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The official WSK test at La Conca (times) took place Wednesday-Friday this week, and with race tyres available is one of the first indications of whether the status quo is going to change in 2009. No overall dominance was established from the manufacturers but Tonykart/Vortex (SKF and KF2) and Intrepid/TM (KZ2 and KF3) shared the fastest times.

Gary Catt (GB, Tony/Vortex) was fastest overall in Super KF with a time set on Thursday, and Armand Convers (FR, Kosmic/Vortex) and Arnaud Kozlinski (FR, CRG/Maxter) also topped the times on the other days – Convers seems to be settling in well with his new team. Aaro Vainio (FI, Maranello/Maxter) has moved straight up from KF3 and was fourth overall and top Maranello, just behind Sauro Cesetti (IT, Birel/Parilla) who was third. Marco Ardigo was only 10th overall but he does a lot of development testing so he probably had a lot of new stuff on. F3 racer and former Maranello star Jules Bianchi was also out at La Conca with his former team and was on the pace by the end of Thursday, taking the fastest lap in the final session.

New Tonykart factory driver Anniello Smarazzo set the pace in KF2 with Nikolaj Moller Madsen (DK, Energy/TM) just three hundredths off. He was also at a new team and along with Joel Johansson (seventh) shows that the Energy karts could well be worth watching this year. Karol Basz (PL, RK/Parilla) was straight away able to keep up with the best on Robert Kubica’s new kart and finished the test third but Kevin Ceccon was down in 17th (IT, RK/Parilla). Mackenzie Taylor (GB, Alonso/Vortex) was fastest in several individual sessions but a couple of tenths off overall.

Yet another transfer, Rafaele Marciello (CH, Intrepid/TM was fastest in KF3 but was pushed hard in the times by Sam Looijenstein (NL, DR/Maxter) who is new to international racing. The Dutchman was fastest in the vast majority of his sessions, buthis compatriot and reigning champion Nyck De Vries (NL, Zanardi/Parilla) was fastest on the Thursday when the track was generally slower.

In KZ2 the Intrepids were again very strong, with Norman Nato in front (FR, Intrepid/TM) and Jeremy Iglesias in (FR, Intrepid/TM) swapping fastest session laps between them. The Pex brothers, Jorrit and Yard, were second and fourth in the final times though, both on CRG/TM. Intrepid’s decision to stay away from the top class except for De Brabander at the satellite team EGP seems to be paying off.

Photo by Chris Walker