AGAINST some of the world’s best karting talents, twelve-year-old Ballymakeery karter Keith Grant made it through to the X30 Mini finals in the IAME Warrior Finals (IWF22) at Le Mans and finished 18th overall.
During qualifying some 88 karters were vying for the thirty six places on the grid for the final.
Earlier in the week in qualifying practice Grant, who won the Cadet category in the final Motorsport Ireland championship race of the season, took second spot and in the various qualifying heats he was fifteenth, second and twelfth respectively. He went on to qualify P4 in the pre-final. In the final itself he was 23rd after the first of the twelve laps. By lap five was up to eighteenth and was seventeenth from laps seven to eleven before finishing eighteenth overall.
Reaching the final at this elite level against karters from all over the world was a major achievement.
Finishing in the top twenty from the original group of 88, is sure to be a great confidence booster as he moves up to X30 Juniors next season.
Mogeely’s Daniel Kelleher finished a superb second - for the second successive year and in the X30 Masters, Glanmire’s Gary Edwards was third.
Last weekend, Ballylickey’s Colin Cronin and Clonakilty’s Ronan Hennessy were amongst the 138 entries in the X30 Junior category in the final part of the IAME Warrior Finals (IWF22).
