Baptism of fire for the new KF engines in Japan
The CIK-FIA World Cup for KF1 (former Formula A), which was revived in 2006 after a few years of interruption following prestigious editions in the 1990’s, will be organised on 25-27 May 2007 in Japan, on the Karting track next to the famous Suzuka Formula One circuit.
In addition to the prestige that it conveys, this World Cup will be doubly followed as the event will mark the first real appearance in competition of the new KF engines in Japan. The local national championship will indeed not adopt until 2008 the new KF type of engines characterised in particular by their cylinder capacity which is increased to 125cc and their engine rev limiter. Fewer Japanese drivers than usually are therefore entered in “their” World Cup but the main local teams and importers have nonetheless wanted to be present so as to become better acquainted with this new generation of engines and to prepare the future.
Armed with the experience of the first event of the 2007 CIK-FIA European Championship held in Ugento and with the (inter)national events which have already been organised in Italy or in France, European drivers seem to be the logical favourites of the 2007 edition of the World Cup for KF1. The provisional leader of the European Championship, the Italian Marco Ardigo, will be accompanied by a European delegation that includes his compatriots Davide Fore and Sauro Cesetti, the Anglo-Pakistanese Kazeem Manzur (who races with an Italian licence), Belgium’s Benjamin Bailly, Britain’s Gary Catt, the Frenchman Nathanaël Berthon and the German Marco Wittmann, who won in Suzuka the 2006 Asia-Pacific ICA Championship.
This Asia-Pacific Championship will in fact be held again this year, but with the new KF2 category instead of the former ICA.
Qualifying practice and the qualifying heats of the World Cup for KF1 and of the Asia-Pacific KF2 Championship will be held on Saturday 26 May 2007, whereas all the races of the final phase are scheduled for the Sunday, the KF2 and KF1 finals being respectively programmed for 14h15 and 15h. |
