with second national triumph
Tom Harvey confirmed his status as a leading contender for British title glory this year in the same championship that first launched a certain Lewis Hamilton on the fast track towards F1 superstardom – Formula Kart Stars (FKS) – with a superb victory in the opening meeting at Rowrah in Cumbria.
Having come on in leaps and bounds over the past 12 months, Tom entered 2010 widely-regarded as one of the front-runners to lift the laurels on the national stage, and by qualifying quickest in his group and second overall amongst the 49 MSA Cadet class competitors – the indisputable crème de la crème of young talent at that level – the highly-rated South Wales hotshot rapidly demonstrated that his pre-season billing was well-justified.
“The aim was to get a top three finish to start the campaign off well,” he explained. “I had a lot of confidence having won the weekend before at Whilton Mill, and I was just hoping to be able to carry that pace over. Rowrah is one of my favourite circuits – it’s really twisty and difficult to get right – and I’ve had some very good results there, including a couple of victories in club meetings. Then after qualifying I thought, ‘Yes! I’m on it – and I’m in it to win it!’
“In the first heat, unfortunately, my kart didn’t come on until midway into the race, which allowed my team-mate Nathan Aston to get away early on. Then it started to spit with rain, which caused me to lose all grip. The drivers behind began to close on me due to that, but whilst I was mindful that they were there, I didn’t look round because that only slows you down and gives them an even greater incentive to catch you. I could hear their engines in the background and it got pretty close at times, but equally I was always confident of being able to hang onto second, which was a really good result in the circumstances.”
That it was, though Tom’s second heat efforts were somewhat hampered by further grip issues and what was at first thought to be an engine problem but would later transpire to be carburettor-related – costing the Bonvilston speed demon crucial time to his adversaries and leaving him down in fourth at the chequered flag having begun from pole position and pulled out a handy early advantage.
Those same difficulties would similarly stymie the 12-year-old’s efforts in the final later in the day, when after starting from fifth he coped admirably in conditions that would have led to many a lesser driver parking his kart in frustration. Doing a tremendous job even to finish, that he did so in seventh place – barely eight tenths of a second shy of the podium and under four seconds adrift of the race-winner – was impressive indeed.
“It was like getting blood from a stone,” Tom quipped. “I could see the engine was getting hotter all the time, and at one point it cut out altogether. I had to immediately get on the carburettor and richen the mixture up to ensure there was enough fuel flowing through to get it going again – all whilst trying to hold onto my position at the same time!”
With Tom’s dad and Fusion Motorsport team boss Dan Hazlewood working through the night to diagnose exactly what was wrong, a new carburettor was fitted for the next day, and following an early scare when the engine initially refused to fire up at all, the Cowbridge High School pupil was sent out into qualifying with nobody really knowing quite what to expect. That being the case, second position in his group and third overall was an excellent result.
“I woke up in the morning feeling really positive, and Dan said to me ‘today could be your day’,” Tom recalled. “He told me I was going to win because he could see it in my eyes. It’s great having him there – Dan’s the best! He’s not like some other team bosses; he relates better, spends more time with his drivers and it’s obvious he really cares. He’s amazing with me.”
Admitting that his kart was now ‘electric’, the Vale of Glamorgan ace was determined to show what might have been the previous day. A brace of runner-up spots to local specialist Aston in his two heat races – with no more than eight hundredths of a second to choose between them in either outing, and setting identical fastest lap times to one another in heat two as the pair’s mutual respect shone through in their close but clean contest – earned Tom a front row grid slot for the all-important final.
“I got hung out to dry a bit at the start with being on the outside line,” he revealed. “That dropped me down to ninth, but I just focussed on working my way back up again after that. There were 15 drivers in the lead battle – the whole back straight was just one long train of Cadets all on each other’s bumpers – and it was anybody’s race to begin with, a real lottery! You had to concentrate on both attacking and defending at the same time, because in a situation like that if one driver goes past you they all will.
“I got up to second just behind Trevyn-Jay Nelson, and I knew he had been really quick all weekend. I got into his tow, and it was always my plan to push the two of us clear of the rest of the field. If you are at the front of a group of 15 karts towards the end of a race, you can only go backwards, so I just wanted the two of us to get a break, with no lunging or overtaking attempts until the last lap. If you do that, you only slow each other down – and that would have allowed the others to catch us again. It’s a lot easier to fight just one other driver than 15!
“I just sat on T-J’s bumper and pushed and pushed. By watching his lines I found out that his weakest point was into the bottom chicane, and on the last lap there I got past him and made sure there was no room for him to come back at me again. I was just focussing on keeping it tight everywhere and not giving him any opportunity to re-attack.
“I celebrated so much when I crossed the line, and coming into the pits afterwards I gave my dad the sign for number one! I had given him such a hard time the previous day for the problems we had, but when he got it right on Sunday it was incredible. There’s nothing better than that winning feeling, and it was amazing to get my second FKS win!”
Indeed, having berated himself in the wake of the Super 1 curtain-raiser at Shenington just under a month earlier for snatching the lead on the last lap only to surrender it again by leaving the door open into the final corner, he acknowledged that he ‘wasn’t going to make the same mistake twice’, and the manner of his success evinced a keen intelligence and maturity beyond his years.
Sitting a challenging second in the title chase heading next to Whilton Mill – scene of a brilliant breakthrough national victory in FKS last October and his ‘favourite track’ in the country, Tom warned his rivals that ‘they’d better watch out!’ On current form, they would do well to heed that advice.
