That much was proved by the 15-year-old achieving a first and second place finish in two of his three heats on the Saturday, helping to negate the effects of a start-line mêlée in the other one that left him stranded right down at the rear of the pack having had to lift another kart off the top of his own. Those results placed him fourth on the grid for the first of the weekend's two finals, on the wrong side of the grid but raring to get out there again and show what might have been.
“Following the two good heats I had my confidence was sky-high,” Max asserted. “I knew I could do it and that we had the pace; it was simply a matter of staying calm and composed. The start is always the toughest part, and because the track there is quite slippery it's very easy to make mistakes.
“Starting on the outside line is a big disadvantage at Genk. You go down the straight then there's a little kink before it tightens up around the right-hander. Because the track is so wide there people tend to slide outwards under braking, so if you are starting on the outside you are generally going to lose a few places. You have to try to minimise the number of people getting past whilst at the same time being sure not to make any silly errors.
“After that the difficult thing is to be able to bang in lap times within about a tenth or half a tenth of a second of each other every time. If you can find that consistency you will always be in with a shout.”
Indeed, the Barnet ace was more than in with a shout in the twelve-lap encounter, storming through to win commandingly by more than two seconds from closest challenger Kalvin Quinn and setting the fastest lap along the way for good measure, one of only two drivers to dip below the 59 seconds barrier race-long.
Sunday's final would witness a similar result, as Max converted sixth place on the grid into victory, despite a couple of indifferent heats in which he had finished a comparatively lowly ninth following an opening heat penalty that saw him docked three positions and points placed on his licence.
![(L-R) Gemma Stephenson, Max Hawkins and Tom Ingram on the BRDC Stars of Tomorrow Junior Max podium at Genk in 2007 [pic credit: TSR Productions]](http://pix.crash.net/thumbs/360369.jpg)
