Curtis Mitchell Karting

Hi, my name is Curtis Mitchell, I am 18 years old and just about to finish my A-levels at Bulmershe School in Woodley. My karting career started 4 and a half years ago when we were on holiday in Portugal. We came across a kart track near the town of Almancil and Dad convinced mum we should pull in and have a go. There were several Portugese there driving round the track like lunatics and as it was my first ever time in a kart Dad said he would drive round behind me and protect me from being crashed into by one of them. We lined up first and second in the pit lane and joined the track first. I was expecting the 'locals' to start passing me but no-one did and after several laps I realised I was coming round to start lapping them. I looked round to see where Dad was and he was still on my tale (but only just); we started lapping the locals and it felt really good. Then the session was over and we were flagged into the pits and that's when I realised the brakes didn't work!!! I flattened the pit marshall and took out some of the tyres. Dad couldn't get out  of his kart beacuse he was laughing so much, the track marshalls were not very happy about it until I pointed out the brakes didn't work. They were then pretty impressed that I had managed to keep the kart on the track with hardly any brakes (there are a couple of hairpins on the track). They suggested Dad should get me a kart as I obviously had a natural ability.

My first kart was a 'Bowman' chassis twin engine pro-kart. We bought it as a bit of a fun kart and also to enter into 'Pro-kart' championships. We should have done a bit more research, beacuse we then found there is only one junior 'pro-kart' series in the South of the UK and that is at the Llandou cirucit in Wales; not particularly local to us and only run at  one circuit.

As it was the midle of the year we decided to stick with the pro-kart and visit local tracks, so I could get some 'track time ' and learn the art of karting. We first visited the Thruxton kart track and as Dad races cars and is pretty quick, he said he would take the kart  out first and set a time for me to get to. By the third '10 miunte' session I was within 3 tenths of his time; we then stopped for lunch and had a chat with  the marshalls who pointed out a couple  of areas where they thought I could go quicker. I went ot after lunch and was nearly a second quicker per lap, smashing Dads time by 6 thenths of a second. Dad then went out again to set a new lap time, but couldn't beat my time; the best he could manage was one tenth off my time.

We sold the Pro-kart at the end of 2007 and purchased my first serious race kart, a 'Jade' chassis Junior TKM 4 Stroke; we decided to go the 4 stroke route for ease of maintenance and longevity of the engine. In 2008 I entered the 'F6' Championship, a championship specifically for '4' stroke karts. At the beginning of the season I was finishing mid-field in the races and by the end of the season I wa starting to win races, hauling myself up from 9the overall mid season to finishing the championship 4th overall. Pretty good for my first full season of racing against 19 other junior 4 stroke karters. 

Half way through the year, I convinced my Dad to spend more money and buy me a new 'Tal-ko' chassis. We managed to find one which had only done 3 races from Tal-ko, which we picked up for a pretty good price.

Also in 2008 I entered the 'Clay Pigeon Raceway' championship, which was contested by 12 Junior 4 stroke drivers and I immediately started finnishing races on the podium, and it wasn't long before I started winning. I consequently went on to win the 'Clay Pigeon Raceway Junior 4 Stroke Championship' and was crowned Champion.

This year '2009' we decided to contest the pinnacle Chamionship in the UK 'The Super1 Championship'. The is the National Championship in the UK where the 'cream' of the TKM karters race against each other, hoping to be crowned Champion and go onto bigger and better things. It has proved to be a very tough year, particularly as Tal-ko (the TKM engine builders) enter their own team of drivers. The first meeting we arrived at (Fulbeck), was a bit of an eye opener with all the huge winnabego motorhomes and factory backed teams. It's amazing how much money people are putting into karting, but I guess this is the top national championship in the UK and we do travel all over the country. The cicuits we visited this year are : Fulbeck Lincolnshire 7/8th March, Glan Y Gors North wales 11/12th April, Larkhall Glasgow 23/24th May, Clay Pigeon Dorset 27/28th June, Beccles Suffolk 15/16th August, Buckmore Park Kent 3/4th October. After the first round we realised this was going to be a tough championship and due to me growing about a foot in height over the last year that perhaps I should have moved up to senior because I was on average 10 kilos over the minimum weight limit. And several people have now told us that 10 kilos can be worth about half a second a lap. This doesn't sound a lot but when you consider the whole grid (from first to 14th) was only split by 0.4 of a second, then you will realise this is actually a great deal.