Editorial
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To start karting. You can, even at the age of 50.
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Saverio Villa, journalist and editor, knows he is not made for karting: he weighs 90 kg, is 1.87 meters tall and is always swamped with work. Sporting activities: zero! Yet, he dreams about racing in a kart and one day, a few years ago, he decided to give it a try. Here’s how it went.
I am here in my bed of pain and I tell myself, once more, that letting yourself go to rash judgments is always an unforgivable stupidity. I already got “burnt” a years ago, on the occasion of a clumsy attempt (then abandoned) to approach the noble world of golf: “Not to worry, it’s an old man thing, not a real sport”, I had proclaimed Urbi et Orbi.
The results of a few of the following days, starting with that darn practice green, I felt as if I had tried to stop a Hummer with the power of thought. This time, I had given up reference to the golden age given that, those who race in a kart are mostly guys who could be my great-grandchildren. Yet, I had said to myself “what’s the worst that can happen?”, with a clear conviction when Vortex offered me the chance to try a tool of those who participated in the non-shifter Rok Cup. After all, it had been a bet many times for a ham & mushrooms pizza with colleagues in those karts with weed-whacker engines which they rent to you everywhere, and I believed I knew what I was facing. Well, this time the Hummer I tried to stop had studded tires, judging by how badly every part of my body hurts… The approximate 30 HP of the single-cylinder 125 by Vortex, together with the 90 kg of a complete chassis, are going to flush down the toilet your concept of inertia, along with everything that goes with it. Somebody like me, who see’s karts only in photos, does not think about the suspension, here, there’s not even a shadow of one! Therefore, there is not even a few milliseconds of margin to understand what is happening and what to do: when you think of steering, it, the kart, has already been doing it. So, if you do not keep your knees desperately tight to the tank mounted under the steering wheel, you will fly out of the seat at the first turn. Already from this point the first bruises start showing up, to which are then added the narrow and stiff seat which transmits to you, while amplifying them, all the stresses which can come from an asphalt surface.
Highly experienced journalist, specialized in the field of cars and engines. He has been vice-editor of Evo and editor of the monthly Cambio, of Panoramauto and of the weekly Auto Oggi. He has collaborated or collaborates with companies such as Corriere della Sera, Gente Motori, AM and Autosprint.
Keep in mind its duty is precisely to faithfully inform you what is going on under the tires, but the flip side of it is that you can then verify it on your skin and ribs. More or less, all the muscles you have (including those you never suspected of having) are contracted in an attempt to remain anchored to those four tubes welded together, yet, at the same time, you need to reach a minimum of slack which allows you to have control of the steering wheel, brake and accelerator with some semblance of awareness. As with any racing car, the more you drive at ease, the more physical fatigue decreases. With karting, however, when this ideal psychophysical situation is reached, fatigue goes down from an inhuman level to the superhuman one, which is still a plus, but from here to be a stroll, there’s a significant time span. After a while, let’s say a dozen rounds, keeping the helmet still when you pass on the track’s edges will become an issue, concentration will start to weaken on all fronts and your trajectories will start to diverge in a worrying way. Until then you had tried to follow, with all of this going on, with an iron perseverance. The appointment for my test was at the San Pancrazio circuit: 1.154 meters which kart drivers know very well [it is the Parma kart circuit, a few month before it was closed and demolished. Ed.].
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