Hi Jim, I think the big difference came from the old format with WKA and the new format. Before, they ran qualifying, prefinal and final each day. Most of the time, that added up to be less then the laps provided by USPKS. Now, they are qualifying, Heat 1, Heat 2, Prefinal and Final.

Talking with WKA President John Ferris, the new format has been a big hit with racers.

USPKS helped address a lot of the issues that karters had with WKA at the time. More track time, time certain schedule, live practice timing, more racing, fewer classes and the racers noticed. WKA followed suit and overhauled their format to make it more racer friendly.

I was at the WKA and USPKS races at Mooresville the last two weekends and I think both series are doing a great job for the racer. I can only hope that the competition between series will only help improve the series for the racer.

I would echo what Dave and Mark Jr. said.  At the time of conception, USPKS was offering significantly more track time, as well as other benefits, like cash payouts, a time specific schedule, etc.  Basically, the things most people thought were wrong with WKA, were addressed with USPKS.  The hope was that WKA would get the message that the product they were offering sprint racers was no longer what the racers wanted and they would make some changes, or at least there would be a series that was listening to the racers.  What we got was the best of both worlds.  USPKS went out and put on a great show, and WKA realized they needed to move forward and made great strides in their program.  Now there are two great programs, and hopefully they can both thrive.  A lack of competition breeds complacency, and that’s bad for everyone.  So yes, there isn’t much of a difference in laps anymore, but they still each have their own character and positives.

One thing you should keep in mind too is not the amount of laps but the amount of track time.  Looking at it that way the faster karts even though they run more laps are probably on the track for the same amount of time. Honestly to watch kid karts go 16 laps would take forever and be boring to watch unless you are a parent of one of the drivers. No offence to the little guys!

Sorry Jim,

I did not really time anything so I’m sure your right about the amount of track time for the finals we just watched and waited for our turn on the track and it didn’t seem like one race went quicker then the others, but just out of curiosity were your practices and qualifying times the same amount of time as everyone else? Or were they shortened too? 8 minutes I think it was? I wonder if the rain had something to do with it or that’s a normal procedure as it seemed in the drivers meetings they wanted to get out of there and it did rain both weekends for both the WKA and USPKS races.