Last Updated on 13 June, 2024 by FKC
Stage 4 of season 2024 took place at Valla Raceway in Katrineholm on the sunny day. 10 participants splitted into 2 groups. Karlis showed a very good lap time in his group in Qualification until he was beaten by Mattias who got his first TQ of the year. 3rd best result went to Igor S.
Karlis started first in the Semi-Final 1 and kept a comfortable lead. Berke was fighting Championship rookie Stefan until Stefan pushed Berke off the track and received a yellow card for this move. Erik was able to use this situation in his favor and jumped up to P3. But not for long. Berke took back 3rd place and started chasing Stefan. He reached him on the next lap and made a successful move. Erik also wanted to overtake Stefan as he was a very short distance behind. Meanwhile, leader Karlis started to experience troubles with his kart. Suddenly power was gone and Karlis stopped! Such a disappointment! Instead of starting Final A from the 1st row he will have to start last in Final B! That way Berke became the new leader and Erik had his job done by overtaking Stefan for P2. They finished in that order plus Armin took P4.
In Semi-Final 2 Mattias started first and kept the lead. Igor S got passed by Igor K. Another GoKart PRIX rookie Heidi used this moment and also passed season’s leader. With this result Igor S would appear in Final B which he didn’t want. So he tried to overtake Heidi for a couple of laps and finally succeeded. Next target was Igor K who went too wide in a right-turn corner and let Igor S pass him. There were no more overtakes in this session and everybody finished on the same positions they started.
The Finals began. But, unfortunately, Björn decided not to start there and that way he didn’t get any points for this stage. Stefan started first, then Heidi, Armin and Karlis who wanted to win this heat very badly to move to Final A. He overtook Armin quite quickly and his next target was Heidi. She was a bit slower at some corners, but was defending very well by blocking all the possible options for Karlis to pass. When the 2015 champion finally made a successful move the leader was already far ahead. Stefan won the heat and advanced to Final A.
The last session of the day began with a nice shot from Mattias into the first corner. The rest of the field except Igor K were gaining speed slowly. However, Berke managed to gain on Mattias and Igor K was on the tail of Igor S. Couple of unsuccessful attempts and finally two Latvians switched positions. In the front Berke was breathing at Mattias’ neck. Mattias was defending but not well enough, because Berke jumped inside the last hairpin and took the lead. Meanwhile Igor S took back P3 from Igor K. But the same mistake from last year’s Katrineholm winner moved Igor K to the front again. This battle helped Stefan to get closer to them. And next thing you know – Stefan is already ahead of Igor S! Mattias doesn’t like to be second. He was pushing Berke to make a mistake. He couldn’t wait for long so he decided to overtake the leader on the outside of the left-hand corner. And it worked! Next turn was a right-hander, so it was in Mattias’ favor. After this move Berke just couldn’t keep up with the reigning champion. So Mattias won the race! Berke is 2nd. Again. Igor K had a quite calm race. He didn’t make any mistakes and got himself second podium this year. And second in a row! Behind him Igor S and Stefan switched places, but it could happen again and again. There were many blockings, side-by-side runs and different overtake attempts. But in the end Igor S saved P4 from Stefan’s attacks. Erik finished 6th.
This victory helped Mattias to move to P2 in season standings. Erik jumped up to P4 and Karlis entered the top 10. But the real stuff will begin from the next stage when we will start showing Championship points predictions without 4 worst results.
Big thanks to Valla Raceway staff and to all participants. Special thanks to our Championship rookies Stefan and Heidi for the great race! Also special thanks to Karlis for filming our battles!
Next race is already this Saturday at Ös-We Ring! Don’t miss that one and apply on our website www.gokartprix.se
Race documentation you can find here.
We even uploaded some videos of the race which you can find here:
Semi-Final Group 1:
Semi-Final Group 2:
Final B:
Final A: