Club Racing

We spent a lovely weekend at the track for Chloe's club race. It seems Chloe has some kids gunning for her. There has been lots of practicing and tweaking of karts on the part of Chloe's competitors. We thought Chloe would be in for some serious competition at Sunday's club race, but it didn't turn out that way. Chloe won handily.

Chloe carries the checkered flag as the kid kart winner.

Chloe also found out this weekend that we were buying her two more karts, a micro and a cadet. Yes, we have officially gone off the deep end. The karts won't be ready for a couple of weeks, but that didn't stop Chloe from taking some practice runs in a micro and competiting in the micro feature race.

Chloe made her debut in micro this weekend.

Chloe standing in front of her new CRG kart chassis. The kart on the right, a CRG Big Al 900 will be her micro
and the kart of the left, a CRG Hero 950 will be her cadet.

Like I alluded to at the start of this post, Chloe has become well-known at the track for winning and standing at first place for the kid kart podium. We're really proud of her and how she continues to improve her lap times, but we know just because she comes in first in kid kart each club race that doesn't mean that she is going into the much more competitive micro-kart level and going to win. So, I found it amusing at the awards ceremony for kid karts that two boys who compete in micro were discussing that Chloe made her "debut" in micro that day and high-fiving each other that they passed her during the race--the way they were discussing it, you would have thought Chloe was equivalent to Michael Schumacher. They were quite pleased with themselves on their overtaking of Chloe.

Chloe taking her first place podium finish for kid karts.

Everyone at the track is a big Chloe fan, but we are also realizing that she kind of has a target on her back now. Matt and I laughed when Chloe complained that a competitor tried to block her from passing on the track. She was really offended he didn't just let her lap him. Matt had to explain that was racing and the other kid wanted to win just as much as she did.

Chloe trying to overtake.

We laugh because Chloe always makes sure her competitors know exactly where to line up for the start of the race.

I love the goofy Go-Pro sticking out of Chloe's helmet. Chloe loves to watch the video as soon as we get home.

Chloe also made a fan of a professional photographer that came to the track a couple of weekends ago. He took some photos of Chloe racing that were really fantastic.

The professional photo of Chloe taken after a rainstorm at the track.

I also found it funny that this weekend I was asked no less than four times when Oliver would begin karting. Someone even asked if we would see him in a kart this season. I tried my best not to pull a face at them when I explained he just turned three, wasn't potty trained and pretty much had a mind of his own. I think it will be several more seasons of kart racing before anyone sees the little dude in a kart.

He's cute, but he's not getting into a kart anytime soon.

Reasons 1, 2, & 3--He still needs a nap, he still wears a diaper and drinks from a sippy cup. Does this look like someone capable of driving a kart around a track at 35 mph? Really? He's three.

A group shot of the competitors was taken for a track ad. I think from the range of ages in this photo and my two kids in the front of the photo, you can see its really laughable that someone would ask if Oliver were getting in a kart this season. But, perhaps its not that crazy when you know that all those little boys to the right of Chloe drive karts at 60 mph. I want to note that Oliver is making a face and has my iPad that he insisted he hold for the photo--he was playing a dirt bike racing game and just couldn't give it up to smile.