Being fast over one lap and winning races are two different skills. Pace is how quickly you can get a kart around the track. Racecraft is how well you play the game wheel to wheel, and how good you are at it is your race IQ. Plenty of drivers have one without the other. I found that out the hard way, twice.

How I learned it the first time

I started racing indoor electric karts in Baltimore, Maryland, in 2014. I was one of the fastest drivers in my league and consistently got pole position. The track was tight and twisty, so once the start lights went out, passing was almost impossible. Because I was fast, I won the championship easily.

Then I went to Europe. In my first year of car racing overseas I raced in British F3, one of the most competitive series in the world. I put it on pole for my first race at Oulton Park by a quarter of a second, so the speed was there. But at the start I fell back to P5 before the end of lap 1, and that became a theme for the whole season.

In the US, I hadn’t been tested enough in race scenarios. The indoor karting layouts meant I never really had to defend, and in cars the level wasn’t high enough to punish a driver who was simply fast. In Europe, everyone was fast AND had strong racecraft.

Why European drivers seemed to race better

I used to think European drivers had better racecraft because they were more aggressive. Over time I realized they were racing smarter. They saw moves coming, sometimes laps before they happened. I was always reactive. I’d see someone make a mistake, go for it, lock up, and make a mistake of my own.

Racecraft is a lot like poker. You don’t just wait for a pair of aces to land in your lap. You read the cards you have, work out the most likely hands, read your opponents’ body language, and only then act when a bit of luck comes your way. There’s always luck involved, but the further ahead you plan a move, the less you have to react in the moment. That’s ultimately what separates a fast driver from a champion.

Why racecraft is harder in a kart

When I came back to karting a few years ago after racing cars, my race IQ was pretty much back to square one. Karts don’t have mirrors, so your blind spot is much wider than in a race car. In cars, I’d got used to more or less always knowing where the attacking car was behind me. In a kart, you either physically turn your head to look, or rely on passive situational awareness to guess where they are.

That’s why it’s so easy to get overwhelmed or freight-trained in a kart, especially in a multi-kart battle.

Which should you work on first?

In my opinion, driving dynamics is the foundation, and you should make it as solid as possible before you think about wheel-to-wheel racing. Racecraft is the layer on top. If you’re using 100% of your conscious brain capacity on single-lap pace, you won’t have the headroom left to plan a move.

Unlike driving dynamics, racecraft isn’t an exact science. A lot of it comes down to human psychology. But I became competitive by breaking it down into a series of IF and AND statements that decide which play I use when, and that’s how I teach it.

Karting Handbook: RaceCraft breaks wheel-to-wheel rental karting down into those decisions. Join the waitlist.