This is part of my series where I kart across all of Thailand, publishing them in the order I visited them. For more about deciding to do this and how I went out and about and got from place A to B you can read my intro article to the series, I Kart Raced Across the Entire Country of Thailand. Also worth checking for some general safety comments for karting if you’re new to it, as safety is not always priority #1 out there…
Name: Go Kart Hua Hin
Website: http://www.gokarthuahin.com/
Location: map – literally across the street from the airport.
Cost to get there: After karting in Phuket, I figured I could use my prices there as a benchmark. In reality; not so much – everywhere was quite different. Available transport here seems to mostly be taxis, at least from where I was station, which was very near the rail station. These guys wat 200 baht to do anything. I literally just needed them to take me straight up the street up until the airport, zero turns. The first set of taxis offered to take me ‘there and back’ for 400 baht. I said 2. They just kind of laughed and I left to go on to the next group, although a guy did say he would do it for 300 as I was leaving. Next group… 200 there or 400 for round trip. Kept going… Same with the third group. After that, I ran into the problem of running out of groups of taxis… far less here and far less going on overall in Hua Hin. Uh oh! I thought I may just take a frustrated long walk to get there and potentially please for a very late race! Luckily I came upon a taxi, he just dropped someone off – from Bangkok! This is about a 3 hour trip, the guy said it wsa 1200 baht. In any case I took him the remainder of the way to kart – and the metered fare was under 70! The owner of Go Kart Hua Hin, Neil, advised I just take a green truck for a few baht back into town, then would turn around at the airport and head into the night market – although I met a guy outside the airport who was waiting for his wife, who offered to give me a ride. He said no payment was necessary, although I planned on giving him some after I hopped out of the truck. He was off so quick I didn’t have a chance to offer him the money even! Some great Thai generosity at work for which I was grateful for. Note that taxis in general did not seem to be aware of this place, although you really just need them to take you next to the airport (although if you ask to go to the airport straight up, they may add on some kind of extra airport transfer fee themselves.) Armed with this info, good luck! Let me know your own results.
Cost: Cash only. The prices on the site are up to date as of this writing – 500 baht for 10 minutes on the senior race kart, or 1000 baht for two 13 minute sessions on the same kart.
Track: The track is fun and challenging and flows nicely. It’s used in national kart championships in Thailand. 750m in length, a pretty good distance!
Popularity: For some reason, the taxis in town have attractions to go to, which usually include at least one of the kart places in most of the cities I visited, although these taxis didn’t have it. You’ll probably want to bring some friends to make sure you’ve got people to race with, or definitely come on a weekend in the hopes to run into some people. One of the mechanics came out with me in the second session, to show me how it was done. Made it more fun and it was good to see his lines, although I didn’t always try to follow them – surely to my detriment. I definitely could not keep up with his pace! He shows up pretty well in the video.
Karts: 13 hp karts. Kart felt solid to me. 50+ mph, karts are movin’!
Timing: No timing is taken here, at least not normally taken and provided.
Overall: Fun track but you’ll probably need to bring some friends. Neil, the owner, will probably be there running things, and he is a cool guy to chat and have a beer with.
Video: If you click the title on the embedded video, it will open up in youtube and you’ll be able to full screen it.
Limited light as it was later in the evening. For some reason GPS data was wonky. The data and their mechanic do pop in later in the video.
Other tracks in Thailand:
Phuket
1. Patong Go-Kart Speedway
2. Phuket Kart Speedway (100cc and 125cc 2-strokes)
Hua Hin
3. Go Kart Hua Hin
Chiang Mai
4. Chiang Mai X-Centre Drift Karts
5. Chiangmai Speedkart
Ko Samui
6. Samui Go-Kart
7. EasyKart Samui
Krabi
8. Krabi Kart (420cc and 560cc 4-strokes)
Pattaya
9. EasyKart Pattaya
10. Bira International Circuit (no arrive and drive; rotax rental)
11. Pattaya Kart Speedway
Bangkok
12. MSL Motorsports Land
13. EasyKart Bangkok (RCA)
