships, which delivered a mix of dominant performances and fraught dices to leave all 2018 titles to be solved in the 27 October finale. 

There was a surprise in the premier DD2 gearbox class when Jonathan Thomas beat teammates Jason Coetzee and championship leader Jurie Swart to pole position, but Swart duly made off to win the opening race after dicing Coetzee for the first few laps. Thomas ran into trouble to allow Connor Hughes into third, before Swart made off to win the second heat as he left Coetzee to pip Thomas at the post. Swart then overcame an early race 3 dice with Coetzee to beat his teammate to the final win by half a second and take maximum points for the day. 

Gary Lennon scored three fourth positions overall to overcome Hughes to the Masters win and third overall from third Master Jacques De Bruyn in fifth, Thomas and Masters duo Ernst Viljoen and Roy Gruer. That leaves Swart in a 20 point championship lead over Coetzee, who sits a comfy margin clear of Thomas heading into the October finale. 

Jason Coetzee however utterly dominated the open class Senior Max races to open his championship lead over Andrew Rackstraw, who overcame a difficult start in a dramatic early race 2 to make it three seconds on the day for second overall. A delighted Andrew Thomas came out on top of an intriguing dice for third over Storm Lanfear and Tristan De Nobrega, Reece Oellermann and Ziyaad Ibrahim to leave Coetzee just fifteen points clear of Rackstraw in the championship with a race to run.

The high school Junior Max races delivered among the best racing of the day — Troy Dolinschek led the opening race from lights to flag as he left the rest scrapping in his wake, while Joseph Oelz climbed from fifth to second. Race 2 saw a close dice between Dolinschek, Charl Visser and Oelz, who dropped back later on to leave Dolinschek to the win from Visser, Tate Bishop and Oelz. 

Visser then made off to take a lights to flag final win as Dolinschek and Oelz clashed after a furious dice and Oelz dropped back before stopping on the penultimate lap. Kai van Zyl kept out of trouble to come from 8th to take second from a recovered Dolinschek and Bishop. So Dolinschek took the day from Visser, van Zijl, Bishop and Oelz, with Simon Simpson-Heath sixth from Storm Lanfear, Sibo Solomon, Luca Wehrli, Mikaeel Moolla and Triston Galp. That all means that Dolinschek has closed Oelz’ championship advantage down to just 16 points with three heats left to race…

Kyle Visser overcame Mikhail Fernandez two races to one to take under-13 Mini Max. Fernandez took race 1 with a last lap move on Visser, who had led from lights to flag as the two of them diced through race 2 before Visser took the win by a tenth. Visser led the final until the penultimate lap when Fernandez took the advantage, only for Visser to fight back to take another close win and the day. Denis Joubert emerged best of the rest over Joaquin de Oliveira, who hit trouble in race 2, with Jason Macbeath splitting Le Riche brothers Andre and Kyle in fourth and sixth. Visser takes a strong but not unassailable 33-point advantage into the final over Fernandez.

Jason Macbeath took under 13 Mini Rok pole, but Lucas Royston drove to a lights to flag race 1 win from Kyle Visser, Paul Malcolm and Macbeath, who bounced back to a dramatic late race 2 win over Malcolm after the dicing Visser and Royston dropped back on the final lap. Macbeath then took the final on another last lap move on Visser to take the heat over Joshua Smit and Visser as Macbeath won the day from a tied Visser and Royston, Malcolm, Smit and Conner Rensberg. Visser takes a 25-point advantage into the final over McBeath, who moved into second in the title race on Saturday ahead of Royston.

Reese Koorzen took the under-11 pole position and three race wins, the first two in dominant fashion, to take the day. Koorzen however had to fight hard for the final win after he and Reza Levy delivered a stunning dice through the race. Levy was second in all three races, while the returning Valentino Hoffman took two thirds to Ethan Stier’s one to mount the overall podium on his comeback, ahead of Joshua Smit, Ethan Lennon and Mischa Williams as Levy takes a handy 17-point title lead over Koorzen into the final.

Last but not least, Johan Hamman consolidated his Cape Clubmans championship advantage with two race wins off pole position over Mario Ras’s final race victory. Jared Jordan was second over Harry Georgiou, Andre Steenkamp, Michael Jordan, Robert Peche and Ryan Buda, leaving it all to play for in all classes in that end-October finale…