Mid-Season 2015
The Canadian National Karting Championship, the peak of my karting season, is just over a month away. In the upcoming days, a lot will happen, but for now I think it’s time for a bit of a debrief for 2015. Four of the eight rounds of the Eastern Canada Karting Championship (ECKC) series have been completed, two at Goodwood and two at ICAR. Rotax Senior has proven to be more of a learning curve than I had anticipated, but even so I’ve achieved two top ten finishes, along with an 11th and a 14th. MIKA level racing has also been competitive with reasonably sized fields as many teams are preparing for the Nationals at that venue, but I’ve brought home some podiums and hope to get some more.
As far as my season as a development driver for BGR in the Toyo Tires F1600 series goes, I’ve spent some more days on track with BGR. Getting up to speed down the Andretti Straight at Mosport is a feeling that I’m pretty sure cannot be matched; probably the closest thing you can get to flying while being in a car. I must admit that being a development driver has its downside; after a great day of practice on the Friday in the BGR Piper Honda DF5, it was heartbreaking to watch my teammate race on Saturday and Sunday in it. Following problems with his car on practice day it was decided he would switch to my Piper as it was available. I would have much preferred to be out there on the track with everyone else, rather than watching my car whip around the track and finish with podium results as I sat on the pit wall.
On my days off, I’ve been focusing on raising funds for my 2015 season. It’s tough, but it’s something pretty much all racers have to do and it will be worthwhile. If you are a follower of my social media, you will know that one initiative I have started a crowd funding campaign. If you haven’t had a chance to look at it, please go to http://www.taegenpoles.com/team.asp to learn more and help me achieve my goal for the year.
The 5th and 6th rounds of ECKC are this weekend at Mosport. I’m looking forward to seeing how I can put this year’s experience to use! Working with Kevin Glover and the REM team, I’m excited to race with some teammates, share racing data and try to improve on personal best lap times which I set while practicing a few weeks ago. The last time I was out bits of asphalt were flying everywhere following some patch work, but I understand that has been redone in the lead up to this weekend. Minor modifications have been made to the layout of the track since last year that will make for some interesting passing opportunities this weekend.
Like always, you can keep up to date by following my social media pages to see how things are going on and off the track.