King shrugs off Spanish disappointment in record breaking style

Andy King in action

One of the keys to being a successful racing driver is not to dwell on races which don’t go as planned and to bounce back quickly, something which Littleborough’s Andy King did in fine style in the opening two races of his 2012 Senior Rotax campaign.

On the heels of his third place finish in last year’s Super One Senior Rotax Championship and his stunning drive to tenth in the prestigious Rotax World Finals, the 17-year old Myerscough College student and his Strawberry Racing team were looking to pick up where they left off in the season opening Rotax Winter Cup at Campillos in Spain.

But despite being one of the fastest in the field King, named by Motorsport News as number two on their annual list of ‘Drivers To Watch’ in 2012, didn’t leave the Malaga circuit with the result he had hoped for.

“Its disappointing but I’ll take the highlights that we had the pace to win,” said King, who finished 13th after another driver turned in on him during the final, spoiling one of his trademark charges through the field from 18th on the grid. “But that’s racing, you win some you lose some but we know we’ve got the pace in Europe to compete for wins.”

To coin a football terminology, King showed tremendous ‘bounce-back-ability’ the following weekend as he smashed his own lap record at the Three Sisters circuit in Wigan in the latest round of the Manchester & Buxton Kart Club Championship.

King began the final from fifth place but a slight brush with the driver in front damaged the steering on King’s kart, leaving him struggling to keep his 80mph machine stable.

“As we went through the Valley my front right wheel got caught on Ash Hand’s rear bumper and that twisted the track rod,” recalled King. “I could tell something was wrong straight away as the steering was very heavy when I tried to turn left and very light when I tried to turn right.”

Despite the unusual handling characteristics King battled into third place, breaking his own lap record by seven hundredths of a second in the process. On the final lap King caught the leading duo and went for an audacious lunge on both rivals going into the first corner. The move almost worked and for a brief moment King found himself in second place but having lost momentum King was squeezed back to fourth place when the chequered flag fell.

“I’ve always been fast at Wigan but because its such a fast track and I have to put lots of weight onto my kart it is a track where in theory I should struggle,” commented King, who now holds the outright Senior Max lap record at both the Club and Valley circuit layouts used at Three Sisters. “After the race my dad came over to me and said I had broken the lap record. I was surprised as the situation I was in with the bent track rod wasn’t perfect so it was good to finish the day we learned a lot of valuable data for the Super One round here later in the year.”