Youth, start your engines

One sports club is doing its part to help recession-hit parents.

The Bermuda Karting Club is allowing young people to race for $50 per day instead of laying out thousands of dollars on a new kart.

Jason ‘Skuzzie’ North, new president of the Bermuda Karting Club, said: “The past few years the club has been pretty stagnant. There is a lot of potential out there. Most of the potential is in the junior programme, which we do have up and running now.

“We invested in 10 junior go-karts, which we are going to start using on a regular basis because that’s where most of the growth is.

“Once you get the kids involved, then you get most of the parents involved. That’s our main goal.”

He said the club has been in the sporting wilderness for too long, having never really recovered from a two-year absence when the original Southside track was closed.

“We had a period when we weren’t racing and that’s when most of the interest was lost.

“Karts sat around and got rusted, corroded because people didn’t take care of them.

“For them to bring those karts back out would take money and time. That’s what really hurt the club.”

The club moved to Morgan’s Point briefly before the new purpose-built raceway was built at Clearwater.

North said other presidents have tried to breathe new life into the junior programme, but it just never seemed to take off.

“It takes money; it takes investment.”

He said the club isn’t asking parents to splash out thousands of dollars on a kart to see if their child likes it. Instead, for $50, they can bring their children down to Southside on a Sunday and give it a try and see if it’s something they would really enjoy.

“We’re charging $50 a race day to drive around in a kart for four races. That’s pretty reasonable.

“The club is picking up most of the cost in the maintenance of the vehicle and the tyres, and things like that.

“That $50 will give them a race day and some experience. They’ll be able to show up and drive and at the end of the day put the helmet back in the seat and they can leave.

“This is feasible for most juniors who want to give it a go.”