News
2012
Good Start to 2012 For Gus and Alex - January
Gus Greensmith and Alex Sedgwick were out racing at PFI. The Velocity duo were on form with Gus starring in the Junior Max race.
The PFI club meeting was Gus's strongest showing to date in the Junior Rotax class, a quality field were present at the first PFI club meeting of 2012. Gus showed great form in the heats with a 5th and 7th finish, the 7th place after coming back from 26th in wet and tricky conditions. The Velocity team had given Gus a great set up for the heat where he gained fastest lap! Gus Started in 6th for the final, he quickly moved up in the opening laps with some decisive manoeuvres taking the lead at half race distance. Gus then led the race from the front pulling out a decent lead, unfortunately however a small mistake close to the end of the race let the pursuing pack pounce. Gus still managed to make the podium which was an excellent result for the ever improving driver.
Velocity Minimax driver Alex Sedwick was competing in his first ever minimax race and so there was never any expectations on the promising young driver. His results exceeded everyones expectations however by taking two top ten results in the heats and finishing tenth in the final. Unfortunately for Alex the final was held in drying conditions which meant the tyres he had available were not ideal (this being his first race), he showed determination to make his tyres last to the end with little hope of being as fast as the leaders who were on worn out wet tyres. The team is hoping Alex will now take a lot of positives out of this race after his unexpectedly good performances, he was so good in the heats he drove his Mum to tears!
The Team will be out again for more action at PF at the February club meeting.
Exciting times ahead in 2012 - January
Velocity Motorsport are proud announce the signing of two new drivers and an exciting new racing schedule.
Velocity maintains its current drivers into 2012. Gus, James and Joe will be carrying out selected Super 1 championship rounds (Exams mean that they unfortuantely will not be able to compete in every Race).
2012 is an exciting year for the team as it moves back to racing on the international stage. Gus Greensmith will be the teams representative in the CIK FIA under 18 world championships. This championship will be contested by the best up and coming talent and is a great place for Gus and the team to show case their ever improving talent. The events, to be held in Portugal France and Bahrain, will hopefully see the Velocity Motorsport colours achieving further recognition on the international karting scene.
Joe Byrne will move into Senior Rotax in the 2012 season. After a succesful winter testing session in Portimao Spain the team is confident that Joe will easily make the transition from Juniors.
James Biggs makes the step up from Mini max to Junior max for the 2012 season. Hopefully James will continue the progression seen towards the end of 2011, winning the Rookie cup at the last super 1 race of 2011. James will concentrate his season around the PFI club championship and take part in Super 1 events which do not clash with his GCSE exams.
Newly crowned WTP champion Alex Sedgwick joins the team to compete in the Super 1 Mini max championship. The signing of 12 year old Alex brings about the fourth generation of Velocity driver, a driver the team is very excited about regarding his potential for the future. The team hopes to have a long and succesful future with Alex who is hope fully on a long term plan to move through the Rotax classes with Velocity, Alex will be looking to race in Super 1 with future ambitions of moving into Euromax and CIK FIA World championship events in the future.
For 2012 Ben Walker returns to the team following 3 years sitting on the sidelines. Ben has been in the unfortunate position that he was to big to race in Junior rotax yet to young to race in Seniors. Ben turned old enough in the middle of 2011 to race in senior 177 and made the wait count in his first race taking 3rd in the Kartmasters GP. Velocity Motorsport is looking forward to working with Ben again in the 2012 season where he will be racing in the Super 1 Senior max 177 class.
Keep checking back to this page to see how the teams driver fare throughout the 2012 season.
2012 Winter testing update - January
Velocity Motorsport team drivers have been hard at work preparing for the 2012 season. Gus, James and new signing Alex have been honing their talent in the wet and slippery conditions whilst fellow team member Joe Byrne has been carrying out carb development work for the team in Spain, Portamiao. Joe has had a good few days in slightly better weather than the other drivers are experiancing in Britain!
Below are a few shots of the drivers at work!
2012 Driver line up announced - January
Velocity Motorsport are proud to announce its driver line up for 2012
Mini Max: Alex Sedgwick
Junior Rotax: Fergus Greensmith, James Biggs
Senior Max: Joe Byrne
Senior 177 Max: Ben Walker
Harrison and Velocity finsh 6th in the World in Abu Dubai!- November
Velocity Motorsport and driver Nathan Harrison made the long trip to the Al Ain Raceway in Abu Dahbi to represent the UK at the Rotax World Finals in the Junior Rotax catergory. The event is special in that every driver has equal equipment handed out at the start of the week long event so its up to the driver and race engineer to work closely to achieve a good setup in order to out perform the competition. Renewing old relationships Nathan and mechanic 'Carbon' soon got back to their previous ways and were pacesetters in the very first practise session! .
Carbon acting as race engineer / mechanic / manager for this event and Nathan worked hard throughout the limited practise sessions focusing primarily on the race pace, going into qualifying the pair were in confident mood despite only being 22nd in the final practise. In true Velocity spirit however there had been a logical plan to testing and come qualifying all the pieces were put together. This strategy was taken due to the ease of which other competiors could copy your set up due to the shared paddock area! The event showed the experiance in depth of the Velocity team due to the event being run on the unfamiliar Birel kart, this did not pose a problem! The qualifying session was a 15 minute long session the strategy was therefore to wait as long as possible to save the tyres and go for the one off hot lap, the pair timed this to perfection and Nathan put in a stunning lap to qualify 3rd overall on only his third rolling lap, this put Nathan as top Brit!
Going into the heats there was a relaxed mood in the Velocity corner of the UK pit area, Ash from Evolution was on hand to help Nathan out with his race tactics and act as a 'spotter' on the other side of the 1.4km long Al Ain raceway. Unfortunately disaster struck as Nathan was muscled back to 5th at the start of the first heat following a nervous first corner, Nathan was then hit hard again after colliding with another driver on the first lap and sending himself into a spin after getting onto the dirt and marbles. Nathan staged a fine recovery drive setting fastest lap along the way, coming from 32nd to finish 17th, unfortunately the stewards would later impose Nathan with a 10seconds penalty for his actions on the first lap. This incident made the team a little nervous however we knew we had the pace, Nathan therefore opted for a conservative route in the 2nd heat to finish 3rd. The following day Nathan knew he had to get a top ten finish in the third and final heat to be in with a shout of making the world final . The weather conditions were much cooler with the worry of rain on everyones mind (this being in the dessert) however this failed to come to fruition and Nathan made a super start and the Velocity Motorsport setup looked very strong a fine 2nd place finish being the result. A nervous wait followed as the team waited to find out if Nathan had automatically qualified for the World final, after an anxious few moments the team found out that Nathan had easily made the final despite his first race incident Qaulifying in 17th position for the pre final.
The finals were held in much hotter conditions, the tactics were simple stick tight to the inside on the chaotic first corner and make up as many places as possible in the pre final! The long pre final went much to plan with a fanatastic start putting Nathan from 17th to 13th on the first lap. Nathan then patiently worked his way through the field to come and eventual 9th the kart looking strong in the middle of the race.
The final then came and it was great for a Velocity Motorsport driver to walk out onto the main straight of the driver and place the kart in 9th position in front of the 5000 strong crowd and many thousands more watching the race over the internet. The race was all or nothing, and knowing that the track would be much grippier following the other catergories pre finals changes were made to the chassis. Nathan and Carbon made a pact on the grid that whatever happened they were really proud of there achievements but there was only one place to finish in a race like this and thats first! Going into the race every one was nervous but quietly confident.
Nathan made a superb start, however the 4 rolling up laps in the 35 degree heat were making Carbon nervous, would the Kart stay onto the end of the race after the pair had made the decision to go for an aggressive strategy and be fast at the start to ensure the front row drivers did not escape. The teams strategy worked well on the opening lap of the race with the kart looking superb and Nathan making it to a fantastic second by the 3/4 distance point of the race, an aggresive move during this fantastic rise up the order saw Nathan hit a kerb hard, post race this event was found to have bent the kingpin putting the front geometry of the kart out of line. As the race went on towards the closing stages the circuits ever imrpoving grip and the four rolling up laps started to take its toll and Nathan started to drop back towards the pack a ambitious move by the Austialian driver forced Nathan wide onto the marbles meaning that Nathan lost futher momentum and slipped back to his eventual finishing position of 6th.
Initially Nathan and Carbon were gutted as they aimed to at least make the podium following the strong showing through out the week long event. However following time to reflect Carbon and Nathan grew happy in the knowledge that Velocity Motorsport and driver Nathan HArrison had just finished 6th in the World. Well done Nathan! This meanth that Velocity and Nathan had managed to beat 66 drivers at the event which in totalling up all the drivers from the 56 Nations present meant that had beat over 4000 of the Worlds best Junior Rotax competitiors!
Velocity now looks to further its relationship with Nathan in the 2012 season were pending further negotiations Nathan will be part of Velocity's attack on the CIK FIA under 18 World championship.
