Now its new 1241m kart track is open the Rotorua Kart Club has its sights set on obtaining an international licence.
If it's successful, it will be the only club in the Southern Hemisphere to have an international licence.
Yesterday the club held its first meet on the new track, based at
Off Road New Zealand.
Club captain Zane Willis said it was great to finally have their new track up and running after 15 years of planning and fundraising to establish the $3 million facility. "[The track] will provide an excellent platform for our drivers of the future to succeed on the world stage," Mr Willis said.
The club's ultimate aim was to obtain an international licence. "It would mean we'd be the only club in the Southern Hemisphere to have one."
Mr Willis said there were 20 karting tracks in New Zealand but "nothing like this" with most tracks only 400 to 800m long. "This track provides a challenge not available elsewhere," Mr Willis said.
Yesterday's poor weather affected the number of people who turned up to the club's first meet but it was still a good day, he said. Most people had come from Auckland but there were also people from the Waikato, Wellington and around the Bay of Plenty.
"We race in all conditions, it's all part of motorsport. There's a certain lot of skills needed to drive well in the rain," Mr Willis said.
A couple of young drivers who went along, Taupu-nui-a-Tia College student Faine Kahia, 15 and Western Heights High School student Josh Anderson, 14, were both thrilled with the new track. The teenagers have both been racing for about two years. "It's awesome, I want to be a race car driver," Faine said.
The Rotorua club is preparing for the sixth and final round of a New Zealand-wide series which it will host this weekend.
