Walker vows to bounce back

British Super 1 title challenger Jonathan Walker has vowed to put his frustrating start to the domestic kart racing season behind him, and return to form at the first round of the European Championship at Angerville, France in two weeks time.

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The 19-year old crashed heavily during testing, spraining his wrist, which then plagued him for the remainder of the weekend.

The Three Sisters circuit at Wigan leaves little room for error. Unfortunately, with the meeting hit by sudden and frequent rain showers, judging where the grip was became very difficult. Jonathan explains: “I went down the ‘Valley’ section and hit a patch of water and speared straight off into the barriers. It was a big accident, and I wrote-off a brand new chassis in the process.”

Matters didn’t improve when his motor seized during Timed Qualifying. Walker had only completed four laps when the engine let go. His frustration was further compounded when he discovered that he was 6th quickest and just a tenth of a second off the 3rd fastest time - “I think I could’ve gone quicker, but the pain in my wrist was getting so bad that I couldn’t pull the front-brake lever.”

This forced him to consider abandoning the heats in favour of racing solely in the two finals. However, as the organizers called the drivers to the grid for the first race, Jonny put his kart down on the third row of the grid. Driving through his obvious discomfort, he battled to a creditable 9th place.

In the second heat, he managed to get up to 4th before dropping back to 5th.

The first final proved to be a trial for the Gillard driver. Lacking pace, his team tried desperately to cure the problem – even putting a jacket around the engine to maintain its temperature down the circuit’s long, wind-blown main straight. “We just couldn’t get the engines to rev over 15,000 rpm” he said dolefully. “I was losing a second up the straight”.

Sticking gamely to the task in hand, Walker climbed back into his kart for the second final, despite describing his wrist as “…mangled. It just killed all the time.”

The race proved to be a disaster. Forced off at the first corner, Jonathan rejoined the circuit only to tangle with Irishman, Raymie Eastwood. With the kart’s floor-tray detached in the crash and lifting the front wheels off the ground, Jonny decided enough was enough and called it a day.

“I just need to write Wigan off and look forward to Angerville” he said. “Hopefully I’ll be able to break into the top fifteen and make the cut for the Championship finals”.

Photo: Kartpix

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