Presenting Sponsor

Presenting Sponsor

Associate Sponsor

Purse Sponsor

Media Sponsors

2002 Rock Island Grand Prix Summary

General Event News

Every year the Rock Island Grand Prix continues to grow in attendance, as it is truly a world-class event.  This is the Kentucky Derby of karting.  Promoter Roger Ruthhart along with his support staff once again put together a show that is the "business model" for inter-continental caliber karting promotions.  This year's event included 15 regular classes, and a new exhibition class for the 250cc Biland powered karts.  Rules for the various classes were extracted from SKUSA for shifter classes, Rotax Max Challenge for Rotax, and "the most lenient" of IKF and WKA for the remaining regular classes.

Special thanks to the sponsors listed above for providing the support for this race.

Event operations format opened on Saturday morning with 2 practice sessions for each class with an afternoon qualifying session timed with an AMB timing system.  Sunday races were held as consolation qualifiers for those classes with over 25 entrants, and Feature races for the top 25 qualifiers and the remaining top five finishers in the consolation races.  Feature races were restricted to fields of 30.

Race Director Tom Argy & son kept the grids and racing in fine order.  Tom has a penchant for implementation of safety and in an event as intense as this, the quality of his contributions shined brightly.

Course layout included carefully placed hay bales in several layers around the perimeter of the track.  Approaches to corners were shaped to allow for excellent passing opportunities, yet provided adequate runoff to scrub speed in case of impact with the softly packed hay bales.  SCCA certified Corner Workers kept the action on track as well providing a well coordinated clean-ups between races.  Catch fencing was installed around the outer perimeter of the course.

Perfect racing weather with temps in the 80's with the mild northern sunshine at a warm but not hot level.  The background of downtown Rock Island provided a festive atmosphere with a large crowd of over 30,000 in attendance.

While the "King of the Streets" challenge among the SuperPro class is the feature event, the remaining classes also put on some spectacular racing.  Its too hard to predict which class put on the best show, they were all very entertaining.  The Kartweb reports will be structured by class to provide comprehensive information of the event.  Additional media covering the event were Rob Howden of Shifter Kart Illustrated magazine, Jeffery Franz from eKartingnews. 

Kartweb has the best video footage yet coming.  Some in-car, but the really spectacular stuff was taken trackside.

2002 Rock Island Grand Prix Race Reports

 To view the Race Reports click on the Class as they become linked.

As Video Clips Click are posted, the links under Video Clips will be activated.

Keep checking back over the next few weeks as we will continue to post the reports and video clips as we finish them.

2002 Rock Island Grand Prix Race Photogallery