As motivated and determined as usual, James Wharton worked hard with his team to perfect the set-up of his equipment during the Free Practice sessions. "The first two rounds of the Championship were held at Zuera in Spain and Sarno in Italy, which are long, fast and wide tracks. Here, it was almost the opposite," said James. "But this is a circuit that I like, this is where I won my first race in Europe in Rotax Junior. Free Practice ended with a 4th place in my group and I was confident before the Qualifying session. Unfortunately, I didn't manage to repeat the same time and I was in 7th place in my group, 25th overall." There were 65 drivers registered in total.

A Great Start in the final

James Wharton's task became even more complicated in the first race on Saturday morning, where the Australian had to retire on the first lap. Nevertheless, he recovered perfectly afterwards. He moved up to 7th place in the next race with the second best lap in the race. He was even 5th in another one! Unfortunately, a crash at the beginning of the last heat took him out again, so that he had to be satisfied with the 33rd place on the starting grid for the Final.

"Due to my distant position, we had to make a specific technical choice to favour the first part of the race. In fact, I made a very good start and then I managed to gain several places. At this point in the race, the objective of scoring more points in the European Championship was possible. Then, my end of the race was more difficult and I had to settle for taking the chequered in 24th position. To make matters worse, my front fairing suffered in the duels in the Final and I received a five second penalty that put me back two places."

For his first year in OK, the category that brings together all the best young international hopefuls before they move on to cars, James Wharton has learned a lot and made progress during the European Championship. Now the Australian will focus on the World Championship, which will take place in Portimao (southern Portugal) from 5th to 8th November 2020.

About James Wharton

James Wharton is a 14-year-old Australian kart driver currently competing internationally in his first season in the premier class, OK, with the official Parolin Racing Kart factory team.

James started racing karting in Australia at the age of seven. He then shone in the most important single-brand world challenges before making his debut in FIA Karting competition. 13th in the World Junior Championship in his first season in 2018, he also won the KA 100 Junior class in Las Vegas at the SKUSA SuperNationals.

In 2019, in his first full season in OK-Junior, he achieved top results: 9th in the European Championship, 4th in the Italian Championship and 2nd in the legendary Winter Cup in Lonato. Despite an injury, he was fighting for victory in 2nd place in the World Championship when he was stopped by a mechanical problem. He was again victorious at the SKUSA SuperNationals in Las Vegas in the X30-Junior category.

An official Parolin Racing Kart driver, James is involved in the development and tuning of the equipment thanks to a very good rapport with Albino and Marco Parolin. His discovery of OK, the top category in karting, was interrupted by the Covid-19 pandemic. He restarted competition in July 2020 with the aim of making it into the international top five.

James Wharton plans to continue his career as a single-seater driver with a first step into F4 as soon as he reaches the required age.