Friday Night Thunder Kicks off KartStars Shannonville

The KartStars Canada National Championship at Shannonville Motorsport Park officially kicked off on Friday evening as three ‘Pro’ classes took to the track for the first competitive races of the weekend.

After a full day of practice, a number of racers in Briggs Cadet, Junior and Senior all got the chance to race wheel-to-wheel for the first time as the sun began to set. A quick Qualifying session set the grid before a dash to award the first Bears of the weekend took place.

Briggs Senior Pro lined up 22 drivers for their Final and it came down to a ‘shoet-out’.

Working together early in the race, Nicky Palladino and Ayden Ingratta were able to pull away from the chasing pack. However, Palladino was able to sneak into the lead a little earlier than he expected when Ingratta hit a bump and his shoe became dislodged. He was able to keep his composure, and race Palladino to the finish only a couple of laps later.

Trading the lead a number of times over the final two laps, Palladino rounded the big sweepers with the lead and the checkered flag in sight, beating Ingratta to the finish line.

In a great race for the third position and a trip to the podium, Ethan Waters overtook his teammate Michael Ing to score the position and the trophy while Chad Webster pulled off a pass on the last lap to take the fifth position.

The Briggs Cadet Pro Final saw a pack of five emerge in an early race for the lead, but lap traffic late in the race was the deciding factor.

Navigating his way to the lead early, David Zhao kept himself in the lead to the finish line, navigating his way through the lap karts. Hudson Urlin kept close to Zhao until the final lap and had to settle for second place while Quinn Tyers scored the third step of the podium over Decklan Deonarine and Justin Di Lucia.

Wrapping up the evening races was Briggs Junior Pro, where these young racers got to push their Briggs 206 engines to the limits.

A four-kart battle erupted and it came down to a near photo finish, something that has become common at Shannonville.

Elijah Joshi emerged with the lead late and he held on just enough over a charging Jordan Di Leo to score his first Shannonville Bear trophy. Gavin Goldie also made a late push for the win at the finish line but came up just short as the three crossed the stripe separated by only 0.051 seconds.

Fourth went to Joey Lecce after he got shuffled back with only a couple of laps left while Max Franceschello completed the top-five.

In addition to these three races, the Rok Cup classes completed their Qualifying sessions. Leading the way in their respective classes were: David Zhao (Mini Rok), Mayer Deonarine (VLR Junior), Ayden Ingratta (Rok Senior) and Mark Pavan (VLR Masters).

Saturday will feature heat races for the Rok Cup classes along with a full race day for the Briggs Senior, Masters, KartStars Junior and KartStars Cadet.