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Stacey…..What is the mini max rated for horse power? It appeared to have some very long legs on the back straight of your track.
Just my observation from the first points race at your track.
Mike Edwards
Mike, they say 13 hp at sea level, watching th erace very closely it seems the briggs has better bottom and mid and the mini a little better top, but they were so close at our track.
Stacey,
What is the weight that you run them at?
John
I usually do not like to get into controversy on this forum. Since you opened the can of worms. I have spoke to Doug and asked the track owners to get together on a strategy for Jr1. We run the comer 80 and blue printed I think the most horsepower rating it makes is 9.5hp.
I have heard that the Animal can produce up to 13 hp as well. The larger disparity is between the Comers and the rest of the field. We mentioned at the begining of the year we would look at the changes if they were not copmetitive. Look at the results since the flywheel adjustment could be made on the animals. The Comers arent even close. Know I know it could be considered complaining since I am now the only one who runs Comer 80’s here. (The other Comer fathers gave up and switched to Animals or went to a different class) However with three boys racing it gets expensive to change three motors. I have already changed one to a novice shifter. However I am very reluctant to change the other two to novice shifters since they are only 8 yrs old for next year. I am very reluctant to run them since most of the time they run with the 80 shifters.
Too fast to be run with the little guys for me. So what to do? The larger disparity to me is the Comers not the Mini Max. If the 4cycle dads think the mini max is too fast how about going out and buying a mini max. I think we should find a way to slow the rest of the field down to the speed of the Comers rather than figure out how too make 8 and 9 year olds go faster. The rest of the country runs Comers in their fields and if we run nationally we have a competitive motor. What we have done here is basically alienated the Comers in our search for speed for kids. The reason I bought the Comers in the first place is that they are Relatively easy to work on and inexpensive to run. At the beginning of the year it looked like there were going to be enough to maybe have a class of there own, however as you can see we pretty much ran everyone in the Comers out of Dodge. So… what do we do now? Switch to novice shifter to be run with jr 80 shifters? (not very safe) Continue with the Comers and have my kids (who have done well in the 50 comer class) place in the back of the pack? Spend the money to buy Animals, Mini Max or the new motor that comes out with 50 hp that will anitquify all the others? Tell you what, if someone will assure me that we will not run the novice shifters with the 80 junior shifters. I will go buy two more motors ( that I will be able to use for years to come) and get out of the JR1 class completely and you won’t hear me complain again.Sincerely,
Zipnby Racers Dad
Zipnby Dad……….Who’s animal is producing 13hp?…. If we keep changing the rules, my 2 karts and 3 animals will be for sale and you can buy mine!
Mike Edwards
From a father of someone who wants to start in Jr1 soon, I agree that they’re too fast. For a kid who didn’t run Comer 50s, starting in Jr1 is jumping onto a pretty fast moving train. I’d like to see the class slowed down if anything, and have a step between Kidkarts and Jr2.
Then there’s cost – $2500 for a Mini-Max? That’s what – 2 or 3 times the cost of a nice Animal? If that’s what it takes to be competitive, we (and probably lots of other potential karters) will find another sport.
So if you’re taking a poll, I vote no.
Let me start off with a quote I got from an “experienced” Junior 1 parent earlier this year:
Don,
I don’t think adding more engine options into the Jr 1 Class is a good idea.
Now, having experienced the Junior 1 class I totally agree with Angie and have a better understanding of her and others reasoning. Basically we are making it an Animal class now, watching the flatheads dissappear and the 80cc Comers slowly die. Everything I have read says the minimax is stronger than the Animal, and nothing to the contrary, and if introduced we would eventually see the animal engine fade to the minimax. As several articles have pointed out so eloquently, including one listed on this site not so long ago, and I am paraphrasing here; we don’t need more motors, complexity and costs to entry level karting, what we need is more karters. Do we really want to pay $2100 just for an engine in the second, level class of karting here in Colorado-?? Ok, maybe this is what some want. Don’t get me wrong, I am all for progress when it makes logical sense, but I don’t think this does. In fact, I agree with others that we should slow these little guys down some either by going back to “WKA legal” Comers or by switching the Animal’s to alcohol and running a restrictor plate. And let me state by adding, I am not trying to stop the Minimax’s growth, but just don’t believe it should be in the Junior 1 class.
Now to settle the power issue: Stacey either we could get these motors on a dyno at this altitude or better yet, get one of the top Jr 1 drivers to drive a minimax. Either Ben Whetstone, Nick Burton, Austin Farley or James-Michael Sullivan, I would pick Ben since he is, in my opinion, the most stable, consistent driver and/or then put your daughter in an animal. I would bet, based upon several aspects including watching the last several CSC Junior 1 races that Ben could easily beat his best Animal time while your daughter would slow down.
Finally, my personal observations: Stacey and Mike, I disagree with you on the Animal’s and Minimax’s strong points. I saw my son, Nick Burton, Austin Farley trying to pass Stacey’s daughter again and again and not one of them did. (I am not trying to take anything from your daughter Stacey, but it is my believe the reason she kept them behind her had more to do with her motor than her growing driving skills, but I could be wrong.) Time after time they would catch her at the end of the straight away and stay along side her in the corners only to lose several kart lenghts out of the corners. That minimax literally jumped out of the corners and it took the animal most of the straight aways to catch it again. My contention is this, if all Animals in the last race were place behind the minimax of Sabre’s maybe Ben Whetstone might of passed her, but no one else would have. As Stacey stated, not to open a can of worms, but my wife video taped the Jr. 1 races and it is pretty obvious the power difference, especially out of the corners.
my two cents
don
Thanks for the quote, Don, but as Cole only spent one season in Junior 1, I would hardly say I am an “experienced” Junior 1 parent! Also, as you know, once we got Cole going in the shifter, we opted not to do both classes and sold our Animals. There are times when it would be nice to have him back in that class, which is always a full field….it is, in my opinion, one of the best races to watch. And that is the only opinion I am going to voice on this!! (at least for now)
angie
I don’t think the mini max should be in Jr 1, but you might think about using the motor as the basis for a TAG class below TAG Jr., maybe a “TAG Junior Junior.”
I don’t think the Jr 1s are going too fast. My son is going maybe 2 miles per hour faster down the back straight than he was last year and it has more to do with a higher entry speed due to not lifting than the motor.
I agree with Don, the mini maxes were much quicker out of the corners. I saw the same thing. I would bet the mini max has significantly more torque than the animal.
All of this is great discussion for th 2005 season. The rules should not be changed mid-season. Period.
My feedback is that the Rotax motor is too expensive for the Jr1s. I also think the Animal in its present form is too fast for Jr1. I would restrict it per WKA.
Let’s keep the discussion going so that everybody can be heard before setting next year’s rules. Once they are set, don’t change them until 2006.
Rod Whetstone
Without dyno tests to compair the motors, we could talk until were blue in the face…………I stated earlier in the year that the last thing these kids need is more speed. I too have new flat heads at home that I thought would be competitive this year until it was determined by someone that the keyway needed to be removed on the animals so they could keep up with the flatheads. I’m still confused about that one, anyway I have the only rototiller on my block that turns 6500 rpm.
We talk about how strong karting is in Colorado but IMHO putting this issue to rest and coming up with a set of rules and living by them will do more for kart racing than any one thing.
Mike Edwards
I like Jeffs idea of a jr jr TAG, the jr TAG class we have now is using senior engines with no resricter. There are other engines that could work in that class also 2 and 4 stroke with electric start. We did all agreed at the meeting to not add engines during the season but this would be a good time to evaluate next years classes.
First off, I don’t think anyone is trying to change things mid way this season. I think Stacey is doing the right thing by bringing this up now, so people can be thinking about it. Mike is right, we need to tune the rules, get them in print early in the off season, so that people can adjust accordingly. I consider this a kind of “brain-storming” session, and gives those that are making the final calls something to think about.
We have wondered what the interest would be in something like Jeff has mentioned – a “mini” tag class. There are other Tag Motor packages designed for that age group. But the big problem is whether or not there would be enough interest to populate that kind of class. (We would be interested.) If not, where to put the Mini Max?
As for slowing down the Junior 1 class, the biggest problem I see here is forcing those in the class already, to make yet another change. What if, like Rod suggested, and we used more of the WKA rules such as mandating cadet chassis and/or eliminated the open clutch rule?
Another idea (and these are just more ideas to keep discussion going) is maybe dividing into a Junior Novice and a Junior Intermediate class. Basing the division on experience kind of like Novice 125 and Pro 125, or the Novice 80 to the Junior 80. The problem here would be, of course, that it creates yet another class that really should run independant of other classes. Maybe the age could be extended for the intermediate class, to let the kids stay another year or two if needed before moving to Tag, Shifters, or Senior 4 Cycle. That way the Junior 2 class could be dropped. A Junior Novice class would let kids move out of the Kid Karts maybe a little sooner, as they wouldn’t be looking at quite the jump in speed. Also, kids that have not had the Kid Kart experience won’t be as intimidated to start racing. Again, just thinking out loud to keep conversation flowing on these very important subjects.
One other thing, Rich, although we would love to see the Novice 60/80 class be filled up – I don’t think going straight from Kid Karts to Novice 80 shifter is a good idea. Just my opinion, but just the one year in Junior 1 for Cole, even though he didn’t run up front, was a Huge learning experience. If you don’t think the boys could handle being mixed in with the Junior 80s, then I wouldn’t consider starting them in that class yet. The Novice 60/80 shifter class has only been put out with the Junior 80s one time this year, at Grand Junction, as you well know. All CSC races before that (including the first GJMS CSC) and all of IMI local races, they have been run successfully with the Junior 2 class. Except at Action Karting where they actually got to run by themselves. There is no way that all of the classes can be run independently, there are too many classes, and not enough hours in a day.
I hope that the time is taken to get the Junior classes squared away before next season. It may not be true, but sometimes it seems as if the kids are treated like they are less important than the “Big Boy” classes. We need to realize that these are the future drivers in those other classes, and time needs to be taken for them, too. Entry fees, track time, pit fees, etc are the same for all, so no one class should be made to feel like they are a nuisance to the rest of the racers.
Angie makes alot of good points. The question I am beginning to ask is “where do we go from here?” as next year will be my son’s last year in Jr 1 and we are thinking about racing two classes next season. TAG Jr karts seem to have alot more horsepower than Jr 1 karts. What kind of h.p. does a Biland or Rotax put out? At our altitude a really strong Animal motor might put out roughly 10 h.p. at some point in its power curve. Don’t TAG motors put out atleast double that or more? If so, that is a big jump in power for a 12 year old and might argue for a Mini TAG or TAG novice class. A mini max would seem to be tailor-made for such a class.
It seems as kids progress in kart racing they choose the shifter track, or the TAG track. Perhaps this also argues for a Novice class for TAG to bridge the horsepower adjustment for the younger kids, ie. having a “feeder” class that eases the transition to TAG Junior, ala Novice 80 in the shifters.
Jeff
Jeff, the Mini Max is 13hp at sea level, in 2 minutes you can pull out the restrictors for the Jr package which is 19 hp at sea level then from there add a senior cylinder and it bumps to 27 hp at sea level. We are all on the right track talking now so that we can have things worked out for next year. Just a note for Don, my daughter had the 4th best lap time in jr-1 and finished 3rd. I think it was your son that passed her and she passed back. I think put it on the dyno and like you said maybe having a few of the kids drive a mini max would be best, I just like being able to run this motor just like it is for the nex 6 years then throw on a senior cylinder and she can run it another 6 years. It makes great economic sense to me. Plus the electric start is great.
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