Buckmore Park 24hr Race

The Adrenoco karting team's first ever year at the infamous Buckmore park 24 hour race located in Chatham England.

And what a race it was!!

Before the race even begins

In a challenging race like this, preparation is key. Many weeks of preplanning is needed to get everything ready for a full weekend of racing.

Due to Covid 19 being a big part of everyone’s life during the time of the race in 2020, it added an extra level of difficulty. England was wavering around lockdowns and restriction the whole lead up to the race, many of us were scared that the event wouldn’t even be possible.

Luckily, we had been given the green light and the race was still on!!

I could talk for days on how Covid made this a challenge just arriving to the race but were not here to complain. We're out to have a blast no matter what and learn along the way!

The whole fun in doing something like this is working as a team and coming together with a goal in mind. We had a goal to go out there, give it our best and leave it all out there on the track for others to see. We knew we were the underdogs with barley any experience in 24hr races and how they worked.

So having said this, here is a list of a few things you may want to know before entering in one of these events yourself.

Things to know

• The race itself may be 24 hours but you’re at the track for 2-3 days.
• Bring lots and I mean lots of water.
• Chances are you will be sleeping in your car or at the track so plan according.
• Not all tracks may have room for a tent or caravan so find out before you leave.
• Track food is mainly fat fried food and not going to sit in your stomach great on track so bring your own dinner. (We enjoy a good stir fry. One pan, healthy, cheap and easy)
• Track communication is key so investigate in coms or signs. (Walkie talkies)
• Bring clothes for all weather! Weatherman isn’t always right.
• Power is usually limited so may want a generator.
• Bring helpers! Drivers alone doing everything is not an easy race!
• Don’t forget you gloves!

Practice

Between the helpers and the drivers everyone managed to make it to the event. Luckily the night before the race was in the rain so the drivers could get a glimpse of the wet weather conditions glooming over the whole weekend to come.

Our drivers were very quickly putting out fast lap times. The only mishap that occurred was  While Robin was switching the radio over from his own helmet and onto Sam’s, he accidentally tuned into the local radio station 107.9 rather than the driver intercoms. So Sam drove around listening to some tunes for a while.

No harm was done though and this is exactly what practice is for.

Qualifying

And so, the fun begins for real. The day has arrived and the whole team is together excited and ready for the green light. Before the race is to start and we know where we will place on the grid, we must go through qualifying.  Dante Dhillon aka “the getaway driver” opted to do qualifying and the first stint of the race. Flying though qualifying finishing in 3rd place, therefore meaning we would start from the grid in 3rd spot.

The race begins.

If you have ever seen the famous Le Mans race start, then you can get a picture of how this event started too. All the karts are lined up along the other side of the track. The racers must sprint from one side to the other, enter the kart and pull away as quickly as possible.

Dante being the one that qualified for us also started the race for us. Flying off the line and capturing 1st place by the second corner and holding that position for the remainder of his two plus hour first stint. Excited and dedicated the team even through driver changes managed to hold this position for the first 7 hours of the race.

This being a full 24 hours of nonstop racing a lot happened that I can’t cover, or this will be a novel by the end. So long story short.

The heavens opened and it started to rain during Sam’s first stint. The rain played as a major advantage to the 2nd and 3rd place teams as they were local to the track and knew the perfect wet line straight away, while we had to learn it. We tried our best but after 2 hours they were able to catch us up and overtake putting us down to 3rd place.

Robin did an awkward stint with three different track conditions. He went out in wet conditions, then it started to dry out with it going through a greasy stage first. Once the track started to get a good dry line of course down came the rain yet again.

The weather would not hold up and yet got worse for Kallum and his stint. He drove the wettest, coldest and most miserable stint in the dead of night. Pulling out great wet lap times and pushing hard.

Most of our pit stops went very smoothly throughout the race. Jonny ended up being the unlucky one who got stuck in traffic at both his pit stops. He definitely made up for it though with his superb driving on his stints.

We may have dropped down to 3rd but this didn’t break our spirit. We continued to stay consistent and minimized our mistakes to help us hold 3rd position for the rest of the race. We finished with a very comfortable 14 laps ahead of 4th place.

We are incredibly proud of the whole team to finish 3rd. Both the drivers and helpers did a phenomenal job making the weekend run smoothly. More importantly, we put our best efforts in and had a blast doing so. I'm sure I can speak for the whole team and say that  the event though it was wet, cold and long, we had a brilliant time and enjoyed every second!

Congratulations to ‘Brentwood Banta’ and ‘Essex Racing’ for finishing 1st and 2nd place!

And last but not least, thanks so much to the Buckmore Park staff for organizing and running such an amazing race and we’ll be back next year aiming for the top spot!

Check out the 2020 Buckmore park video on our youtube channel.