Top 5 Most Common Karting Mistakes (And how to fix them)

Alright guys, in this article I’m going to share with you the top five karting mistakes that I feel are the most frequent and that I commonly see with my kids when I do the coaching, and throughout my entire career being in the racetrack.

Some mistakes are pretty general, whereas other are more specific.

And I hope that some of these mistakes can resonate with you and hopefully push you to improve yourself. So, having said that, let’s go with the top five mistakes.

Here’s the list of the top 5 most frequent karting mistakes:

Lack of proper tires warm up
Cannot keep consistent
Always blaming the kart
Not aggressive enough during the race
Bad at giving setup feedback

#1 Lack of proper tires warm up

So, mistake number one that I see is that they never warm up the tires properly. Now, this is one of the most common mistakes since so many people don’t really focus on this.

But the really, really good drivers I’ve been driving against are really clever and they focus a lot on warming up the tires.

This is because when you warm up the tires, the faster and better than your competitors, you will have the grip earlier than them.

Therefore, you will be able to be much more aggressive in the race, perhaps if you’re leading a race pull away from the pack or if you’re in qualifying, you can give you more time to wait in the pits and perhaps get out later so that you can do the time anyways.

Whereas your competitors will not be able to do that.

But generally speaking, it’s really important to train yourself to improve your warmup technique.

Because when you do that, again, in a race, you’re going to be so much better than your competitors in the first few laps. You cannot do too much with tire pressure.

Because yeah, you can say “well, I will increase the tire pressure and so I can go faster in the beginning”. But there’s a limit for that.

You cannot go with high tire pressures because you’re not good enough with the warm up procedures.

So, it’s really important for you to focus on that.

When you go training by yourself or in the Wednesday or on Thursdays when there’s no races, you should really focus on improving your warming up.

And how you do that, you do that by really like waving a lot more aggressively, braking aggressively specially in the first out lap where the tires are really cold.

And it’s important for you to do that.

Really lean on the kart like if you’re driving in the wet, therefore that will allow you to create a lot more temperature in the tires thus making you faster.

#2 Cannot keep consistent

The second most common mistake I see is that they struggle with consistency.

So, they might be doing a great lap, a really good lap in qualifying but then they are struggling to maintain the pace and drop backwards.

So, this is really a big problem. Because if you cannot sustain your ultimate level, your ultimate pace, then you’re going to be going backwards in the race.

Because if you want to be at the top, you have to make as little mistake as possible.

And you also need to be as fast as possible.

So, throughout the entire race, if you are not consistent, you’re going to suffer. Because when you will make a mistake people will overtake you.

So, it’s really important for you to understand that.

And you want to maximize your concentration for this so that you are going to keep your consistency and make less mistakes. Focus on this.

Again, this is something more difficult to improve compared to the warm up procedure, because it’s something more subjective and you really have to work on yourself.

But I tell you what, this is going to be really important for you.

So, if you want to be a pro driver, you have to meet focus on consistency.

Not only on the fastest lap that you will see on your Michron. You have to really make sure that your consistency is key.

#3 Always blaming the kart

The third most common mistake that I see is that they are always blaming the go kart, they’re always blaming the equipment, and they’re not taking responsibility of themselves.

To me, this is probably the worst because it tells me that there is a lack of willingness to learn, willingness to improve and there’s no accountability.

So, you really need to be more responsible of yourself if you are in this category.

So please stop blaming the go kart and start driving like you are supposed to drive. But most importantly, if you do a mistake, there’s no problem with admitting it.

Just say I made the mistake or just say I’m not driving well enough, I need to understand how to do this corner properly, so on and so forth.

So please take responsibility of yourself and don’t blame the card. Don’t take excuses all the time. So of course, if the kart has issues then just tell it but don’t keep telling it.

I mean, it’s never going to be always about the go kart.

So please make sure that you are taking responsibility of yourself if you are into this category.

#4 Not aggressive enough during the race

The fourth most common mistake is that they are not aggressive enough in the races. And this is a big problem because when the race starts, you have to be really aggressive.

Now, I don’t mean that you have to crush other people or take them out, I’m just saying that you have to have that right amount of aggressiveness so that it allows you to keep your position and move forward, so that you don’t lose your position.

Especially in the first laps of the race, which is really important to maintain focus and again, a good level of aggressiveness.

And what I see oftentimes people are not covering so the other drivers can easily overtake them which is three big frustration when I see this with my kids when I coach them.

Because I do understand that– you don’t want to be overly aggressive and you want to go ahead. But you have to make sure especially in the beginning of the race, you have to be smart, you have to be smart and aggressive.

And that means overtaking when the time is there, when the opportunity is there and also defending at the right time so that you don’t get overtaken.

#5 Bad at giving setup feedback

Now, the fifth common mistake is that they’re not really good at giving feedback for the setup. And this is again, something that is not so easy to fix because it takes time.

But if you’re into this category, you need to make sure that you are thinking thoroughly about your setup and then give feedback.

So, you want to think thoroughly about what you say. Because if you give bad feedback, you’re going to get a bad setup.

So, you can even make the situation worse. So, if you say, Oh, the rear is lighting.

But if the rear is lighting because the front is not turning or maybe the rear is just the consequence, then you’re going to give yourself more of your grip.

And then it’s going to get even worse, because at the end, the problem was that the front was not turning.

So, it’s important for you to be really clear and try to help yourself with this. And make sure that you train yourself also to give better feedback.

Okay, so that’s why a coach can help you. A coach can help you give more feedback, better feedback.

So, these were my top five most common mistakes that I oftentimes see at the racetracks.

And I really hope that if you are inside of one of these categories, then you can learn from them and make a plan a strategy for fixing them.

It’s gonna take a little bit of time but I tell you what, if you want to become a pro kart driver, if you’re serious about karting, then you have to really think thoroughly about this.

Okay, having said that, I hope that was useful.

Please let me know what you think about it by sending an email to me at info@solox.gg.