There you go, because you are only 5kg over you are brainwashed into thinking you can't be competitive and must move up. Yet the tiny penalty you have is probably less than somebody who carries more than 10kg of lead and has no choice. The irony is you will probably get exactly the same relative penalty when you move up with the lead you need to put on, however you'll just put it down to inexperience in the class..
Having said all of the above, I would be interested to hear from anybody who has properly tested this theory themselves, especially on an adult size chassis and rubber. Although I spent a considerable amount of time on it, this was in only one low powered cadet class and at one circuit, obviously there are tons of variables and perhaps as power to weight ratio and available grip goes up, then lead has much lesser a penalty than being overweight.
All the same I don't think that anyone could doubt that a 40kg driver in a kart weighing 105kg is going to get some disadvantage against a 65kg driver in an 85kg kart. This was the on track example I witnessed recently where the weight limit is 145kg and the 5kg overweight driver was moaning about the weight limit being too low, yet the smaller driver is already carrying 20kg + of ballast (no max kart weight here).
|
|