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Local favorite Billy Musgrave leads the S1/S2 field at last years Calspeed event. (Photo: DromoPhotos.com)
After a small hiatus for national competition, Superkarts! USA’s flagship regional program, the CaliforniaProKart Challenge, returns to action at the Auto Club Speedway in Fontana for Round 3 of the 2018 championship on June 1-2. The popular venue also plays host to the Los Angeles Kart Club (LAKC) and is among a favorite of local competitors, thanks in part to its proximity and wide variety of configurations.
While the 2018 championship is only two races in, some early season favorites look poised to make their bid for the regional title. National #2 Billy Musgravecontinues to be the man to beat in the Mad Old Nut / Mad Croc USA Pro S1 category. The MRC factory pilot has not put a wheel wrong since his SuperNationals 21 victory. But Matias Podboj and Brian Keck continue to give chase and will no doubt look to upset the PKC points leader. Musgrave runs well at the paved CalSpeed circuit, so the two will have their work cut out for them.
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Billy Musgrave scored his second straight victory in S1 for 2018 (Photo: DromoPhotos.com)
The California ProKart Challenge allowed its racers to stretch out their karting machines for the second round of the 2018 season. On March 30-31, the Superkarts! USA flagship regional program visited the Streets of Willow course at the Willow Springs International Raceway facility in Rosamond, California. The 1.6-mile course – with a reduced layout for X30 Junior and Swift drivers – took racers away from the normal karting track and onto a road course, reaching the highest speeds of the season. The 12 categories were put together into four race groups on the day, sticking with the same qualifying, two heats, and main event format. A number of classes were swept on the day, while others went down to the wire.
All six Stock Honda categories took to the Streets of Willow circuit in a combined race group throughout the day, putting 50 karts on track to make every session a busy one. At the front of the field all day was Billy Musgrave. The four-time series champion and SuperNationals 21 victor swept the Mad Old Nut S1 Pro Stock Honda class, but it was not easy. Musgrave cleared the entire race group by half a second with a 1:15.311-lap time, ahead of S1 rookie Rory van der Steur and Josh Lane, making his return to the California PKC. It was Brian Keck that put the pressure on Musgrave in Heat #1, stealing the lead for four laps until Billy retook the position and the win. Heat #2 saw van der Steur leading four laps before Musgrave resumed the spot – right before a red flag and restart cut the session short. Musgrave and van der Steur were able to get away from everyone in the 14-lap Final, making it a duel for the victory. Rory led the majority of the race, with Musgrave leading the final two circuits. At the line, the two were separated by 76 thousandths of a second at roughly 80mph. Lane was on the podium in third to cap off his return to the seat, while Matias Podboj and Peter Abba completed the top-five.
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The 2019 season marks the 10th year of the sport’s only national series – the Superkarts! USA Pro Tour. Initially launched in April of 2010, the SKUSA Pro Tour has grown throughout the previous nine seasons of competition, creating lasting memories, establishing current stars in the sport, developing drivers for the professional ranks, and all while remaining the premier championship series in North America. From the very first season, the weekend and year-end prize package has been a focal point for the organization, and this approach continues into the 2019 season with a staggering $162,000 prize purse for this year’s series, supported significantly by SKUSA’s passionate partners at MG Tires.
“From the day that I stepped in, we have been about giving back to the racers,” stated Superkarts! USA principal Tom Kutscher. “This is our 10th anniversary of the SKUSA Pro Tour, and we wanted to make sure the racers were rewarded for their support and their success on the track. Our staff spoke with a number of the race teams, competitors and families who have supported what we do year after year, and we tailored our prize package around their input as best we could. This is a prize package you can’t match anywhere, and I’m thankful to have our partners at MG Tires on-board with our efforts.”
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The 2019 racing season is officially underway for the Superkarts! USA program, as their track team hosted the first major event of the calendar year, launching the second year of the SKUSA Winter Series in Florida. Following the upcoming series finale in February at the AMR Homestead-Miami Motorplex presented by MG Tires, all of SKUSA’s attention will turn to the tenth season of the SKUSA Pro Tour and their growing ProKart Challenge programs for 2019.
The new season is one of adjustment, specifically in the class structure area. One of the major updates is the move to the Evinco Blue “H” spec tire for the X30 Junior division. Since the introduction of the Evinco tires into Superkarts! USA competition, the category has followed the same compound as the other X30 categories, utilizing the Evinco Red “M” tire. The Blue “H” is a harder compound for the X30 Junior drivers, and is the same tire required in the KA100 Senior and KA100 Junior categories.
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