Dandaragan Go-Karting

Go-karting in Dandaragan is not common, although Evan and Gaylene Bradshaw do have a current racing team (Midget Class on Bitumen A.K.A ) based at Redgum Village

We are renown for our Racing on a budget motto for 2 reasons:

1. Best way for kids to learn how to drive
2. Restrictions of funding

Some pics of the karting crew....Driver and Manager...based at the Redgum Village in Dandaragan West Australia.

   

Midget Karting on a limited budget and a top 3 State Title Trophy.

A 3yr old CRG Picollo Kart, one blue printed Comer SW80 motor, 3 sets new tyres over 20 meetings and 6 club rounds in one year.

Here is proof that once you outlay the approx $5k this form of motor sport can be done for under a 2 grand a year budget.

Refresh motor once, and a check over before state title round $500, 3 sets tyres @220 = $660, couple sprockets and chains $150 and a few cans of oil and cleaning products.(yes I know I should clean the kart more but it don’t make it go any faster, but does allow you to find loose bolts etc…)

 The biggest expense is traveling to the tracks. Camping on all WA tracks is available, so a good tent or camper-van, or just a van or a car and trailer are well worth having, and this all helps strengthen the parent child bonding.

This bonding alone is a minimum 50% of your child’s driving ability, just happy to be with Mum or Dad or both means a lot to the kids.

This fact file is from Evan Bradshaw and his son Jonathon with daughter Cheyanne as team boss, whom at 7yrs holds us all together. Mum holds the fort at home and Elle is in boarding school.

We don’t have a lot of spare cash so we had no choice but to approach midget go-karting on a very tight budget and to refrain from the many many pleas from other dads and kart shop owners to spend some money on Jonathon and give him a newer vehicle to pilot.

We didn’t have that kinda money so we stayed with what we had and the free advice and help came in its droves, so much that we had to concentrate on what would work for us and what would not.

Thankfully many hour long conversations with Harvey at Kart-Mart managed to keep us level headed and a belief that our faithful CRG kart was good for the job.

Yes we had our ups and downs with a great start to 2009 with a win on his first race and a third overall for the meeting. We had a mid year slump when we changed to our 1^st set of new tyres and stayed mid pack for 4 meetings until Shane from Kart-Magic lent us a wider rear axle and a few tips on how to drive it and within that meeting we were back up at the front line again.

A simple too much grip factor with a set up based on older tyres was the problem.

We arrived in Karratha WA State Titles without an actual race win for months but a lot of very close finishes amongst the top 3. Now no problem here with our kart or motor, we just happen to have a nice kid whom can drive but lacks that killer instinct, which is just fine by me for as a 10 yr old kid he has plenty of time to be a asshole on the track or a arrogant prick, a winner or whatever you call race car drivers that race to win at all costs.

We ended up third by 2 tenths of a second and if Jonathon took a balsy move when drafting Josh at the end of the straight and dropping in on the inside for the lead and using his smaller than everyone else’s sprocket to gather some speed in the front he maybe, possibly could have run away with a win, maybe, or crashed..

He didn’t make the move and stayed on the track and then a small error allowed Bryce to come through and we had a very close finishing trio, awesome to watch and all kept nice and clean.

 "This is how MIDGET racing should be".

To all the parents out there you do not need a mega buck budget to do very well in midget kart racing, its mostly in your approach to your child and remembering he is a child and he or she is in the kart not you, remember that and then you can really appreciate the fun that this sport can be and is.

 Having said all that if you do have a lot of spare cash there are several Kart shops that will take your money and offer on track advice, but do remember if your child learns to race on a budget, they will be in a position to drive whatever is put in front of them when open wheelers become the next step in the professional driving world.(then you will need some money or a sponsor or stay in motor racing)

So please use the midget/rookie years as a development of your parent to child bonding, having fun and being involved in sport… It can be done without a bank balance ego!!!!!

I know of over 60 year old's still enjoying karting, so no need to rush the seriousness.

 Here are some pics from our karting journey......

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