Featured Driver – Danielle Gardner

Danielle started karting about 3 ½ years ago in late 2005 with her sister.  Her dad was already karting at this time, racing Biland and he decided to let the girls have a go.

Danielle and her sister started by sharing a kart, this being a World Formula and practised at Teesside and Warden Law.  The plan was to get her to do a lap time that was under 60 seconds and the prize was a set of new tyres, but what she didn’t know was as the tyres got worn the harder it got then after a few weeks she got it!  When the new tyres went on she was on the pace.

Danielle was a bit shy to enter her first Club meeting at Warden Law in 2006 but one of our friends Ray Watson talked her into it.  With a year and a half in World Formula and finishing 2nd in her first half a year, then 4th in her 2nd year we decided to move her onto Junior Max. She thought this was great and we got her through her MSA license. She has been in this class now for about 10 months and is getting to grips with the changes, enjoying travelling to the different tracks and learning different things.

When we moved from four stroke to two stroke karts it made things interesting because there was so much to learn and now Danielle has got to grips with her kart and setup and she knows what she wants therefore we should do a lot better.  Watch out guys move over for the girls!

Her chosen Championship for this year is the NKF, which she is currently 7th and still has four more rounds to go, she is aiming for a top 5 finish. We are enjoying the experience of travelling to different tracks around the country and competing with lots of other good drivers, not many girls competing in this sport.  Danielle will hopefully step up to Senior Max next year and we hope we can still have lots of fun on the track and on the social side of things, where we have met some great people, who have become very good friends. We won’t mention you lot because you know who you are.

Thanks to everyone for their support who took the time out to help us in a male predominant sport.

Kim Gardner & Neil Bage