James Singleton might reckon that his form around Belgian circuit Genk has never been ‘stunning’, but it was certainly eye-catching enough when the Lewis Hamilton and Bernie Ecclestone-backed Formula Kart Stars (FKS) Championship paid a visit, as he stormed to his fifth victory of the 2011 campaign to race clear at the top of the title standings.
James headed overseas with a 27-point advantage in the chase for the coveted crown in FKS’ fiercely-fought Junior Max class and with an outstanding record this season to-date, having tallied four triumphs and one second place from the first six rounds. Better still, the last time he had competed at Genk in FKS, he had won – meaning the talented young North Wales karting star returned there in confident spirits.
“The aim was to try to finish in the top three again and extend our championship lead,” he acknowledged. “Obviously deep down, you always want to win, but I think looking at the bigger picture, our main objective for the weekend was just to try to beat our closest rival, Sam Marsh. We’ve always tended to be good rather than stunning around Genk, but recently we seem to have found a few things with the kart there, and my driving has improved a lot over the past couple of years, too.
“It’s really good fun to drive, and like with any European track, if you go off-line and off the rubber, you’ve got no chance of getting back on again – they’re far less forgiving of mistakes than British circuits are. You have to stay 100 per cent mentally focussed all the time, which can be pretty draining, especially with the weather being so changeable throughout the weekend.”On a drying track surface on Saturday, James annexed a comfortable pole position in qualifying in the 23-strong field – “I knew I had the kart underneath me to take pole and I timed it right, put my lap in when it counted and then just saved my tyres,” he explained – and he followed that up with an utterly dominant, lights-to-flag triumph in the opening heat, as his pursuers battled ferociously over the scraps in his wake, enabling the Conwy-based speed demon to ease off the gas in the closing stages and still prevail by nigh-on five seconds.
The second heat on a sodden track might have been ‘a much harder race’ as James confessed to lacking a little consistency, but if he was not quite as devastatingly fast as he had been earlier, he was nonetheless fast enough to rack up a second consecutive success – and with it, secure pole position once more for the all-important final.
“One half of the circuit was dry but the other half was still wet in the final, which made it a really tough call in terms of set-up,” recalled the highly-rated Penmaenmawr hotshot. “We went for a dry set-up in the end and fortunately, that turned out to be the right decision. The right-hand side of the track – where I was starting – was wet, so they let us go round for two warm-up laps rather than just one to try to get some heat into the tyres; that seemed to work, and I was able to move straight into the lead.
“The kart was probably the best it had been all weekend – the set-up was spot-on – and I was able to pull away, but being out on slick tyres with only one dry line was certainly challenging. It was really tricky around the wetter parts of the lap – I had to be extremely careful through some corners.”
In distinctly treacherous conditions in which it would have been all-too-easy to throw it off into the scenery, James kept it all together and controlled proceedings beautifully to complete a clean sweep of peerless lights-to-flag victories. It was, he reflected, pretty much perfect.
“We were really happy with the day,” the Ysgol Aberconwy pupil mused. “We beat Marsh in all three races, which had been the goal, and even though it was my fifth FKS win of the season, it still feels just as special every time because we know we’ve had to overcome some tough opposition to accomplish it.”
The following day yielded another commanding pole position in qualifying – on a wet track this time – but heat one would swiftly degenerate into something of a dogfight, as after initially grabbing the lead, James subsequently found himself dragged back into the chasing pack.
“We made the mistake of leaving our wet set-up on with the track drying out,” he rued. “A lot of other drivers had changed over to a dry set-up, and we struggled in comparison. Towards the end of the race, it all got a little bit scrappy and going down into the chicane at the end of the back straight, George Williams overtook me for third place. He then ran a bit wide on the exit, though, and I decided to make a move back up the inside of him into the next corner – but I don’t think he saw me and he just turned in, which sent me straight off.
“I ended up crossing the line all the way down in 20th, which obviously wasn’t good for the points situation and put more pressure on for the second heat because we knew then that we would really have to pull something out-of-the-bag to get a half-decent starting position for the final.” Evincing characteristic grit, though, that is precisely what James did, and even if he conceded that neither his driving nor his Coles Racing kart were quite ‘100 per cent’ in heat two, a close and competitive third place was sufficient to salvage 11th spot on the grid for the final – from where he had the top five in his sights.
“I got a really good start to move straight up to fourth,” he related. “We had set the kart up to come on as early as possible, and during the first few laps, we were very quick and I managed to get into the lead and pull out a little bit of a gap. As the race progressed, though, I felt the kart slowly beginning to go off.
“Ryan Norris overtook me midway through, and we didn’t really have an answer to him. He was able to pull away, but we knew we wouldn’t fall too far down the order because of how much the field had spread out. With four laps to go, Marsh passed me, too and similarly pulled away, and then on the last lap, I didn’t think there was anyone particularly close to me, but I looked behind with two corners to go and saw Bobby Thompson was right there. I had to defend the last corner pretty heavily to hang onto third place...”
Taking the chequered flag a scant 15 hundredths of a second ahead of Thompson – and less than two seconds shy of the winner – incredibly, James’ third position is currently in-line to be one of his dropped scores under FKS’ points system, representing as it does his second-lowest finish from the opening eight rounds of the campaign.
With the title battle clearly at the forefront of his mind all the way through, he wisely and maturely elected not to fight too hard against drivers who had more pace than him on the day – “If I’d ended up getting involved in an accident, that could have been a big dent in my championship, so I just let them go,” he reasoned – and his reward was a handsome gain in the standings to head into the remaining four rounds 51 points clear of any of his adversaries. Better yet, next up is Whilton Mill – where he has invariably shone.
“It was definitely a successful weekend overall, and I think we should be quick at Whilton, too,” the 15-year-old pondered in conclusion, pausing to wish rival Nick Arthur a speedy recovery from the injuries he sustained at Genk. “It’s a track I enjoy and that seems to suit my driving style well. Another couple of podiums there would do just nicely...”
James is seeking sponsors to help support his burgeoning career; if you are interested in backing North Wales’ brightest young F1 hope, please contact his father Mark on 07795 297350
