SL Kart Sport Organization (SLO) was founded by Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd. and Japan Kart Land Association in 2006. The precursor of SLO, SL Kart Club (SLKC) was founded by Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd. in 1974 and is the largest kart club in Japan. “SL” stands for “Sports and Leisure”. As its name suggests we hope people to have an easy and fun feeling about kart racing. Our aim is to organize fair, safe and affordable kart races by using one-make-based kart machines.

The top rankers of all the local SL kart race series aim to make the special event, the national SL kart race championship, truly to decide the Japan’s number one SL kart driver. The event has been held since 1977 and the names of Formula 1 drivers and many of the top drivers in the national and international race categories can be found in its winners list. This fact is a testimony to the SL kart races’ important role as a car racing initiator of which roles include teaching sporting regulations and race track manners, as well as being the first step in karting.

Setting the sporting regulations is not the only service of SLO, issuing and administrating the SL membership cards, fostering the young kart drivers, developing and promoting karting, educating the sport instructors and arranging tie-up with other kart races in the Asian countries are also our tasks. SLO always aspires to a better environment for kart racing.

SLO PRINCIPLE

  1. Promote the fun of karting and racing to wide range of people.
  2. Foster junior drivers by karting.
  3. Provide exchanges with Asian countries through karting.
  4. Karting is the starting point of motor sport that establishes motor sport culture.

GREETING FROM REPRESENTATIVE

SL Kart Sport Organization (SLO) was founded in order to promote and develop karting. Our precursor, SL Kart Club, was established back in 1977 and we inherit their spirit which is to make karting an accessible sport for everybody and to organize fair, safe and affordable kart races.To enable these tasks we basically run one-make-races using the Yamaha engines. It can be said that this is a huge attraction for all ranges of competitors, from junior to adult classes, to be able to race with the same engine just by controlling its inlet system.

To aim for fairer and safer kart races, we draw up the SL race regulations. For this purpose, we organize the SL license seminars. Only those who learnt the race regulations and racing track manners are allowed to participate in the SL race events. By fully understanding the risks of motor sport can one care for safety and its importance. We will be able to provide a better karting environment by developing both hardware and software sides as such. We hope the SL races to be used for fostering young kart drivers especially. Through experiencing the importance of rule observation, serious competition, bonding with friends and so on. We believe karting can help them flourish.

Recently, we have seen more drivers from other Asian regions in Japanese race events and more Japanese drivers in vice versa cases. Exchanging between foreigners should give chances to realize importance of communication skills and knowing different languages, which we hope will be able to contribute to their development.

We would like as many people as possible to come to know about this splendid sport.

Takahiro NATSUGARI
President of SL Kart Sport Organization