Cooloola
6 Hour
Qualifying: P4
The season's second visit to Cooloola opened with two hours of practice and an 8-minute qualifying dash, and the kart felt good from the first lap of the day. Thiago drove the session and put the #49 P4 on the grid, behind ShapeCUT's pole, CASA and Force Phantom. The honest read: the kart was good all day, but this track layout made matching the outright pace of the front-runners hard, and P4 was what the package had in it over a single flying lap.
| Pos | # | Team | Class |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | #787 | ShapeCUT Racing POLE | Maxx |
| 2 | #397 | CASA Racing | Sportsman |
| 3 | #66 | Force Phantom | Maxx |
| 4 | #49 | BR Motorsport ★ | Sportsman |
Where the pace really sat. Qualifying said P4; the race said faster. BR's best race lap of 43.422s was the 3rd quickest of the entire field, with only CASA (43.153s) and Force Phantom (43.171s) ever going quicker. Over six hours, that is front-running machinery.
The Race: Six Hours
Lights out at 10:50 with Thiago aboard from P4, and the plan was the one that worked at Ipswich: a two-driver alternating strategy, Thiago and Fernando trading the kart in long, disciplined stints all the way to the 16:51 flag. For three and a half hours it ran almost exactly to script, the mandatory stops banked on schedule, the lap times metronomic, the #49 firmly in the Sportsman podium fight. Then, on lap 286, a single screw rewrote the afternoon.
| Pos | # | Team | Class | Laps | Best Lap | Round Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | #66 | Force Phantom | Maxx | 480 | 43.171s | 150 |
| 2 | #397 | CASA Racing FASTEST LAP | Sportsman | 475 | 43.153s | 145 |
| 3 | #95 | Project 5FIVE3 | Maxx | — | — | 137 |
| 4 | #787 | ShapeCUT Racing POLE | Maxx | — | — | 134 |
| 5 | #49 | BR Motorsport ★2ND SPORTSMAN | Sportsman | 454 | 43.422s | 128 |
| 6 | #253 | Dominators | Sportsman | 435 | — | 125 |
| 7 | #33 | Team Fange | Sportsman | — | — | 122 |
| 8 | #42 | GF Motorsports | Maxx | DNF | — | 0 |
Up front, Force Phantom won on 480 laps with a metronomic 10-stop run that never put a wheel wrong. Behind them it was an attrition day: Team Fange lost nearly an hour across two long stops (35 minutes at 12:39 and 24 more at 14:12), Dominators lost 30 minutes at 12:47, and GF Motorsports retired at 13:43 with a cracked engine, confirmed in the paddock afterwards. Notably, it was essentially green flag racing throughout, there is no field-wide safety-car signature anywhere in the lap data; every gap on that timing sheet was earned or lost in the pit lane and the paddock.
| Time | BR Lap | Event | Driver | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10:50 | 1 | Race start from P4 | Thiago | Straight into the fight with the 66/787/397 lead train |
| — | 45 | Drive-through (mandatory stop) | Thiago | One of 10 mandatory stops required of every team, not a penalty |
| 11:47 | 74 | Refuel + driver change | → Fernando | First full-service stop, run to schedule |
| 12:45 | 150 | Driver change | → Thiago | 76-lap Fernando stint completed, consistency holding |
| — | 208 | Drive-through (mandatory stop) | Thiago | Second mandatory drive-through banked |
| 13:35 | 215 | Refuel + driver change | → Fernando | Second full-service stop, still to schedule |
| — | 238 | Drive-through (mandatory stop) | Fernando | Third mandatory drive-through banked |
| — | 285 | Drive-through (mandatory stop) | Fernando | Fourth and final mandatory drive-through cleared |
| 14:29 | 286 | ⚠ ENGINE MOUNT COMES FREE | Fernando | A screw worked loose, engine mount and chain came free · kart in at 14:29:33 and onto the trolley |
| 14:43 | 287 | ⚠ Repair complete, back out | → Thiago | 13m12s paddock repair · 18 laps lost (leader lap 292 to 310) |
| 15:21 | 335 | Refuel + driver change | → Fernando | Final full-service stop |
| 16:10 | 398 | Driver change | → Thiago | Final stint begins, P2 in Sportsman secure both ways |
| 16:51 | 454 | 🏁 Chequered flag | Thiago | P5 overall · P2 Sportsman · a relaxed run home, enjoying the traffic |
A note on average pace. One lap on BR's timesheet reads over 13 minutes, that is the repair, not a lap of driving. Any average-pace figure computed across all 454 laps is skewed by it. Read the stint medians instead: Thiago at roughly 43.6–43.9s, Fernando at 44.8–45.3s, both remarkably consistent. The pace was never the problem on Saturday.
The Incident: One Loose Screw
Fernando was mid-stint and running to plan when it happened. On lap 286 a screw worked itself loose, and with it the engine mount let go and the chain came free. He got the kart back to the lane, in at 14:29:33, straight onto the trolley and into the paddock. The crew found the problem, remounted the engine, refitted the chain and had the kart rolling again in 13 minutes and 12 seconds, out at 14:43 with Thiago aboard. While it sat on the trolley, the leader went from lap 292 to lap 310: 18 laps gone.
To be absolutely clear: this was not driver error. Fernando was aboard when the mount let go, and nothing he did caused it, a fastener that was torqued at build simply worked loose over 286 laps of racing. The root cause of why that screw loosened is still unknown, which is exactly why it goes on the pre-race checklist for Round 5 (see Section 7). His response, getting a kart with a loose engine and a dead chain safely back to the lane, was exactly right.
The 13-minute turnaround deserves its own credit. A loose engine mount and a thrown chain is not a splash-and-dash fix; diagnosing it, remounting the engine, re-tensioning the chain and getting the kart back out inside a quarter of an hour kept BR firmly in the Sportsman podium fight. The Rd 3 king pin took nearly six minutes to fix with the fault already found; this one was found, fixed and back racing in 13.
Driver Performance
Thiago and Fernando split the six hours across seven stints, Thiago running four (laps 1–74, 151–215, 287–335 and 399–454) and Fernando three (75–150, 216–286 and 336–398). The stint medians tell a story the season keeps repeating: both drivers consistent inside narrow windows, and the gap between them closing round by round.
The alternating strategy worked. Seven stints, clean handovers, mandatory stops banked on schedule, and both drivers fresh enough at the six-hour mark to still be racing properly. Same structure as Ipswich Race 2, same verdict: keep it.
What the Day Cost
BR finished 21 laps behind CASA, the Sportsman winner, and 19 clear of Dominators in third. Here is where the gap came from, and once again it was not pace.
| Window | Event | Cost | Impact |
|---|---|---|---|
| 14:29–14:43 | MECHANICAL Engine-mount screw loose, mount + chain free (lap 286) | 13m12s | About 18 laps stationary while the field ran green (leader lap 292 to 310) |
| All race | MANDATORY 4 drive-throughs + 3 refuels + 2 driver changes | — | The same 10-stop requirement every team carried, no net cost |
| 16:10–16:51 | DELIBERATE Cruise-mode final stint | P2 safe | Position secure both ways, pace managed by choice, not necessity |
The Race, Reconstructed
The math is simple again this round. Add the roughly 18 lost laps back and BR is on about 472, fighting CASA (475) for the Sportsman win to the flag instead of finishing 21 laps back. That is four straight rounds where the pace was front-running and one incident set the result: the engine restart at Cooloola Rd 1, the safety-car restart crash at Warwick, the missing king pin bolt and underweight penalty at Ipswich, and now an engine-mount screw. The counterweight is just as consistent: every round keeps proving the pace is structural, and this time it still ended with a trophy.
Championship: P5 and Climbing
The 128 round points move BR to 540 for the season, up from P6 to P5 overall and holding P2 in the Sportsman championship. CASA lead the class chase on 585.5, a gap of 45.5, while Team Fange sit 7.5 behind BR on 532.5. Championship totals use the 2-point bonus method and match the official Speedhive championship table; the full standings live on the Season Dashboard.
After Round 4
Recommendations for Rd 5 Manning Valley
Round 5 is the Manning Valley State of Origin, 21–23 August 2026. Cooloola's lessons are short and specific this time.
The Big Picture
Four rounds in, the pattern has not changed, but the outcomes are starting to. Front-running pace, one incident per round, and this time the incident cost 18 laps instead of the race: BR still came home P5 overall, P2 in Sportsman, and up a championship place. A best lap 0.269s off the fastest in the field, seven disciplined stints, a 13-minute repair executed under pressure, and the season's first trophy in the cabinet. The luck is still overdue; the operation is no longer waiting for it.
Round 4 in Three Numbers
Thank you, Cooloola. A huge shout-out to the SEKQLD committee and organisers, including the Cooloola Coast Kart Club, for another superbly run six hours of racing, with special thanks to Revolution Racegear Queensland for their amazing sponsorship and participation across the series. And as always, to Just Karts and 64 Productions for the photography and event coverage that make pages like this one possible.