Ready to race - on life's course

MANILA, Philippines - One could easily mistake spunky 15- year-old Rafael “Roby” Benito and 16-year-old Jose Antonio “Juha” Turalba of the Ready2Race (R2R) team as teenage brats in a classy private school. However, these champion karters’ achievements go beyond the confines of the race track.

Roby’s romance with motorsports started with collecting toy cars when he was three, which eventually developed into his love for race car video games. Seeing his child’s interest in cars, Roby’s father Ramon “Chito” Benito – himself a karting enthusiast and team manager of R2R – enrolled Roby in the TRS karting clinic at the Manila Speedzone. Roby liked it and continued karting, winning races during his first year in the sport.

“I like the fast feeling and overtaking people on tracks. In other sports, you only beat one person or you have to work as a team to beat other teams. In karting, you beat a lot of persons and a lot of teams!” says Roby.

On the other hand, Juha’s love for racing started with his fascination for machines and moving parts, and took off when he won the Arthur Tuason Memorial Cup at the Manila Speedzone karting track in Fort Bonifacio at age of eight.

Juha, a 10th grader at International School Manila, says he’s into racing because “I enjoy the thrill of racing and competition. I love speed and the thrill of victory.”

Karting at a young age is no walk in the park. While other kids wake up late and chill out in malls during the weekend, Roby and Juha usually spend Saturdays practicing at the tracks as early as 8 a.m. They also have to build up their strength and endurance through regular workouts at the gym and by getting involved in other sports.

Juha plays soccer and badminton, runs and recently took up biking, while Roby plays basketball and badminton, runs and lifts weights to keep in shape.

But like regular teenagers, they still manage to find time to hang out with friends at Greenbelt and Rockwell malls and get involved with their hobbies. Roby plays modern and classical pieces on the piano. Juha flies RC choppers and planes, reads manuals and occasionally hies off to the beach.

A great challenge for these young men is balancing their karting careers with academics. For example, during the Asian Karting Open Champion held in Macau last October 10-11, Roby missed a week of class at De La Salle Zobel where he is an honor student.

Nevertheless, he was able to catch up with the lessons he missed once he got back.

Chito says R2R parents make a deal with the karters: “Maintain your grades or you are out of the race,” and Roby sees to it he keeps his side of the bargain.

It also helps that the values of discipline, hard work, humility, responsibility, patience and critical thinking which the boys learn from karting can also be applied in real life.

“In karting, you can’t easily give up. You have to analyze why you lost in order to win the next race. You have to know what’s wrong with your kart because you need to explain to the mechanic so it can be fixed,” shares Roby. Because of this, he observes that he is more patient, disciplined, and hardworking in school.

Juha’s father, Architect Toti Turalba, points out that “a karter must have a high degree of intelligence, determination and courage to accept failure. He must love the sport and must not fear defeat.”

To this, Roby adds, “Racing requires the drivers to think fast and make quick decisions without being reckless.”

Toti says that he realized Juha’s determination and passion for the sport when he was injured at the age of 10: he broke his collar bone when his kart flipped. He felt very bad, not because of his injury, but because he might miss his race. He was very diligent in doing therapy for his injury. A couple of days before the next race, they visited the doctor to ask if he could go back and race. His doctor asked him, “In a scale of 1 to 10, how important is this race?”

Juha replied, “11.” He raced and won.

Hardwork pays off

For all the sacrifices Roby and Juha have to make for the love of karting, their hard work and dedication pays off with their impressive karting achievements.

Roby ranked second out of 24 karters during the Macau leg of Asian Karting Open Champion held last October. He is the champion of the Kart Formula 3 (KF3) class – for junior karters aged 13-16 – of the 2009 Pagcor KF2-KF3 Series.

He was second runner up in the ROK Jr. Class 2008 of the AKOC, a karting series held in four Southeast Asian countries organized by Johnny Tan.

He was also first runner up in the ROK Jr. Class 2007 and 2008 Shell Karting Series, and the back-to-back champion of the Expert Class in the 2006 and 2007 Arthur Tuason Memorial Cup.

Juha’s achievements in racing are equally praiseworthy. He finished sixth out of 34 karters in the Dellorto Cup of the 2009 ROK World Cup Finals in Italy last October. He is this year’s winner of the 3rd Round of the AKOC which was held in Indonesia recently. Last year, he was the 2008 AKOC ROK champion and was the recipient of the 2008 Golden Wheel International Driver of the Year award. The last award mentioned is like our local version of the Laureus awards in sports, although it is confined only to motorsports.

Juha has been participating annually in the World ROK Cup Finals in Lonato, Italy since 2006, and was a participant of the AKOC championship in Macau, Indonesia and Thailand since 2005. He has also been participating in the Shell Super Karting Series every year since 2004.

One of Juha’s most memorable racing events would be the 2007 ROK World Cup Finals where he met Formula One great Michael Schumacher.

Juha’s and Roby’s track records in the local and international karting scene are no small feat. With all their awards, what would they consider their greatest achievement?

“At first you’d think it’s the awards that are my greatest achievements. Maybe at the moment you receive the awards, you think you’re on top of the world. But later on, I realized it’s the values I learned in karting that can be considered as my greatest achievement,” says Roby.

Chito affirms this by saying “I want to see how my kid will fare in life: how he would turn negative to positive. Being a critical thinker will not stop in karting alone but will be useful in real life. Success is not just about the awards.”

Toti adds: “Winning is not everything, but the experiences we share are priceless. To see your child beam with pride when he wins is something all parents wish for their children. On the other hand, the acceptance of defeat builds character.”

For Roby and Juha, success is not just about reaching the finish line but learning the lessons essential in winning in the real course of life.