Kart Suit Buying Guide (CIK-FIA Explained)

Do you actually need a CIK FIA homologated suit, or is that just for professionals?

Not gonna lie, I get this question a lot, and in this guide, I’m going to provide all of the answers to all the questions you may have. So let’s get into it.

What does CIK FIA homologation actually mean?

The CIK FIA homologation is a way to prove that the suit is following the FIA guidelines regarding to safety, so that manufacturers need to follow those specific rules and guidelines in order to maintain safety, even though they may be trying to find innovations such as lightweight, aerodynamic flow, ventilation, etc.

So if you wish to race at international level or even at a national level, you will need to make sure that your karting suit is properly homologated and that, of course, it’s not expired. You need to make sure that the homologation is still current.

When is the homologation mandatory for the suit?

While it’s not mandatory for just training purposes and testing, it is mandatory when you want to do races, especially at international level, you’re actually going to get checked at scrutineering that your race suit is going to be properly homologated, as well as your glove shoes, neck protector and helmet, whereas for National club level is not as often that the suits get checked, but still, it’s a common practice to check it, and so you need to make sure you comply to that homologation number if you don’t want to risk getting disqualified.

But at the same time, it’s not just about that. It’s also about the safety, the reason why they allow a suit to be homologated for X amount of years is that with a general wear and tear, it’s going to progressively break up, and so it’s not going to protect you as well in a case of incident.

And so you need to still want to make sure that you are driving with a properly homologated suit, not only to comply and so to, let’s say, not get disqualified, but also to make sure that if you have a crash, you are more likely to get protected.

With my personal experience, I have never been checked the racing suit at national or club level races, whereas for international races, I’ve always been checked, such as European championships or world championship races, and in many cases, also for WSK races, just to let you know, but still, it doesn’t mean you should not drive without a properly homologated suit.

For other races as well, I guess it’s just a no brainer for all drivers to just drive with a properly homologated suit.

At the end of the day, pretty much every racing suit on the market is homologated, but not old. So you need to double check and at the end of the day, yes, they may have been all homologated, but if you have a suit that has been sitting in your wardrobe for 10 years, probably now it’s not homologated anymore.

And so you need to double check that to make sure that it’s not illegal. The worst feeling would be to win a race and then get checked by the scrutineers and getting disqualified because your race suit is out of homologations because it’s expired.

What’s the difference between entry level and top tier race suits?

Well, the big difference in karting suits, stands in the weight, in the comfort and in the breathability. So let’s break them down.

Now the weight is super important, because you want to weigh as little as possible, especially for adult karts and all the drivers where it’s hard to be within the minimum weight limit, and so managing to save up weight everywhere, including the race suit, is a big plus, something that you want to look for.

And so a heavier, bulkier suit, it’s not as good as a smaller, lighter suit, as the case of the Sparco Super Legera, which is only 300 grams in weight, whereas the other brands are about 500 to 600 grams.

So that’s, of course, a big improvement.

And at the same time, the ventilation is important, because you sweat a lot during your sessions, and if you’re able to breathe out that liquid and basically ventilate out of your body and out of your suit at the end of the session, you’re going to be a bit lighter than drivers who, instead, are going to sweat it, but it’s still going to stay inside their suit.

So that’s a big, big deal.

Difference in ventilation.

And also, if you’re able to get more air into your suit, you’re going to stay a little bit cooler, and again, in the summer months, that’s going to big.

There’s going to be a big advantage, and I highly recommend you to to take that if you can.

But of course, the Sparco Super Legera, it’s the best, but of course, it’s the most expensive, so it’s about 950 euros.

But yeah, it comes up with great advantages, such as the lowest weight suit in the market and probably the best ventilation.

Then it also comes down to comfort.

You want to make sure that suit is not too bulky and too large, which is also going to drag you down on the straights.

It almost creates, like a parachute effect.

You don’t want that, but also you don’t want them to be too skinny and too tight.

Otherwise you will be very limited in the movements.

But overall, I prefer a suit to be tighter than too large.

How should the karting suit fit?

A karting suit should fit in a way that it’s just right, so it means not too large, not too tight.

I can give you my experience from last year, for example, in the world championships, I got my brand new Omp suit.

That’s the same we all had at sodikart.

And even though I gave proper measurements, I received the suit a little bit larger than I expected it.

So instead of just driving with it, I went to a dressmaker, a tailor, basically, and I asked him to make the suit a little bit skinnier and cut out some extra centimeters here and there, which is what I did.

And so it was fitting perfectly, as if it was a wedding dress, perfectly skinny, and that, I believe was good because it made me less bulky in the kart and I felt more aerodynamic when I drove.

So that is one of the recommendations.

I think that it’s better to be a little bit actually tighter on the suits and have it a bit skinnier rather than having a large fit better to be a little bit more slim in in a way that you can gain a little bit of time down the straights, as it is better dynamically.

Think about it if you have a huge suit, which is twice your side as I’ve done by mistake once I had a very large suit because I didn’t have any suit I for that day testing, and this suit was so large that I was literally feeling like a parachute, and I could feel like it was slowing me down the streets.

And I checked the data and it was actually a bit slower than normal.

So, yeah, it was quite funny.

But yeah, do not buy an oversized suit that is going to make you slower.

Do oversized suit make you slower? And why?

Yes, oversized suits make you slower, simply because they create this kind of parachute effect where you actually get slowed down on the straights due to the extra drag.

And it really feels like you are going a little bit slower.

You feel like the wind is more effective every time you are going on the straights.

You feel like a little bit slower.

And you can actually double check that on the data.

So that’s why I don’t want suits to be large.

I want the suits to be extremely slim fit, and almost be a bit too slim that I struggle to move.

But again, when you drive your kart, you don’t have to move anyways, that much.

You just have to be very smooth, very firm with your body.

So at the end of the day, you want to have a suit that is so skinny rather than a suit that is so large.

Does a lighter suit mean faster?

Absolutely, absolutely.

Of course, it really depends.

If you are struggling to get within the minimum weight of the kart.

And if you’re already overweight by a few kilos or so, having a very low weight suit is going to help you to bring down that deficit.

And of course, extra weight is just negative, as you probably know in motorsport, the lower the weight, the better the exits and acceleration in general.

So anything that can reduce the weight of a kart, especially when you’re on the edge of being overweight, is going to help you drastically.

And even when you are not overweight and you’re still within the minimum limit, you can, you can still gain by using a lighter suit, because then you can place the weight, the ballast.

Basically, you can place it wherever you want on the kart.

You can place it nice and low to reduce the sensor gravity.

So instead of having 500 grams spread around your body, you can actually have 500 grams nicely placed at the center of your kart, for example, to reduce the moment of inertia and therefore make the kart a little bit more reactive.

So I guess that is one of the things that you should keep in mind.

And also, I feel like lighter suits overall feel better, also in terms of comfort, and they are less tiring.

To be honest, imagine if you had a five kilo suit wearing or a 500 grams suit.

That’s a big difference, right?

Which one would you think you would feel better?

There with a lighter suit, of course.

So yeah, of course, the lighter the suit, though, the more expensive, because it requires a proper technological manufacturing system to bring down the weight.

So again, it’s going to cost a bit more money, as in the case of the Sparco Super Legera, okay, which is 300 grams only, which is incredible.

And so, yes, you will need to budget for about 900 euros for that, compared to like the average suit, which is about 400 euros.

How long do suits last?

A suit can last five years, or they can last five races.

It really depends a lot on the way you use it.

If you have crashes or not, if you drive every single day or not.

So it depends for many things the way you use it.

Of course, because if you have, for example, some washers and bolts on your seat that are a little bit too large, then you may scratch the suit every time there, and you may end up breaking the suit.

And once you break the suit, yes, you can put a tape on it, you can put a patch on it, but at some point you will need to replace it, because, to be honest, in the regulation is actually clear that a broken suit cannot be used because it’s not in homologation anymore, and so you can get disqualified for that if you get found with a broken suit.

Like if you have a hole here and there.

So yes, 99% of the times