Kiwi karter Marcus Armstrong has scored the biggest win of his career to date – beating the cream of the karting world’s top young drivers to KF class victory at the final round of this year’s European CIK-FIA championship in Sweden.
Works Tony Kart driver Armstrong, from Christchurch, qualfied 19th, finished the Pre-Final sixth and led the 25-lap Final from the eighth lap to beat Richard Vorschoor (Exprit/Vortex/Vega) from the Netherlands and British driver Tom Joyner (Zanardi/TM/Vega) to the line.
The round win is the 14-year old’s most significant win to date and follows a recent 2nd position in the Winter Cup in Italy. The weekend’s achievement will undoubtedly draw attention from some of motorsport’s best-known teams, an exciting prospect for Armstrong.
“This result validates everything I’ve been working toward this year. It’s been a very intense learning curve being based in Europe since February, I’ve raced extensively in the States and Asia but the racing here is easily the most fiercely contested in the world, familiarising myself with that early in my career stands me in good stead for future opportunities.” Says Armstrong
Armstrong bounced back from a spectacular crash on Saturday when a shunt from another driver sent Armstrong into a tyre wall causing the kart to flip and throwing Marcus from the seat. Despite the off-track excursion Armstrong remained focussed to secure the win, working his way up from 19th to 6th in the pre-final qualifying.
“Some great work has been done by the team extracting the speed from the kart and I’ve been working hard with simulator training as well, it really culminated in an awesome result this weekend. To get my first win in a European Championship event is a massive achievement, I’m so glad to deliver the result to the supporters that have helped me get here.”
Marcus will remain based in the UK under management by former World Champion, Oliver Oakes, testing in F4 and training in anticipation for the World Karting championships in September.
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