It all begins with an idea.

The modern motorsport discipline of kart racing, or more informally karting, has never quite shaken off the stigmatised descriptors of ‘Go-Kart’ and ‘Go-Karting’ as the newly invented diminutive machines and sport were originally dubbed in late 1950’s in the USA. Popular folklore credits a US journalist with coining the names; Go-Karts and Go-Karting [or Go-Cart and Go-Carting as it was sometimes spelt back then]. Maybe so, but that was not the first time that these terms had been used to describe a small, wheeled device…. not by a long chalk it seems…..

Discovering today that Scotland’s top rallying journalist, John Fife had recently written about his concerns that the history of rallying was also in danger of being “lost forever” was both shocking and vindicating for me in equal measures.  Shocked that a mainstream motorsport category such as rallying might be heading towards the same predicament as karting and personally vindicating for me; in as much that rallying’s predicament simply reinforces what British Karting Heritage is endeavouring to achieve for karting!   So what’s John’s viewpoint?

Not a direct financial donation to the project, but certainly a “benefit in kind” that will hopefully realise some financial benefits in the long term. An offer of a few karting magazines turned out to be 73 boxes of over 3,000 various motor racing and motoring magazines, hundreds of event programmes, and the like from 1936 to 2010!

While the iconic Karting and Kart and Superkart magazines have undoubtedly been the mainstay in recording British karting history, there were from time to time, several other UK karting periodicals, short lived and most now quite rare. Despite their short print runs and present-day scarcity, they still had a part to play in capturing UK karting history. They are very much wanted by the project. Do you have any of these titles?

Although the project has a near complete set of Kart & Superkart magazines, there are some missing issues and others in the collection are in poor condition, and not optimal for scanning. Ideally, I would prefer to use magazines in a better condition. So, do you have any of these magazines?

East Lothian based Redstone Websites have been chosen to build the archival website for the project.

While the British Heritage Karting Project is the overarching project for karting in the UK, over the border, another heritage project has also been developing in the background over the last couple of years. It’s currently going through scrutineering and will soon be on the dummy grid, ready for printing and presentation to my chosen recipients…..