Young karting phenomenon Luca Kane Houghton is seeking to bring glory to Bahrain at the FIA Karting Academy Trophy championship which gets underway in Genk, Belgium, today.
Luca, who was born in the kingdom to a Dutch mother and an Australian father, will be among 54 contestants – all aged between 12 and 14 – from around the world taking part in an event that was first held in 2010. Current F1 drivers Charles Leclerc, George Russell and Esteban Ocon are listed on the roster of past participants, with Leclerc having won the trophy in 2011
The championship’s qualifying round takes place today, with the heats scheduled for tomorrow and the pre-final and final on Sunday.
“I hope to represent Bahrain on the top podium,” the articulate 13-year-old told the GDN on the phone from Genk, just before he headed off to an FIA briefing. “I feel lucky to be able to represent Bahrain and I am confident that I will do well. We had our practice sessions today and I did okay, considering all the karts had brand new engines.”
All the drivers went through the first practice session slowly, Luca explained.
“We drove in the engines and, then, in the second session, I picked up the pace and got up to P8,” he added. “In the third session, I went even faster and finished at P7.”
And, although he is confident of acing this race just as he has the many others he has already won in his short career so far, Luca acknowledged that ending up on the winner’s podium was going to be a tough ask.
“I know that it’s a very competitive field,” he said, with a surprising maturity for one so young. “But, if I am lucky and can maintain a good speed, I know I could possibly win this championship for Bahrain.”
Luca’s mother Cindy Kramer, who, herself, grew up in Bahrain in the late eighties while her father worked in the kingdom, was also on the call, having arrived in Genk just a few hours earlier.
“Luca thinks of himself as a Bahraini,” she explained. “So he’s very keen to give something back to the country he loves so much.”
Kramer, who works for a private airline, and husband, Kane, an executive chef, had been dividing chaperoning duties for their only son since he first took to kart racing at the age of eight. But, after having taken turns escorting him to various events – which he has invariably won – around the region and other continents, he now travels with Bahraini coach Rashed Almamari, himself a leading young karting motorsport driver.
“Luca is also older now and Rashed is very good with him,” Kramer said. “It’s different now from when he started out so young, just about five years ago. That’s why they arrived here earlier to acclimatise and I just flew in this afternoon.”
Five years earlier, Luca had seen a friend take up karting and made a proposition to his father.
“I went to Dad and told him that I was eight,” Luca said. “And that Lewis Hamilton was the same age when he started karting. So could I give it a try?”
The elder Houghton agreed and took his son to a karting track.
“I started in a rental kart,” Luca explained. “But, less than a year later, when I had just turned nine, my parents decided I had become good enough so they got me my own kart.”
Soon, he was racing competitively. In his very first race, Luca placed third and took the runners-up spot in the competition that followed. Before long, he was standing on the victory podium, in just his third race.
“That was in 2018,” Luca remembered. “After that, I started to get really good so my parents asked coach Rashed to come on board.”
The young driver progressed rapidly thereafter, impressing his coach and parents in his first race in Abu Dhabi. Then, in his first full season in the 2018-19 IAME series in the UAE, Luca won the X30 Mini class for competitors aged eight to 12 years old.
More success followed. Luca won the Micro Max class in the Bahrain Rotax Max Challenge (BRMC) in the same season, before going on to represent Bahrain in the Rotax Max Challenge Grand Finals in Italy.
“I continued to compete over the next season,” Luca said. “But then, Covid-19 picked up and there wasn’t much anyone could do about it for the next year or so. But, then, last summer, I went to Holland, then basically around the whole of Europe, competing in various events. I actually won one of the races, right here in Genk.”
He hoped, Luca added, that his knowledge of the track would give him some advantage over his competitors over the course of the next three days.
“But,” he stressed. “Everyone is here to win. So it’s not going to be easy. I’ll still give it my best shot.”
His mother spoke then, her voice brimming with pride.
“Luca always gives everything his best shot,” she said. “He doesn’t know how to give up. When he was nine, he was diagnosed with Perthes disease – it’s a rare condition in the hip. He has since been cured but, right after his diagnosis, we found out that the late racing legend, Bruce McLaren was also diagnosed with the same disease when he was the same age. That made Luca push himself even harder in the sport.”
Now, as Luca prepares to participate in what could be a life-changing championship for him, he is very clear about how he wants his future to pan out.
“I want to win this competition for Bahrain,” he declared. “And, eventually, some years down the line, I want to represent Bahrain in the F1 championship!”