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K&N Sponsored Go-Kart Race Draws Hundreds to Win $50,000 - The Insane One
K&N Sponsored Go-Kart Race Draws Hundreds to Win $50,000 - The Insane One
5 Oct 2011
$50,000 was the largest karting purse to date.
"The Insane One." Go-Karting's biggest purse to date - $50,000. Word spread like wildfire about this race, leading over 600 go-karters to converge on the small town of Clay City, Kentucky, to compete for riches and fame, the likes of which had never been seen before in go-kart racing history. Locals wouldn't have recognized Clay City Speedway over the weekend as it looked more like a NASCAR track with the huge crowd and large number of teams that showed up for the three days of racing.
Racers screaming around a sweeping left-hand turn.
"The Insane One" was the concoction of Ed "Crazy Ed" Hasty, a promoter who has been involved in various aspects and types of racing his entire life. "I've been nicknamed 'Crazy Ed' all of my life," Hasty said. "When I came up with this idea, they just skipped the crazy and went straight to insane; that's how the race got its name." The largest previous purse for a single go-kart race was $20,000, and Hasty thought he could get more karters to the track if he upped the payout.
Kurt Burris, one of the event sponsors, said, "It was great having K&N's involvement. We fully believe in K&N. They have a quality product that's much better than other filters out there and a lot of the drivers were running K&N air filters."
Fans stood atop pickup trucks and RVs to see the exciting karting action.
Fans packed the grand stands and stood atop RVs to see the exciting racing action and this wasn't the go-kart racing you typically see at amusement parks. These karts cost upwards of $4,500 and many travel at speeds of 80-90 miles per hour! Jerry Welch of Welch Performance Racing Engines in Knoxville, where they build high-performance go-kart racing engines, was on hand over the weekend to support the teams. He commented, "Karting is closer to NASCAR than it is to the rudimentary go-karts people used 20 years ago. The technology has come a long way and go-karts are now built with such sophistication and precision as laser alignment."
Event champion Shay Chavous.
The action was so intense and close that the top 32 times were within 0.2 seconds of each other! At the end of the weekend Shay Chavous, 19, of Georgia walked away with the fame and fortune. Chavous, who has been racing since the age of 6, said some of the money would go back into racing, but, "hopefully, I can do something fun with some of it."
