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Paul Russell an 8 time Autocross National Champion in karts is also a multi time ProSolo National Champion shares his racing tips.
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Paul also has won 2 Pro Solo over all end of year Challenge Championships.
He has 8 Solo Autocross Championships and 7 of those in a row. He was on the cover of Sports Car magazine as Superman.
He is super when he is in his kart. He shares a lot on this podcast and one thing that stands out is how he plans/memorizes a course as separate parts "chunks".
He also has won two ProSolo Overall Challenge Championships.
He started in cars at Texas A&M and would like to get back into F Street "maybe". He is living in San Diego so if you have a F Street car for him to drive and setup let him know!
He started in karts in SCCA in the late 90's when the class was new and everyone was trying to figure it out.
He really advanced when he partnered with Eric Nelson of SeventhGear.com.
After racing on the track they really figured out how to set the kart up (more time in setup than in the engine).
Tip** Put the seat where the designer intended it to be.
Make big changes to the kart and use the time on the clock to gauge how the changes are working.
He compares autocross courses with kart tracks (tighter turns on tracks).
He talks about Super Nats in Vegas.
27:00? He covers advice for Kids Karting including buying a newer kart.
31:? 43%/57% weight balance - he advises to put the drivers seat where the manufacture planned for it to be.
36: How to buy a used kart - roll it to see if it is bent. eKartingNews.com
39: Sports Car Photo Shoot
42: How he handles the lights for ProSolo including needing to add cardboard to keep from a red-light from the staging light from flickering when launching.
45: Line choice and car vs. Kart, how tight should the seat be? (It should have some slop)
54 Walking Courses - he breaks his plans down into chunks and forgets the previous chunk when entering/loading the plan for the next one.
56: **** He looks for cheats which is like finding places where people are setting up when they don't need to because their entry speed isn't high enough to warrant it.
Recommends walking the real line.
Everyone late apexes so where can you cheat and not do it?
1:06 Know you enemy - Mental side of racing. The course is your challenge not people.
1:08 Course walks - Real vs. Social
1:14 Nationals walking - walks both courses before running either one.
1:21 He ignores his class (Well how they are doing time wise).
Only concentrate on the thing you have to do.
Focus on the first thing - Example at a pro get a good light so focus on the lights only.
Get your car sorted by June and don't touch it.
How much does it cost to have a competitive autocross shifter kart?
Always get a time - never actually DNF incase you get a rerun.
1:51 How to attack all three runs - Make the first one a bit conservative (Although he has flown off the course the first run the past two years).
Experiment
Kids motor L0206
Visit his sponsor at www.Seventh-Gear.com for your karting goodies as well as Karts.
What did you learn? What questions do you have (Please let me know)?
