Prudent Motorsports Advanced Karting Program

The Prudent Motorsports Racing Program is the best beginner racing program I have ever attended in my life as I still think about my experiences there!!

The program was hosted on August 24th-27th at Meco Kartopia which is a 1.2km track, it was an absolute blast especially with our hands on coach Mr.Abhishek who has helped increase my pace and significantly drop my lap times throughout the program. The program absolutely blew past my expectations right on day 1.

Day 1

On day 1,i got to meet the other participants and started to understand a little more about how this program was going to work as on most training programs, in different activities usually involves mostly or in some cases only theory which always bores me to death, so i expected nothing less of prudent.I expected us to simply learn about breaking points,the racing line, regulations and such but our coach had a very different idea for us. He stunned me by his more practical approach where he asked us to get into our gear and immediately head out on track as he wanted to know where we stood! I mean i was absolutely shocked, cause so far there was no boring theory at all in fact the only thing i felt was happiness thanks to all the adrenaline flowing through my veins. When we came back from our timed laps my time was 1:19:10 making me the fastest in the program with 1BHP karts. Later on that day we were make to memorise the track layout, have a few more sessions and understand basic flags.

Day 2

By day 2, we were given actual racing suits instead of the simple helmet,gloves and protective vest we were given on the 1BHP karts as we were about to enter karts with ROTAX engines. The engines produces 7 BHP which doesn't sound like much at first until you account for the weight of the kart, the kart had a top speed of 110 kmph as it has no body merely a chassis made of aluminium and a fiber glass seat. We were made to do brake tests, learn different tyre warm up techniques, and do a program called follow the leader where our coach(the leader) went infront of us and led us through exact points where were could make up some time and we also learned how to overtake each other on different corners.

Day 3

On day 3, we were made to try our best to set some fast sector times in the 7BHP karts. Me being the legend i am ended up breaking the chain of my kart by pushing it too hard around the corners (video footage at the end of post) , my chain basically exploding during acceleration sent me into an uncontrollable spin and led me sliding off track into a barrier pulling 2.5 g of force which basically means i had 2.5 times the force of gravity pulling me towards the left when i hit the barrier. That crash without doubt goes into my book of the greatest crashes i was ever involved in (and came out uninjured). Luckily we didnt have to need 7BHP karts in the next session as we were moving on to the big boys the ROTAX MAX 21BHP karts those guys were without a doubt horrible at breaking!! And anybody who knows anything about cars will tell you the 1 function that must always work at all times are the breaks.

Day 4

Day 4, Graduation Day!! I managed to meet Narain Karthikeyan, an Ex F1 racer who was at the track with his son, i even managed to snag a selfie although my hair decided to turn into a airplane and fly that day .Anyway, Our coach told us to absolutely rip the track and blow past our past lap times with the 21BHP kart, all while giving me a look that said don't blow something else up this time. On our second session our coach said that we had 1 more practice session before the qualifying session which would determine where we would start on the final race. Practice went well but things started looking grim when we saw the clouds above our heads. When it was time for the qualifying session and time to put in our laps the track was dropping in temperature and with it our tyres too. I had absolutely no grip at all and ended up coming dead last. Which means i would have to start all the way from the back.

When it was time for the race there were some breaks in the clouds which usually means the weather would shift. The race was set to be 8 laps and we were back to our 1BHP karts as they were the most durable and the fact that the 21 BHP karts had absolutely no pick up pace from a standing start.

We got to our positions and we patiently waited for the green flag to be waived to set off our engines. As soon as the flag dropped we all set off, i managed to get the best start and took the lead immediately but within 5 seconds was overtaken by my friend, we ended up battling for 2 laps before i started losing pace until he made a mistake at turn 5 where i managed to stay right in his blind spot. I stayed there till he thought i was soo far back that he started to relax which was when i saw my opportunity and overtook him at turn 8 and immediately put my head down to reduce drag and get some more speed, increase the gap between us. I pushed the kart for the next 3 laps like i had never before as i knew if he was behind me and i turned to look back he would over take me as i had lost focus.

When i eventually did look back on the second last lap i realised he was over 10 seconds away from me, which was when i decided to get some competition running again by taunting him. I slowed myself down and started warming up my tyres. eventually he managed to come within 2 seconds of me when i went back to push mode and started setting fastest sector times. I secured the win, although now that i look back i feel that if i pushed harder is qualifying i could have been able to snag a Grand Slam (It means you qualify in first,lead every lap of the race, and finnish first).