Slow Driving, Slow Head

It's sunday evening... I have been up for 4 hrs after sleeping all day and I have very clouded memories of last night.

Pete's bux celebrations started with Go Karting at Minto and it was my first foray into Karting, but I was very keen about it. I generally am with new things and this was no exception.

We were split into 2 groups of 6 and each group had 3 ten lap heats in which points were awarded after every race. We did a practice heat first just to get the feel of the track and I must say after this first practice I was surprised how hard it was. The wheel was hard to turn and there were a couple of very tight turns, but it was great fun.

We just went around and around as fast as we could with no idea on placings and I felt like I was flying... but then the race marshal gave us a print out of our average lap times and I was way off the pace... fastest guy was going around in 37 secs and I was back at 43 secs. Six seconds doesn't sound like much but it was a huge gap.

In the official heats, you go out under a pace car for one lap and then fly into it after the pit lane. I was in the middle of the group for the first race, and I was soon swamped!

To cut a long story short, I found that my problem was that I was driving it like a car... accelerator, brake, accelerate again. I didnt know until the end of the heats that I should just have the accelerator down full and brake when I needed to. I tried that better in the Consolation final and came 2nd, but only because I held off Joey and Noyz by blocking them rather than outrunning them... but a wins a win they say (well second).

Then it was onto Marrickville RSL and then the Rocks. The night is a bit of a blur and I recall getting very "emotional" and abusing the bouncers at the Observer (That pub has gone downhill bad!) before we ended up at the Orient. Live band, packed house, much more lively. I lost track of time, the bus picked us up, I reached Pete's house at the end of the line and crashed on his lounge room floor... very messy indeed.