The Real Reason Go Karts Feel So Fast 

Because your low to the ground, un protected, it's bumpy/ noisy and the track is small and appears to go past quickly. Same as how a rollercoaster tricks your mind even though you can drive down a highway faster and feel safer

Small nimble cars >>>> heavy fast cars (Looking at you F1 👀)

For me, it's the realization that a good kart can take a 90° corner out of a straight at full throttle. The grip is unreal.

You forgot at least one major aspect. The incredibly short wheelbase makes the cart steering more responsive/twitchy. It also makes the time between bumps hitting the front and rear wheels quicker which you will perceive as speed.

6:56 I never thought I'd get to say this on a Driver61 video, but "I'm VECTOR! because I have both DIRECTION and MAGNITUDE!"

*seating next to Scott in a plane* 6:23 "It's perfectly possible to be travelling at a thousand miles per hour, but have zero acceleration. So if you were blindfolded, you wouldn't even know." *changes seat*

“I started racing go-karts. And I love karts. It’s the most breath taking sport in the world. More than F1, indeed, I used to like it most.” - Ayrton Senna and "it's as hard to drive a 125cc shifter kart as a F1 car" [I may have the wording off on that one, i couldn't find a copy of that quote to confirm it exactly]

Once i tried a Kz. The most terrifying thing ever. Like, dude i do rental karts every month, and drive a miata, but the KZ is just insane, both from the perception of the 2 stroke buzzing , the acceleration, the inmediate response, the vibration... I would never have the guts to race KZ's, I cant imagine how terrifying an f1 is

Think that's why so many SUV drivers seem to be speeding? :)

05:51 - that's a good analogy. You think you're going really slowly when you're in an aeroplane. But once you see another aeroplane go past you, you then have something to compare your speed to. And those other aeroplanes are (literally) flying at incredible speeds!

The thing I hate the most with karting is when the car starts to vibrate. The kart I drove as a kid used to vibrate so much it blurred my vision. It made 10 year old me absolutely terrified driving at max speed.

In my first experience i was more concerned that the loud engine would explode rather than winning or crashing.

The picture at 33 seconds is me lol. I’m in the back running my number 7 plate 👍

This is why when i was junger i wanted a fast car, but now i'm into dirt bikes bicycles and skis. Going 30/40 kmh feels really fast when you're tucking your elbows to avoid hitting trees, hearing small branches hitting the helmet and jumping around. Add some no fall zones and it will wake you up

Perspective and field of vision. Perception Sensory Feedback Vibration, noise, wind. Perhaps experience a bit too. Really interesting as always.

Its true, i have broken a rib in a kart, due to i rented a kart that with a seat that was way to big for me, and got into a pretty compettative fight with a friend, both of us Simracing fanatics thus we went a bit bonkers offcourse showing off to each other who was the fastest, so i was bashing around in the seat like crazy. After several sessions my ribcage was so sore, i coudn't go on, and i went the next day to the hospital where they told me i had a broken rib. But then it was FUN!!!

You should definitely do a video about 90s to early 00s karting. That was a very special era of motorsport, and sadly, Karting today has lost its soul hasn't been the same since. Anyone are curious should definitely check some videos out of races in that era highly recommend it.

Absolutely brilliant video Scott! I love how you brought together all the factors most people would never consider in the driving experience. I have been driving/racing for 48 years and I learn so much from your videos. Thank you so much for all the work you put into them.

This guy spared no details. Went as deep as describing as how your skin feels the vibrations in the ground. 10/10 video 👌👌👌

Similar to the reverse effect I feel at work. I drive heavy equipment, trucks and buses. 55 mph in those feels slower than 55 mph in my car because when I'm in a truck or a bus, I'm sitting 5 feet above the road.

Being able to see the front of the vehicle clearly also enables a better entry into the corners. Perspective and overall fov make a difference.

When you mentioned Jerk I remembered that one guy that always managed to quickly change someone's acceleration.

The sheer number of creators using clips of the RedBull F1 drone footage proves how incredible such footage is for the sport and how powerfully it conveys the sense of the cars' actual speed.

Great vid bro

Good one! Did my first ever kart session a few weeks ago, I was actually just 1sec/lap behind the fast guys, so thanks for all the tips man ;) Would love to see more videos about karting with strategies etc as it's something we could actually put in practice, with low vibrating footage if possible!

can you please make more carting content, cause f1 and other things sure are pretty exciting but karting is the only thing I can experience irl so its be great to maximise my experience

You have a very clear and easy to understand way of explaining complicated things, thank you for that.

Apart from all the reasons you mentioned, I think another reason is that unlike normal driving, you are now on a very small circuit, so it is action all off the time (any straight is a few seconds max) and unlike road driving you are driving on the limit of grip, which is much less predictable and harder to control once you loose grip, due to the lack of a differential and the very short wheel base. And yes it feels fast if you are on a busy track as you say. I think it is because of your low eye height, and now you can often see even less far ahead. In normal driving eye height makes a big difference in how far you can see in to corners. specially in the mountains.

this is why I drive "camera pod" POV instead of "cockpit" in F1 23. still learning. I'll get there.

Physically speaking velocity is a vector. As a matter of fact when a car is moving on a road to fully express velocity you specify speed and direction. Acceleration is the rate of velocity over time.

An interesting example of how a tight circuit gives out an impression of more speed happens to two races that often take place the same weekend; Monte Carlo and the Indianapolis 500. Despite the speeds at the Indy 500 being substantially higher than Monaco, Monaco gives out the impression of speed a lot more.

My first ride in a go-cart, was in a racing cart that a friend’s dad bought for $5k in ‘98. Scared the bejesus out of me…could do the tonne in only a few seconds. That was also my last ride in a go-kart…😂

I used to kart at the Milton Keynes Daytona track when they had the junior area years ago. Absolutely loved it.

I agree about our inability to not tell steady state. This includes acceleration. We are used to being accelerated at 1g every day all day by the force of gravity. If you get in a lift, you notice the initial change in acceleration, but then in settles down (maybe 1.1 g) and you stop noticing. Then you slow for your floor (.9g) and you notice it again. The really smooth lifts graduate the acceleration change so it’s barely noticeable. When I flew paragliders the down buzzer was more important than the going up beep. It was usually pretty easy to tell when you entered a thermal, but popping out the top when the acceleration change was lower was much harder to tell. This was when the buzzer was useful (and depressingly regular). I remember going to Milton Keynes a few years ago, a lot of fun.

Makes sense with perception. It's like it you put a camera up against the gate of a track, the cars go, vroom, but if you put the camera 15 rows back, the car goes, vrroooooooooommm. So with being farther away, it looks like it's going slower.

i would not have thought there are so many different perspectives on this perception

Wow, so detailed and meticulous. Thank you for another fantastic video! Keep it up!

it was driving Karts in Europe which led me to my Lotus Elise here in America. Closest thing outside a Seven, plus it has a roof!

tge fact that this channel has over 21 percent of it subscribed is already unreal jesus

Downhill skiing also give an off this phenomenon, but to an even further extent: 70-80mph, minimal protection and since you’re on your feet and not sitting acceleration and jerk are more pronounced. Not to mention you are more exposed to the environments then in a car or kart so the mind perceives each feeling as higher.

More competition around feels even faster 😜

The Shinkansen (Japanese Bullet Train) has such a smooth acceleration and braking that you almost don't feel it moving

Can't believe you talked about jerk without mentioning snap, crackle and pop.

I just stumbled on to your channel a couple of days ago, I'm now SUBSCRIBED!!!

This is why small light sports cars (the MX-5 being the prime example) seem fast and manic when you're driving them, compared to something like a diesel hatchback. The hatchback may as well be faster than the sports car, but you feel like going a million km per hour in it.

A relative had a '79 Southwind tunnel drag boat with a 454ci and open headers. It topped out at 70 but got there in 40 feet or so. The seats were at water level. You could reach out and touch the water. That boat made you feel like you were going at light speed. I knew another guy with the same boat but blown that did 128 mph in the quarter.

having ridden motorcycles for the past 12 years, i think the exposure or danger comes into it too while im sure that all other things being equal, things will feel faster the lower your eyes are to the ground, if you add a sports bike into the equation that gets similar increase in percieved speed to a kart while still having a fairly high eye level it probably comes into the harshness thing but another factor is how close to the limit of whatever vehicles capabilities you are in my car 80 vs 50 doesnt really feel any different other that how fast the scenary goes past the window, but the car will do 150 so its still barely stretching its legs at 80

I noticed a similar feeling in sailboats. When on the leeward side of a heavily heeled keelboat (i.e. on the side tilted down toward the water), it feels very fast, even when only going 10kts.

I do believe ribs can be broken! Once I did do a karting session on a on a fast but bumpy indoor track. I new one corner could be faster ao I asked the staff. It turned out it was possible to take the corner flat out "you just need to turn off the part of your brain telling you you will crash". Well I took that corner flat out twice. The next 3 weeks were sleepless as both sides had multiple extremely bruized ribs. My doctor was amazed this was acomplished without crashing.

At 4:37 I thought the horizontal line was being draw diagonally for a moment. I didn't even realize that my brain had already compensated for the slant of the horizon!

Just need to point this out. Both speed and acceleration are vector quantities, and both have magnitude and direction. Acceleration is the rate of change of direction and/or magnitude of the speed vector.

the same effect is at play when riding a motorcycle. If you place your upper body lower and offset from the centerline of the bike (as you must to lower the center of gravity and reduce your lean angle) your eyes are closer to the road and the perception of speed changes dramatically. In fact this is a big factor in "Lean angle fear" that riders experience....it is counter-intuitive but the right way to ride as it will increase the available grip for the same speed....

As hinted at here, speed is a number, fast is a feeling. The required rate of thought processing is a big factor too. . It depends on the class and track of course, but typically things "come at you faster" in karts. Some of that is down to how close you are to the ground, but it's mostly down to literally the rate that turns come at you due to scale. I've found most cars feel relatively sedentary unit you get to wings and slicks in single seaters. At that a shifter kart on a tight track or a street course is about as assaultive on your body as you can get until you spend BIG money running cars.

People think it's acceleration that race drivers love, but after a while you get used to it. It's the jerk that is the real joy. The initial turn-in, and then the switch at apex from brakes to throttle - that's the good stuff. Jerk junkies all of us!

Long term kart racer here (not hire karts), like any race vehicle when you get used to them they don't feel fast. These days I feel like they are slow, guess because I'm used to how they work, good kart control and used to the noise.

Before watching it, my guess is that the main factor is the stability and how reactive it the wheel. A tiny turn in the wheel causes an instant and abrupt change in direction in the cart, forcing the driver to be extremely delicate and focused on his movements, which doesn't happen in a car.

G Force, the closest we get to feeling velocity... one of the best feelings ever...

Interesting explanation about the feeling of speed while karting. It can also be a lot shorter and just as clear. 1) Speed ​​through the bends: A kart has a very low center of gravity and is therefore almost impossible to roll over in a bend. This allows a kart to go around a bend very quickly. Not necessarily in kilometers per hour, but because the bends of a karting track are much smaller than the bends of a normal circuit, you can get through the bend much faster. 2) The kart is open. Everything comes right past you very quickly. 3) A kart has no springs. When driving a kart, your entire body vibrates all the time. 4) You sit low to the ground, so the road surface seems to pass by much faster. 5) Everything goes much faster. Not in kilometers per hour, but in a more detailed way. The length of a kart circuit is much shorter than the length of a Formula One circuit. A lap on a karting track takes a lot shorter than a lap on a Formula One circuit. The number of turns per minute you drive through with a kart is higher than in a Formula One car on a Formula One circuit. As a result, you have to steer much faster in a kart and react much faster to everything. It can be done even faster than in a kart. In a Formula Student car you sit as far from the ground as in a kart. Only in a kart you sit almost upright and in a Formula Student car you lie down, just like in a Formula One car. This means your head is even closer to the ground. In addition, a Formula Student car has very large wings and much more downforce, which means it can corner even faster than a kart. Formula Student cars usually run on go-kart tracks or temporary tracks made of cones with approximately the same dimensions as a go-kart track.

01:30 PC/console gamers have known this for decades 🤷‍♂😅 bumper cam always felt WAY faster than driver cam. That FOV difference was crazy though, I never thought about that. So... tiny, low cars are safer at what the driver perceives as high speeds, because those high speeds are actually lower than what the driver in truck/SUV would perceive as mid speeds. Sounds reasonable enough to me :D Driving around on the winding country roads in my old 785 kg Daihatsu at well under the speed limit felt like driving the Monte Carlo Rally at times, zooming around those corners at twice the speed in an Audi just isn't the same...

100% ive been doing a arrive and drive kart program the last year and its a riot. I was 4 wide going down the front straight at my last race

6:40 correct speed is scalar, but if you include direction with it then you have velocity which is a vector. Therefore speed is just the magnitude of the velocity vector. Acceleration is also a vector, and is basically the rate of change of velocity, I.e. velocity can change its size, its direction, or both, and this is what we d3fine as acceleration.

4:05 In this specific example, the narrower field of the train's view makes the speed seem slower NOT because the field of view is narrower, but because that narrowing is achieved via zooming in (increasing the objective's focal distance), which has the direct optical effect of shortening all distances in front of you (e.g. if you zoom in 2x, all objects look as if they are 2x closer), which literally means that you are traversing shorter optical distances during the same time period, which directly translates into optically-lower speed. Had the author narrowed the field of view by simply blocking out the peripheral parts of the image, the train would feel just as fast as before.

It's why the Aerial Atom is the best thing I've ever driven (compared to the Gallardo and 458 Spyder)

You are so professional.

One thing i noticed immediately when i first went go karting is the wind noises, after that it's the vibration

Changes to the direction of velocity will present as lateral g-force and changes to the magnitude of velocity present as longitudinal g-force.

I raced karts at an event with Takuma Sato at Rye House. I pushed harder and more successfully than I ever had before. However, the next day....

6:59 The more accurate statement would be: accelerating at 10 miles per hour *per second* (I think Scott meant _moving_ at 10 mph to the East) But then we'd be talking velocity and not acceleration!

A quick correction: both velocity and acceleration are vectors. Change of a vector is also vector.

My main issue in gokarts was always staying in the seat, I've always been a feather weight and obviously very skinny, extremely so! That I had to really lean in to the corners just to keep my self in the seat at all, I could have had two of me in those seats! Such a shape KartKraft seemed to have died, what an amazing karting sim it was shaping up to be... Most exciting sim racing game in recent years imo!

Speed (velocity) is also a vector, just like acceleration, and forces.

6:35 acceleration is only a vector if the rate of change is of a vector as well.... i.e. velocity. So you might have said "speed" but if you mean velocity, that is DEFINITELY a vector quantity, and the as I said, the only way for acceleration to ALSO be a vector, is if its measuring the change of a vector "velocity". The rate of change of a scalar, is also a scalar... So you say at 9:14 that acceleration is the change in speed, however it is in fact the change in velocity, the vector

Love Daytona Milton Keynes. I’ve not been for years, I’ll have to make a trip over the summer :)

In some way, perhaps louder engine sounds also help racing fans feel the speed of the cars somehow. So, the people saying the v6 hybrid turbo killed the racing for them is because they have one less stimuli to feel the race car's speed as it goes past them. Not only do they sound amazing, it is felt too... So there you have it. Bring back the V-10s!!!

Love Daytona at MK. Done untold laps there lol. Certainly ached after the 24 hr we did last year !!

I have gone carting just twice and it was quite fun, despite the fact that the wheel to wheel action was pretty much non existent due to my superior speed (unlocked the more powerful kart on my first go, but even in the first one I was smashing others, probably due to better racing lines learned here) besides easy overtakes a couple times a lap. But to be fair, my perception of speed was far lower than I expected and I felt that both (14 and 17hp I think) karts were actually pretty slow.

The proximity to the scenery is why rallying feels so fast, even though you might hit all of 100mph on a really long flat-out bit and even modern WRC cars have a top speed of around 125mph.

"in your typical sedan or saloon" *shows a sports car* Lol

So to make an entertaining road car, triple the spring rate, stiffen every bushing, fit a racing seat as low as possible and rip out all of the sound deadening. I realize I've been doing these things for years, but it was always to make the car faster, not to make it more fun to drive. It really does work the other way as well. This also explains why when I get in an unmodified car I nearly fall asleep trying to drive the thing. Maybe the reason we have so many distracted and untalented drivers on the roads is that our cars have too many creature comforts and NVH control.

10:46 ROCK AND STONE!!!

the feeling gets amplified when you're using a 2-stroke kart rather than an electric one. will never forget how exhiliarating it was to feel that for the first time!

Love it!!!! BMP in Tampa if your in the area.. 🏁

You didnt mention the "wind" that you feel when you dont have protection. I have heard of wind simulators for sim racing that uses fans to blow air at you faster as you go faster in the game to help with the perception of speed

Because your senses, located in your head, are closer to the ground. So at a given speed, the relative motion of the road is greater. It's just trig. Imagine standing 2 meters away from a belt sander on its side, it's motion only takes up a few degrees of your vision. Now have it centimeters from your face, the same speed belt traverses your entire vision in milliseconds.

well i think "Aeroplane" is the most British thing i have heard this month so far ... or even this year ...... oh and by the way: very nice racing lines from you in the kart!

My friend and I use to drive back in the 1970's shifter karts on high bank 1/3 or 1/2 mile ovals. On a track like these in a shifter kart you really felt the speed especially when you crashed.

"How can you tell? My ass". I'm pretty sure every racecar driver has used that answer when asked questions about the sensation of speed and handling.

Just commenting to boost engagement along with my subscription

Surprised you didn ot mention wind resistance for the open kart, compared to a car. I feel like that made a huge difference to me as well.

So that's why I felt sick and sore after my first gokarting session...

For me why it feels fast is the same reason as riding a motorcycle, you feel the air rush and also the really unrefined feel

I don't have much experience with directly driving fast stuff but going downhill (crouched down for extra few km/h to get to 75-77 km/h - not long enough hills to get more =(( ) on a bit twisty road on bicycle definitely feels faster than being in plane on take off even if it moves 4-5 times faster at that moment.

Having survived to 74 years now, I'm amazed at karts lack of driver protection, no safety harness, roll bar or any other crash structure. Of course, without a safety structure, a harness would have not much to be attached to, the chassis I suppose. This goes back to early days of racing when the thinking was to be thrown clear of the car rather being in it when it crashed. At least they wear helmets in karting, but it doesn't protect you from a broken neck. Since the karts only go about 50 mph, you can be seriously injured at that speed. I know as I was seriously injured in a bicycle accident at an estimated 30 mph and I had gone over 50 mph before. I wonder how many kart racers injuries there are and how severe? Karting is for thrill seekers with no concept of mortality. Not me!

I drove a 2 stroke 30hp rotax max, feels like driving a rocketship the first time you drive that, couldn’t imagine what its like to drive an f1 car

can u explain tire physics like deformation slip angle friction delay etc. and how it translates into cars plsss

Velocity is a vector. Velocity has a speed and a direction. You've confused velocity and acceleration. Acceleration is a ². You can have an initial velocity of 30m/s, and then have an acceleration of 2m/s². Every second you travel, you're increasing your velocity by 2m/s. You don't need a direction for acceleration.

didnt expect a physics class at 6:54

Can confirm. Owning a road legal "kart" from Hethel, I´ve never, not once, gotten out of it and not smiled like a mad man. Never driven a real go-kart...guess I really should?

rental carts have just enough power to give you that feeling of speed but if you have ever driven a racing cart thats completely different. like there are rentals that have 6hp or some with 16 (at least I think thets the ones on my local track) and the are 4 strokes so not to loud but the 27hp 2stroke of a raceingcart is overwhelming. I have driven the cart of my parents once last autum and I will go carting next weekend but i never even pressed the pedal halfway and thought my neck breaks. (also in autum when I drove it was with 8 jear old tires (because I repaired it with my father and it sdoot on the attic for 8 jears) so you spun really fast but it kinda helped me drive more carefull in the beginning)

I run a Briggs LO206 on my Ignite chassis. It’s only 9HP but it’s definitely enough to crack some ribs. I’ve been there done that. Months to recover.