News

JUHA TURALBA EMERGES TOP PINOY FINISHER IN PAGCOR KF2-KF3 CUP

Tue, 2 Feb 2010 15:44:20 +0800

          Juha Turalba of Ready2Race unveiled a big fighting heart as he wound up as the top Filipino finisher with two podium finishes recently in the kickoff of the 2010 PAGCOR KF2-KF3 Cup Series at the Carmona Circuit Philippines.
          The 15-year-old Turalba, a 10th Grade International School Manila student, has shown consistency and maturity in his racing skills up against foreign rivals as he bagged the runner-up finish in Race 1 and took the second runner-up honors in Race 2 with the big support of Tuason Racing School, Tony Kart, OTK parts, HJC Auto Helmets, Sparco Racing, AIM Racing gauges, Oakley Race Gear, Active Group, Malarayat Golf & Country Club, Antonio's, Asia Overseas Transport, Anyro Rent-a-Car, Sanyo Seiki Stainless Steel Corp., Bauan Doctors General Hospital, and Cattleya Resort. .
          Starting out fourth on the grid, the 2008 Asian Karting ROK champ took the cudgels for the Philippines after ace karter Stefano Marcelo took an early exit. Then leading Japanese Reo Takahashi was caught surprised by his smooth dive that wrested the lead on the eighth lap and executed impressive defensive skills to keep his post until the 16th lap.
          Takahashi got back on top with four laps to go but Turalba refused to give up down to the very last lap as he checked in close by just 0.209 of a second behind the Japanese clocking 14 minutes and 29.518 seconds.
"The competition was tough but it’s great to be very competitive in the beginning of the season. I am looking forward to a strong performance this year. It will be a challenging year but I will strive to be at the top all through out the season," said Turalba.
          Race 2 proved to be a bigger challenge for Juha as he had to start 11th following a frustrating time trials. But he worked his way up, running a fast laptime of 43.696 seconds to wind up sixth in the qualifying round.
Then he quickly passed two karters at the start of the final race and hit his fastest laptime of 43.583 seconds to climb up third on the fourth lap to wind up just close behind Marcelo and Takahashi after the 20-lap race.

DELLORTO CUP - 6th out of 34

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 07:35:58 +0800

It was raining the first day in Lonato. I barely got one practice session thursday afternoon. i was struggling with the grip of the track since I’m not used to deriving with high grip levels. I managed to qualify 14th out of 34. On the first heat, the track was wet from an early shower and I started from 15th and finished 5th, clocking the 2nd fastest time of the day. When the track dried I struggled with the grip and had to adjust my driving to suit the high grip track. We finished 14th and 19th in the 2nd and 3rd heats. The combined points from the 3 qualifying heats qualified me for the Dellorto Cup, starting at 14th place. I was finally getting my drive suited to the track and managed to move from 14th to 6th out of 34. It was tough to readjust my driving style to suit the track. However, the limited time of practice did not allow me to be truly competitive. Given more track time, I would have been able to fight it out in front.

Round 3 AKOC, MACAU

Mon, 12 Oct 2009 07:41:08 +0800

Juha was one of the 3 fastest during the practice sessions and was favored to win. Our set-up spot on with the engine really strong. He qualified 2nd out of 56 just 0.06 from the pole. But on the first race heat he was hit from the back on the first turn after the start and spun out. A big pile up ensued. As he was about to get back on the track, another driver hit his kart at about 100+ kph which damaged his Kart really bad and bent his chassis rendering it useless. I'm just so thankful that he suffered no injuries. There were a lot of similar incidents, in other races, due to the bad track condition! In the past 4 yrs. we've been racing here this weekend's track conditions was the worse by far. It deteriorated so fast after several practice sessions and qualifying since they rushed re-paving parts of it.

Round 2 akoc, indonesia - champion

Mon, 24 Aug 2009 17:51:04 +0800

This was the best win for me so far. I’ve been competing in AKOC for quite a long time and I’ve always wanted to win in this category. Early on, we struggled in qualifying and only managed a third. We were about half a second off the pole sitter, Tin, who is also my main rival in the points. During the three qualifying heats, I was able to move up to 2nd for all but 1 of them where my brakes locked up where i finished fourth. Those two second places were kind of bitter sweet because it was good that I was starting the pre-finals now next to tin. on the other hand, I was still 0.2 of a second off his pace. My dad and I thought about it saturday night and we discussed a worst case scenario strategy that would give us no points gain or loss over Tin.

During the pre-final, our strategy worked and it was very satisfying to be able to lead the race. I was able to lead the gap that worried Tin and his team. They did a whole bunch of changes to their set-up over lunch break while we sat and waited nervously. During the final race, I opened a gap and tin dropped back to 3rd. I thought it would be smooth sailing from then on. But, after 4 laps, Tin got by me and just disappeared in front. Despite that, I felt that our strategy worked and I was satisfied with a 2nd until, I rounded the corner on the 14th lap and saw Tin sitting in his kart on the side of the track. As they say, the rest is history.

Round 1 AKOC, Macau - 2nd Place

Sun, 14 Jun 2009 23:01:13 +0800

Reigning Asian ROK Senior champion Juha Turalba of Ready2Race put up a tough fight against defending Asian Karting Open champ Tin Sritrai of Thailand before settling for Formula 125 Open Senior runner-up honors, just 0.416 of a second behind Sritrai.

He won the pre-final race from 10th on the grid hosting the fastest time of 50.23 seconds. From 10th place, it took him just five laps to take the lead and coasted to victory.

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