My first big race in the cadet kart came at Race #5 of the 2021 Challenge of the Americas. It was a great learning experience going up against some of the top Micro drivers in West, and it was being run on my favorite layout of my favorite track, Pro National at Sonoma.
Practice went okay on Friday. The pace wasn't too bad, but it did feel like we we're missing just a tick coming up the the hill out of of Monaco, and down the front straight, just like the week before. There were eight drivers entered in the the Micro class, and unfortunately Saturday morning we qualified last in 8th, but only eight tenths off the pole time.
I managed to make up two positions to 6th in the Pre-final, which put me outside row 3 for the start of the Final. In the Final, being on the outside, I kept it conservative going into turn 1, primarily wanting to make it through clean, and fell back into 8th. Again, I was able to make up a couple of positions to 6th, but I just didn't seem to have the power to challenge for more positions.
It was a good first race at this level, I felt I had the race craft to challenge for more, but going into Race #6 on Sunday, we need to find a bit more out of the kart.