Xander Clements December 14, 2014

 

       Almost a month after the conclusion of the 2014 KF Junior season, the Sim Karting World Championship returned to action in
North America at the SimRaceway Karting Center in Sonoma, California. This track played host to the 2014 Rotax Junior season finale back in the third season of SKWC, with Sonoma local Michael Avansino (Praga) coming away with his first career SKWC victory. He would have a much harder time to repeat than with his original win, as twenty two competitors showed up for the event, each gunning for the top spot. 

 

       At the end of Final Practice, J3 Competition had a stronghold on the top four positions, with all four team members running nearly identical lap times. However, the slowest and newest member on the team was the eventual polesitter from qualifying -- Ben Hamlet (Comp Kart). Cory Hayes (Italkart) would qualify second, with his teammate Ryan Harris (Italkart) qualifying third. Hamlet's J3 Competition teammates would qualify fourth, fifth, and sixth, with Brenden Baker (Comp Kart) besting Braden Eves (Comp Kart) for fourth forcing Eves to settle for fifth. 

 

       Moving into the heats in the new race structure, for the first time the field would be split into two different groups based on qualifying results. In heat 1, Ryan Harris was all business as he methodically took the lead away from Ben Hamlet in the beginning of the first lap in Heat 1. However, Harris made a small mistake out of the last turn coming to complete the first scored lap in the event, and Ben was able to negotiate his way back around the Australian. Hamlet never looked back after the pass, building up a respectable gap over Harris that kept him just out of striking distance.

 

       In heat 2, Cory Hayes led the field down to the green with Brenden Baker and Corrie Hiatt right in-toe. Baker initially was shuffled back behind Hiatt off the start, but was eventually able to run back down Hiatt to reclaim the second spot. Baker would remain there for the rest of the heat to lock in his fourth place starting position for the final. Hiatt fell off of Baker and Hayes's pace late in the going, but would hold on to third place over Andre Castro (FA Kart), who had to settle for fourth. Carson Clements (FA Kart) punched his ticket for the last locked in spot for the final off this heat with a comeback drive into the top five after being spun at the start from an incident involving Connor Tebbe (FA Kart). 

 

       With a twelve kart limit on the grid in the final, the last two remaining spots were up for grabs in the ten kart Last-Chance-Qualifier. Xander Clements (FA Kart) led the field to the green on pole, as after a solid qualifying run had him start third in his heat, contact from behind with Max Tadd (TB Kart) caused him to lose his front nosecone, which aerodynamically hindered Clements so much as he could not keep pace with the front runners and fell to sixth. Xander was determined, though, and stretched out a win over Mark Pickett (Flandria Kart) to set himself up with an eleventh place starting spot in the final. Pickett was under fire for the majority of the race, unlike Clements, with charges from Gresham Wagner (FA Kart) and Florian Godard (CRG), both of whom involved in incidents that marred their chances at a transfer spot. Alex Frazer (Praga) was driving the wheels off of his chassis coming from the back of the grid up to third after missing the start in his heat race, but unfortunately it was not enough to catch Pickett and had to settle with the being the first driver to miss the Final.

        In the Final, Ben Hamlet and Cory Hayes led the stacked field of eleven down to the green flag, as Max Tadd had a mechanical failure which did not allow him to reach the grid, and ultimately forcing him into the twelfth finishing position. As the field shuffled through positions within the first couple of laps, bad luck struck the two Italkart KartSport teammates, as each were involved with incidents running with the lead pack. Both Ryan Harris and Cory Hayes were then on a tear back up through the field the entire race, but could not regain the front runners' draft of the top three J3 Competition drivers. With team owner Braden Eves wrecking out early, Brenden Baker, Corrie Hiatt, and Ben Hamlet dueled all the way down to the stripe with Hamlet coming out as a first-time SKWC winner. Baker was within two tenths of him at the line, and Hiatt just a tad over a second back in third. Xander Clements (FA Kart) charged his way back up to fourth from the back of the field after an early spin from contact with his KartSport North America East teammate, Andre Castro (FA Kart), who managed to hold off Ryan Harris and Cory Hayes to maintain a fifth place finish and a solid points day without much pace.

 

3rd Place Finisher: Corrie Hiatt #142 (Comp Kart) "First off, I'd like to thank J3 Competition for signing me to their team, so late in the off-season. It's definitely a pleasure to be running with such a high level team, and I'd also like to thank my teammates Brenden Baker, Ben Hamlet, and, most of all, Braden Eves for giving me this opportunity. We had a great weekend. I can't thank the event organizers enough; I'm just really impressed with this entire race.  Starting from the beginning, I did pretty crappy in qualifying, I just chose the wrong gear. That ended up costing me as I stuck with that gear through the heats, and it really ended up biting me. I showed my passing ability on the starts, but I also showed my lack of pace with that. Moving into the final, I was hoping to be on Ben's bumper throughout the session, but unfortunately, misreading tire pressure, I missed the setup, costing me a chance at the victory. Hopefully I'll be able to carry the positive momentum out of this event into the next round at DKC "

 

2nd Place Finisher: Brenden Baker #109 (Comp Kart) "I mean, I definitely made a mistake on my part not realizing what lap we were on late in the going. But yeah, it was definitely a fun race still. Qualifying was okay for us; I actually was a tenth up on my best lap and made a mistake in the final corner, so that put me P4. My heat race was alright; Cory Hayes was a bit faster than me and I maintained pace with him. I got out of trouble on the start -- didn't really have any issues -- and I got around Corrie Hiatt early in the race, around lap three, and then started to work my way up to Ben [Hamlet]. Towards the end of the race, I got pretty close, but I just ran out of time. Maybe next time I can actually not go that low on tire pressure, because that was a bit of a mistake on me. I was actually the fastest lap I believe all weekend with a 47.9 and nobody breaking the 47 second barrier. We definitely had pace, it's just that we ran out of time, unfortunately, but a good race for J3, 1-2-3, which is really exciting. Hopefully we can do the same at DKC, except with me first this time, not Ben."

 

1st Place Finisher: Ben Hamlet #169 (Comp Kart) "Yeah, it was a big thanks to J3, as in the pre-season I didn't have a team, and Braden kindly offered to take me in and give me a seat. [I] came here, and [have] done a clean sweep, which I didn't really expect, but it's good, you know. Pole in qualifying, won the heat, and won the final, but it definitely wasn't easy. I had Brenden on my bumper at the very end, and had a bit of contact on the second lap with Cory Hayes, but both drivers there, not intentional, just a racing incident. It caused me to have damage to my kart, which I think impeded me a bit, but I'm really happy with the result, and I hope we can do it next round."

 

Official Results:

1st) Ben Hamlet #169 (Comp Kart)

2nd) Brenden Baker #109 (Comp Kart)

3rd) Corrie Hiatt #142 (Comp Kart)

4th) Xander Clements #136 (FA Kart)

5th) Andre Castro #104 (FA Kart)

6th) Ryan Harris #122 (Italkart)

7th) Cory Hayes #111 (Italkart)

8th) Adam Rylance #140 (CRG)

9th) Mark Pickett #192 (Flandria)

10th) Braden Eves #141 (Comp Kart)

11th) Carson Clements #124 (FA Kart)

12th) Max Tadd #135 (TB Kart)

13th) Alex Frazer #151 (Praga)

14th) Daniel Burgess #156 (TB Kart)

15th) Florian Godard #102 (CRG)

16th) Brayden Werner #129 (CRG)

17th) Ian Bushey #137 (Italkart)

18th) Gresham Wagner #105 (FA Kart)

19th) Elliott Budzinski #191 (Praga)

20th) Connor Tebbe #114 (FA Kart)

21st) Michael Avansino #144 (Praga)

22nd) Marco Eakins #118 (Gillard)