Stepping on a podium or WSK race is something very special, and that not many drivers have been able to achieve even less stepping on the top step of the podium, so winning the race. But in this guide, I will explain to you what I suggest you to do in order to increase your chances of stepping on the WSK podium for the first time, and ideally for many more times. Afterwards, with our team at baby race, we were able to win 29 WSK championships over the years, and had countless of drivers on the podium, for sure, more than 100 so I am really, really confident in what I’m telling you here, I will reply to some of the most frequently asked questions that I receive all the time. So let’s get into it.

So first things first, what makes WSK championships so competitive?

The WSK series has been around since 2010 or so, so it’s already been 16 years of WSK history. And the reason why they’ve been so prestigious and so competitive over the years is simply because, I mean, it’s probably the most competitive international karting championship that you can race in. I mean, the name WSK stands for World Series of Karting, and he has a lot of prestige and history behind, of course, drivers like Max Verstappen, you know, Leclerc, Norris Russell, they all been Wk race winners, and so they obviously had, you know, a lot of history from from those f1 drivers now being in f1 and still recalling those WSK moments. And you know, there’s have been a lot of pictures being posted recently from f1 drivers since when they were driving in WSK. So of course, it is a very prestigious championship, and that prestige obviously brings competitiveness. And yeah, I mean, it’s the number one championship to race in, together with, I would say, champions of the future and CIK events, for example, the European Championship and the World Championship. So if you want to compete internationally, for example, if you are between 12 to 15 years old and you’re driving other juniors or seniors, the full program is going to include the whole 11 rounds of WSK, then the four rounds of the European Championship, the four rounds of the champions of the future, which basically anticipates all the European championship races, and then obviously, finally the World Championship, which is at the end of the year, and this year, is going to be held in Bahrain for the senior and junior classes, whereas for the gearbox class is going to be in Le Mans so for the full season, between 12 to 15 years old, is going To be 20 international races, as I said, between WSK champions of the future and CIK events. And what makes wks championships so competitive is that, yeah. I mean, as already explained, there’s all those drivers that are racing in in all those events are also racing WSK as a sort of preparation for the European Championship and champions of the future season, which, to be honest, is a little bit more prestigious nowadays than WSK, but, but still, WSK holds a special memory, and in the heart of many Evan drivers, and I believe it’s still the championship that everybody wants to win, obviously, together with the European Championship and the World Championship, which are proper titles, but still winning a double SK title is is also very, very good thing that can help you progress in your career.

And there’s many f1 scouts, by the way, there’s a McLaren Scout, there’s a Mercedes Scout coming to the WSK rounds, and so for sure, it’s a very prestigious championship where drivers try to do their best and try to excel.

What’s more important to get a podium in a WSK? Is it pace or is it race craft?

Well, you need to get both to be maxed out. You know, you ideally want to be perfect in terms of pace and amazing in terms of race craft. So, yeah, ideally you want to be maxed out on both ends. If you have no pace and amazing race craft, yes, you will be progressing through the field in the races. But you you will probably start in, you know, P 20 in all of the heats, instead of starting p1 in in every race. And if you have instead amazing pace and and no race craft, even if you may get poor position and start p1 in every single heat, you will probably, you know, lose positions and go backwards, simply because maybe in the first lap, they’re just going to pass you and they’re going to run you wide, and you’re going to lose positions and and then you’re not going to be able to recover from that even mentally. So you need to have everything. You need to be maxed out in terms of pace and in terms of racecraft, and once you have both, you can really fight for the podium and even for the win.

How important is equipment in WSK races?

Well, I mean, obviously it’s, it’s very important, as in any championship, obviously the the kart side has to be maxed out. You know, you can be a 10 out of 10 driver, but. If you have a six out of 10 package between chassis and engine, you cannot compete for the win. I mean, it’s, it’s like that, if you have a nine out of 10 package and 10 of 10 driver, you can still compete and still fight for the win. But if it’s like, like a five out of 10 or a four out of 10, you cannot compete at all. It’s so you need to have strong equipment. And, you know, the top 25 drivers on the grid, top 30 drivers that will be in the final will all have very, very similar equipment. You know, there, there can be maximum, what like, 1/10 difference between of of engine and chassis between all those drivers. So I would not, I would not think that. I mean, in WSK, you have big differences in material, of course, maybe the number one driver on the track, maybe with the most experience with the with, you know, with the highest skills, maybe will receive like a like a half a 10th extra in terms of engine from from each unit, just because they want to win and and they have the highest chances of winning with that driver, but I don’t think it’s more than that. You know, you cannot expect half a second of difference in engine or it’s never going to happen. You know, because half a 10th of engine can can be a difference 1/10 even sometimes, but I don’t think more than that. And so if you see drivers being two tenths quicker than everybody else, maybe, yes, they have like, half a 10th of x range in advantage, but then the rest is just the driver. That’s what I really believe personally. But besides that, you don’t really want to think too much about it, you can always affect your equipment. Remember, you can always make your kart better. You can always make your chassis better. You can always make your engine better by giving the proper feedback. So you can’t always be like, Oh, the equipment is that, and it’s, it’s not on me, if the kart is good or not. No, you have a strong responsibility in affecting the performance of the kart. You know, it’s, it’s really like that. So if you want to win more than anybody else, you are going to do the work required to to win and understanding not only how you can go faster as a driver, but also how to go faster as a kart overall. Just try to tune up the chassis with your mechanics, looking at data, looking at videos, describing your feedback, reading the tires, if you want to then, of course, improve the engine that you need to tell the tuner, okay, I feel like we need more bottom. We need more top. The carbonation needs to be a little bit leaner, a little bit richer. You tell your feedback, and obviously they are going to work out the things that need to be done, and you’ll see that you’re going to find the pace after after a bit of iterations, your your team is going to help you, but it always starts from you. If you want to win, you need to give the proper feedback. There’s no other way around it.

What role does testing play in preparation for a WSK,

testing plays a major role. For example. From tomorrow we’re gonna go for four days of testing at Francia corta. We are heading up to the final round of the WK SuperMassive series with babe race, and we just won the last four races out of five in between the under 10 Year three categories. But you know, next week we have a five race, five days race, and how we are preparing for a four days testing leading up to five days race. So at the end of the day, we are doing a lot of testing upfront. Because Why feel that the more testing you do, the more knowledge and information you build, and you’re able to simply go faster and faster thanks to that. And so yeah, testing is extremely important, not only from the driver’s side, because the driver is going to get better and better with more laps under his his belt, but you know, he’s going to get better lines. He’s going to get breaking points. Going to get better in the racecraft, everything is going to be better from him. You know, as any sport, the more repetition you do, the better. But also in terms of equipment, you know, we can improve the equipment. In terms of chassis, understanding what’s what’s going to be best, in terms of collaboration, in terms of engine, in terms of many things. So I feel testings are vital. If you have no testing days, you cannot compete for the win and, and, yeah. I mean, that’s just such an important thing to to keep in mind. And you should always try to get as much testing as possible, even though I know it costs money and it costs time. So yeah, in an ideal world, it would be great to have all the testing available. Obviously, in the real world, you have to trade off the financial side and the time commitments. So I know it’s not ideal, but try at least to get one or two days of testing before every WSK event otherwise, is almost useless to go, I say to my drivers, yeah, there’s no point to raise at the WSK level if you are not testing. I mean, it’s, it’s just silly. It’s, you’re gonna get eaten. The driver may may be a magazine, may be exceptional, the the equipment may be exceptional, but it’s just going to be hard to fine tune and find that last couple of times, both in the driver and in the equipment. And if you are lacking three, four tenths leading up to the to the WK race in the qualifying, then you are basically like 50th out of, you know, 60 drivers. If you are three four tenths off. So you don’t want to be off from the qualifying because then obviously all the weekend is upfield, and even if you are finding some pace during the weekend, it’s too late.

How does the WSK weekend look like?

So WSK weekend includes, normally, two days of testing, on the Wednesday and the Thursday. Now the Wednesday is actually optional. It’s not mandatory. I mean, even the Thursday is optional, but, I mean, most of the teams and drivers are going to do both the Wednesday and the Thursday. On the Thursday of the last two session, you’re going to already have the transponder, so you can already see the laptop, see how the drivers are doing. And then on the Friday morning, you have the warm up, so you have a warm up, and then right into quality. And then you go to heat. In the final session of the Friday, you have a qualifying heat, and then on Saturday, you get the warm up again, you have other qualifying heats. Then you go into Sunday, you have the warm up, and then you have the super heat, which is used called the pre final. And then you go the final. So I just believe that, yeah, the Wednesday and the thirds, they are just for practice days, you know, just you get four sessions of testing of about 10 minutes each, both on Wednesday and Thursday, and yeah. I mean, then on Friday, that’s when everything gets serious and the real weekend begins. So yeah, you need to try to perform at your max in any given day, in any given session. But yeah, everything starts really from the testing that you have to do the weekend before, at least on a Saturday, Sunday, the week before, because you cannot drive on Monday, you cannot drive on Tuesday, you cannot drive in the in the racing week, which is Monday, Tuesday, you can only start from Wednesday. That’s when everybody’s allowed to start, and since you don’t get many laps during the day, so you get maximum, like, 40 laps. If you do every single minute of the practice, you need to try to maximize the track time and try to maximize the learning, ideally, because if you do only, like five laps per session, you will not learn as much. And I mean, it’s a waste of time, isn’t it?

What separates podium drivers from the arrest

well, for sure, the experience level plays a massive role. If you have a driver that has done 50 races in WSK in his life, and you compare him to a driver that has done zero WSK races in his life, then, I mean, it’s not a fair comparison, isn’t it? It’s like you’re not really comparing apples to apples. So the first part, obviously, is the experience. Because through experience, you learn, you build patterns, you have pattern recognition. And of course, you are going to be not only quicker overall in terms of pace, but you’re also going to do better decisions in the racecraft. So yeah, drivers that are on the podium, most of the times are drivers that are more experienced, or have at least the maximum experience that they can get. So they know their tracks very well, like if it’s their living room, and they obviously know the kart very well. So they go into the track with full confidence, not only in their in their kart, but also in the truck. And so they and obviously in themselves. So those kind of drivers are the ones who excel the most, so the ones who have more laps behind themselves on that specific track overall more experience. But at the end of the day, it’s not just that, because you will have a lot of drivers that have equal amount of experiences, but others are not going to perform as well as as a few that we will end up on the podium consistently. So those drivers have a probably better mindset and overall better skills. But not that they’re born with them, but they actually were able to develop them through, yes, experience, but also they built

the skills. You know, at the end of the day, you will find drivers that have done the same amount of laps, let’s say hypothetically, they’ve all done like, I know, like 100,000 laps in their careers, even though it’s a lot of laps. But imagine that. But you will find drivers that with that kind of, you know, laps, they will be, for sure, not on the same pace. Some of them will be a little bit quicker, some of them will be a little slower, and the ones who are a little bit quicker are the ones who have normally got more determination, desire to win, and that basically allowed them to improve their skills and make a gap on the others. So I think the drivers who want to win are the ones who are going to win. And one thing is not enough. It’s the actions that you do that result from wanting that actually going to make you win that’s really, really important. There’s a big difference between wanting to win and really doing absolutely everything you can to win, which is, for sure, more than what anybody else does on the track. So, yeah, it’s very important to to keep that in back of the mind. And if you want to win a double SK race or finish on the podium at least, you need to be that kind of driver. You cannot get lucky. Yes, you can get lucky and gain positions, but you cannot get lucky and finish on the podium is, I mean, you need to have the stars aligned for that to happen. But the reality is that if you wish to become a WSK podium finisher, you need to become a driver that is capable of achieving that. You know what I mean,

how important is consistency during the qualifying hits?

Well, that’s very important, of course. You know it’s. Fundamental that a driver nails every single heat, and it’s important that they are not taking too many risks, because you want to ideally arrive in the pre final with no crashes. You know, you want to keep the points very low in terms of qualifying hits. Because normally you may think that the more points the better. But it’s actually the other way around, because if you finish p1 in a hit, for example, you get zero points. If you finish p2 you get five points. If you finish p3 you get 8p. Four, you get 9p, five, you get 10, p6 11, etc, and it goes like that. So that’s the opposite, actually, of chambers of the future, where the higher up you finish, the more points you get. But anyways, I know it’s a bit confusing, but they chose to make it differently. So the goal is that you arrive the free final with as few points as possible, and you’ll see that by simply finishing already where you start, you are going to progress, because many drivers are going to crash, and that’s going to reduce, kind of like the the average score. So at the end of the day, if you, for example, start every time p2 and you finish every time p2 you will see that at the end of the day you’re probably going to start p1 but it’s a bit like that, because you get always drivers are going to crash more than that, and so they are going to actually get many points. So the goal in in a Wk is to to ideally survive every heat and try to, you know, finish wherever higher you can without crashing, because then it’s going to cost you quite a lot. But again, I mean, it’s, it’s not only depending on you, of course, because there are many variables in that. But the goal is that, yeah, you are reducing the risk of crashing as much as possible. You can take risks in the final, for sure, but in the heats, I normally suggest to not take too many risks. I mean, that’s quite silly. You may gain one position, but you, if you crash, you’re going to lose 10 positions for the for the final and the pre final. So it’s, it’s not, not very clear. And also remember that all the heats that you do are going to affect not only the pre final, but they are going to fit also the final, because then the final is the cumulative of the heat and the pre final. So if you, let’s say, finish last in every heat, but then you get a crazy pre final, and you win it, you will probably not even go in the final, because all the points that you scored in the heats will probably not even get you in the final. You know what I mean. So it’s a bit brutal, but it’s actually quite fair, because imagine if the other way around, you win every single hit, and then you have a mechanical problem in the pre final, and you’re not allowed to start. And then, you know, you have a DNF in the pre final, but then you probably still gonna start in the top five in the in the final, because all the points that you get in the pre in the in the in the heats was was very helpful. So I mean that you actually got zero points. You know what? I mean?

What mistakes prevent drivers from reaching Wk podiums.

Well, as I’ve already mentioned, the number one mistake is to mess up the heats and take risks when you’re not supposed to and like crashing for a silly overtake, that would get you from what p4 to p3 in the last corner. That you know wouldn’t have changed much at the end of the day. But of course, you will have to take some risks at some points. You cannot drive in a complete conservative way, because if you drive like that, then you’re actually going to lose so many positions. But you need to be clever and take your bets accordingly and strategically. You don’t want to, you know, just randomly, yeah, just randomly try to overtake. You need to really be a strategic thinker. And yeah, I mean, obviously when you drive, you drive with subconscious and with your instinct, but at the same time in the heats, you should be a little bit more reflective, because if you drive instinctively, of the all the times, you’re going to really risk crashing. And if you crash, you’re going to start at the back in the final. For sure, if you crash, it’s almost impossible that you’ll start p1 in the final. Another major mistake, and common one is to be honest, like messing up quality, if you have a bad quality because you find bad track position and you just are not warming up the tires. Or you just like, Yeah, I mean, do a lap less or something like that, you are going to start at the back every time, and that’s gonna make your weekend really uphill. So you really want to focus on kneeling qualifying. Also, in terms of setup, you need to try to make sure that on new tires your kart is spot on, because then, yes, once you have good quality and you start at the front, everything is so much easier. Even if your pace is not ideal, you can still compete and stay at the top, whereas if you have an amazing pace in the heat spot, you have a bet by the quality you’re gonna have to make, make everything up, and then it’s gonna be so much more difficult.

What kind of mindset helps drivers perform at the top of a W scale level.

Well, I believe that a growth mindset is always useful, and I mean, actually crucial. You need to know that you’re never perfect and that you can always improve. You need to really remind that to yourself, like, yes, you can improve the kart. You can improve the engine. A shot. See, but the thing that you can improve the most is actually yourself. So you never want to be happy enough about your driving. Yes, you can be somehow proud if you do a great job and you do p1 quality by like, two tenths. But you always need to remind that you can always do better. And the moment you actually stop believing that, then you start feeling like cocky and feeling like you’re the best and everything. That’s when you stop improving, and it’s when your your competitors are going to gain on you. So you need to be the kind of driver like Ayrton Senna or or Michael Schumacher that they believe they’re never perfect, and they will always want to improve themselves every single day, and not caring too much about the other. So you really have to think about yourself, trying to improve yourself every session, and instead, literally, forget about the results. Forget about the result. You want to focus on your performance. So focus on how good you’re driving. Focus in improving your driving. Do not think about whether you’re going to get p1 or not, or whether you’re going to get the podium or not, figure out how to go faster. That’s it. If you every time, figure out a way to go a little bit faster, you will succeed. I promise you, you will then fight for the win. And so that’s really what I encourage you to do, and the result is going to come as a consequence, you have to focus on the performance. If the performance is maximum, it’s really amazing from both the kart and from you, automatically, you’re going to get that p1 but if you instead only focus on the p1 and not on your performance, you are going to actually not get it at all. So that’s very important growth mindset as well as focusing on your performance versus the result, as well as just cutting out distractions and cutting out expectations, just remove expectations. Do not set an expectation ever, please. Because once you tell to yourself, or you tell people around you, oh, I’m going to win, or I’m going to get p1 but then something happens, and you’re not able to then it’s like you’re fooling yourself. You’re fooling people around you, and that’s going to be seen as a weak thing from you, from the others, and you almost going to be lying to yourself. So remember, as in any race, you need to just focus on your performance, on your preparation, on your consistency, improving your lap times, improving your karts, improving your driving every single session. And whether that’s a WSK race, it’s a champions of the future race, or a PN championship race or just a club race, automatically, by you focusing on this procedure, you are going to succeed. And maybe you will not succeed in this race in the next one, but sooner or later, if you are the driver on the track that puts the highest amount of work, in terms of intensity, in terms of quality work, you know, does everything required and puts more and more, yeah, just focus and preparation. Sooner or later, you will succeed. It’s inevitable, but you need to really make sure you put more more work than anybody else. So the way to do that is to be obsessed, become obsessed, and put almost like 10 times more work than anybody else around you. And if you do that, it’s automatically, you’re going to get the podium. But again, it takes time. You need to, obviously, give yourself some time, but at the same time, be impatiently patient, in a way. Yes, be patient, but at the same time, right away, you want to put the action, put the work required to succeed. So if this guide was useful, let me know about it. I I’ll be happy to

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