Glenroy Sinclair, Assignment Coordinator

When the starter waves the green and sends the Shifter Class karters on their way, all eyes will be glued to kart number 23 driven by Martin Anderson.

Anderson placed second in the Florida Winter Tours (FWT) meet, held in Miami, Florida, three weeks ago. So, today's midday meet at the Palisadoes International Raceway, Kingston, promises to be a thriller.

A Kingston College past student, Anderson hopes to reproduce the form which earned him a second place behind Canadian champion Jeffrey Petriello. Another Canadian karter, Richard Boake, finished third, in the FWT meet's DD2 Class.

"It was my greatest performance ... Words cannot express how I felt," said Anderson about the meet that closed the 2009 FWT International Rotax Max Challenge series.

Website

According to the FWT's website, at the start of the race Boake held pole position with Petriello behind. Anderson was third ahead of Brendan Bain and Britain's female karter, Tiffany Chittenden. By lap four, Chittenden moved to fourth, and the quartet cleared the rest of the field and raced towards half. Petriello then took the lead working lap 10 and powered home for the fourth consecutive.

Anderson attributes his superb performance to mechanic, Carlos Duenas, who provided him with a well-prepared kart.

President of the Jamaica Karting Association (JKA), Dave Wong, said that Anderson, along with other local karters' performances, has generated international interest in the group's July meet.

"The performances of Martin Anderson, Collin Daley and others in the FWT series have sparked a lot of interest for our upcoming international race meet. Some well-known world champions have expressed an interest to attend the meet," he said.

At today's meet, there are reports that Jonathan Law has moved from from the 80cc Class to the Rotax Mini-Max to challenge Daley, Thomas Issa and Fraser McConnell.

"Law is a very competitive karter and the word is that he has been practising for the mini-max class," said Wong.