It could've been worse...

I know what you're thinking...Oh god, he's ended up in hospital! He's broken his neck (well I haven't this time, I nearly have before, but thats a story for another day...) I'll explain all about the incident later!

So I arrived, although half-asleep, at 7:45, and quickly oiled my chain, lubricated the brake disk and checked the tyre pressures. I then headed out on a track walk to work out the best line possible for the troublesome Dogleg!

I did my three lap practise perfectly, there was no spins and I was consistently knocking out 55/56 second laps. Everything was looking good, and as I lined up on the dummy grid I was feeling quietly confident!

On the starting grid, The Tyro attracted a lot of attention, I have never been asked so many questions; "How many cc does it have?", "Top Speed?" and "What chassis is it?" All of those questions are reasonable, except the last one, it quite clearly says on the side of the chassis that it is a Gillard.

Anyway I got out onto the track and we set off on our rolling lap, once we reached the starting line we were travelling at a reasonable travel, as we passed the yellow line, everyone accelerated. I managed to cut Josh (No. 94) off and edge in front of him.

This was the final, the race that everything came down to, nothing even mattered anymore. I got to lap 4 in 3rd position, then it all happened. The bolt holding my fuel tank to the kart flew off, hitting my helmet and flying onto the track. I had to race the entire 8 more laps holding the fuel tank between my knees, therefore reducing my ability to break and accelerate. I soon realised that I wasn't going to retain my position of 3rd whilst I couldn't fully accelerate. So I let go of the fuel tank with my knees, removed my left hand which was tightly gripped to the steering wheel and hugged the fuel tank to the metal strip running to my engine.

Although the situation was far less than ideal I was getting through the race and I was holding 3rd position. Then, disaster struck again, the cable taking fuel to my engine slipped out of the top of my fuel tank which resulted in fuel starvation, which meant that I couldn't accelerate over 40mph. Due to this factor, Josh (No. 94) who had been in 4th position, overtook me. I got round the rest of the circuit (luckily there was only one lap left) and I finished in 4th position. At the end of the race I pulled into the pits, and all over my kart was leaking petrol, I was helped out my kart and I was soaking wet. The really weird thing was the fact that I hadn't noticed fuel on me for the whole race, I guess it shows how focused I was.

However, everything isn't all bad! At the end of the day, my mum decided to buy me my own set of race boots. They are Sparco boots and I am very excited to race in them next month...I've uploaded a picture of them below...