MiniWorld June 2019 65
I was eliminated in Round 3, but I got
Paddy to autograph it: priceless!
The next IMM race was in Belgium,
- I changed the wheels and
bearings and was hoping for a good
finish. One thing I didn’t think about
started to happen during the races, I
kept eliminating kids! Race after race
these little kids had to race against me
and lose. Working with kids most of my
adult life, I felt bad doing this to them.
At least the humour of the loud booing
made it more entertaining and put a
brief smile on the kids’ faces. I went on
to barely win my first IMM race with an
almost photo-finish. There were quite a
few people building racers just as fast
as mine, making it almost impossible for
kids to finish in the top 10, much less win.
As the competition was evolving and
getting faster, I could see that it would be
great to have a racing class just for kids.
The following IMM was in Ireland. For
this race I brought back the Paddy racer
as well as a new, low-profile racer with
side bars to protect the wheels from the
track’s edge. I was hoping to get at least
one of them in to the finals. As expected
there were a lot of fast racers, with
even more entries and more spectators.
Lucky for me, both of mine made it into
the final eight. For the finals we picked
a playing card each round to see who
would race against whom. Lucky for
me again, I never had to race against
myself. Both of mine won each round so
the final two was me versus, well, me. It
sounds kind of cool but it was seriously
embarrassing. Needless to say, I finished
first and second with the new ‘Peace
Love Mini’ racer finishing first. Once again,
the kids didn’t stand a chance against
the competitive adults. It was even
more obvious to me that there should
be a separate class just for the kids.
Last year was IMM Portugal. I took both
racers to try to defend my prior wins.
Dirk and Marlen from Germany
proudly showing off the Kids’
Class racer that she built.Marlen, age 9,
building her
first racer!IMM Portugal 2018 – the line-up ready to race.
The startline at IMM Belgium in 2016.
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