Racing event in Spain affected by wet tyres
From 10 to 13 July, the Alcaniz circuit in Spain hosted the qualifying event of the KF3 and KF2 categories of the European Championship, and the ČSMS team's driver Jirka Forman, since he has been holding an English racing licence, was included in this zone. In this case, unfortunately, Jirka Forman was at a disadvantage, as he had to face really great competition.
At the beginning of the free practice, everything looked fine, and the kart, with the help of the top-class MS Kart facilities, was running well. But than, just before the qualifying, a trouble with the new exhaust pipe occurred, making it impossible for the team to adjust both engines optimally by the beginning of the session. So Jirka only came 36th in the timed practice. Taking into account the great competition, this placing, in fact, made it impossible for him to reach the finals. That is, in the qualifying, Jirka had to start from the unfavourable seventh row. 'In the first race, after a bad start, I finished in 13th place. In the second one, we made a mistake by using wet tyres: the track dried up at a later stage. And so, after an enormous struggle, I only came 20th. In the third race, after fierce battles, I came 15th, and the chance of the finals was shattered. In the fourth race, I did not start well. I finished in 15th place again, that is, 41st overall. So, I came short of the finals,' Jirka explains the complicated situation of the races.
If only the team had avoided the fatal mistake with the wet tyres, the Czech driver, with a wide margin, would have qualified for the finals to contest the European Championship title as last year. Jiří Kahuda, chief mechanic of the MS Kart team, describes the atmosphere of the races as follows: 'I was very surprised to see the high-level performance of the drivers and, in particular, the very closely fought qualifying races. Our company particularly has the experience with races in Italy and Scandinavia, where our drivers are involved. I can say that, if we had had the opportunity to adjust the engines in time and, in particular, if we had had the time to explain the method of controlling the engine in the course of the race, Jirka would have qualified with a wide margin, I watched all the heats very carefully. Moreover, the fact that our driver ranks among Europe's top ten kart drivers is well documented by the official results of the racing events. It is a pity, because everything was prepared in an optimum manner. Anyway, we have learned our lesson for the next racing events that we will jointly contest.'
