Drivetime

I went go-karting on Thursday night, over at Monks Cross. We had (what felt like!) a long session (a "Monza Grand Prix") - 5 heats each, 2 semi-finals and a final. Each of the heats probably only lasted for under three minutes though so I guess it can't have been as long as it felt.

As ever, the karts are pretty scary to start with. Once you get used to them and start to go see what they can do, it gets a bit easier. But still scary. Thirty miles an hour is pretty damn fast when you're only inches from the floor.

My driving was actually pretty decent. I didn't make any mistakes of note and people found it almost impossible to overtake me as I was sticking to the racing line. However, my actual lap times weren't too great so I wasn't catching people up and overtaking them much either (except when they crashed). Of the five heats, I maintained my position in all of them except for one where I gained a place (but only because somebody was penalised a lap!).

This put me into sixth place out of eleven. Bang in the middle. In the semi finals, the first two finishers from each race were automatically put through to the final, and the fastest of the two third place finishers joined them. I came third in my race and lost out on getting into the final by about 12 hundredths of a second. Annoying, but I was pretty tired by then so didn't mind too much.

Maybe it's because I'm getting old but it did seem a lot more hard work than I remembered. I'm still aching in various places now. And it was very sweaty. Lots of us had shaky hands and found it hard to lift things.

We went to Maxis afterwards for a Chinese. We almost all had cokes to drink and so combined with the shakes it must have made us look like an AA meeting.

I like Maxis. But whilst the food is good, it does make you feel like you're in a Saga holiday to China. My, those oldies can shake it on the dance floor when they get going.