On December 5^th, NOLA Motorsports Park will hold its fourth annual NOLA Sprint Kart Endurance Challenge. This event scheduled at the end of the season for the NOLA Sprint Kart Championship, formally called “The Ironman”, is a fun post season event for both locals and visitors to come out and team up or see if they can last the full distance of the race.

The 2015 edition is being done a little bit different than in past years, except the things that will be the same will be the Run groups and length of the races. The Junior Group for seven to eleven year old drivers will have a 45 minute Endurance race while the Pro Group for drivers 13 years of age and older will have a 75 minute Endurance race, both groups will have a 20 minute practice session before the race that will also set the starting grid for each groups race with all sessions being a hot pit area. The fun addition of a “LeMans” style will also be part of both groups endurance races. Race classes were tweaked to encourage maximum participation.

Both groups will have classes that will be categorized as 2-cycle and 4-cycle. The 2-cycle classes will be for single speed karts with Rotax FR125 per Max Challenge rules or any TaG style engine per Tag USA rules. Junior Group will allow Cadet engine rules, Pro will be Junior and Senior engine rules. 4-cycle classes will allow all single speed 4-cycle engine like Briggs & Stratton's Animal, World Formula and the popular Local Option 206. The class will also allow Yamaha YF200 and Clone engines to compete. The Open class in the Pro Group will allow Rotax DD2 karts as well as all shifter karts including KZ, ICC, and Stock Honda 125, 4-cycle shifter karts are welcomed in this class as well all the way up to 450cc. Each class will have two sub classes as well, all of the classes designated as “Solo” will be for drivers that will attempt to compete in their enduro without the help of a second driver.

To add to the mix of varying classes, each class will have an open tire rule allowing everyone to run any brand or compound combo they choose. Each class will have minimum weights as well, the minimum weight will be based on the class the kart is eligible to compete in, example, a team or driver can enter a kart built to run Shifter Junior per SKUSA rules in the Pro Open class, the kart with driver will have to meet the minimum weight for the Shifter Junior class at a SKUSA race. Other rules that have been added to make the event as fun as possible but level the playing field, A team can enter 2 karts for one entry in every class, but that team will have to use the same tires through out the race, meaning they would have to swap tires from one kart to the other during the pit stop instead of just swapping the transponder. Speaking of pit stops, it is predicted that most all of the 2-cycle and Open class entries will have to stop once for fuel, the 4-cycle entries could possible make the entire race on one tank, the strategies will be interesting to watch that is for sure.

The track layout for this event has always been a chance for local to run the entire area of the kart track at NOLA Motorsports Park. The race is done between 8am and noon then opened up for Arrive & Drive to start running rental heats for the day. The layout to be used this year is a modified version of the “Insanity” track that was run for the first enduro back in 2012. Using both front and back strait aways that exceed 1000 feet in length, the 1.01 mile layout of Track AF will be the fastest track we have ever run for a kart racing event. This track is also the proposed course for the opening round of Maxspeed Entertainments's US Open to be held on April 21 – 24, 2016. NOLA Motorsports Park is working closely with Maxspeed to use this event as a test to see how the track will race and if changes need to be made in leiu of safety. You can expect the fastest kart will easily reach triple didget speeds as the brake hard into the first turns after each strait.

Registration is now open for this event at Motorsportreg.com at $65 for the Junior Enduro and $100 for the Pro Enduro. Direct links for registration will be below the article. For more info about the event feel free to email Robbie Poupart at [email protected] or Damon Cuccia at [email protected] for info on the event.

About NOLA Motorsports Park and the NSKC, located less than 20 minutes west of New Orleans, NOLA Motorsports Park is a world class facility that has hosted two international karting events, the 2013 Rotax Pan American and Rotax Grand Finals, and will host the opening round of the US Open in April of 2016, is the largest and most versatile karting facility in North America capable of running 80+ configurations and up to three configurations at the same time. The NOLA Sprint Kart Championship will hold 12 races over 10 months with the majority being single day events with two doubleheader weekends and two Saturday night races. Focusing on affordability and competitiveness, the NSKC’s kart classes are based on the national rulesets for Briggs & Stratton’s Local Option 206, the United States Rotax Max Challenge and Superkarts USA’s Stock Honda Shifter Category, helping to ensure that experienced and novice karters can all have a level playing field to compete in. Albeit a local or sometimes referred to as a “club” series, the NSKC often draws over 60+ racers, rivaling that of some larger regional events, not only from the state of Louisiana, but Texas, Mississippi, Alabama and Tennessee. For more info on the NSKC and NOLA Motorsports Park, visit our website at www.nolamotor.com or send an email to [email protected]