Garrett Manes celebrates after claiming victory in the 2025 K1 Speed E-World Championships go-kart race.
The green flag drops at the K1 Speed Virginia State Championship in Sterling at 8 a.m. Feb. 1. The 2025 Adult E-World Champion, Garrett Manes of Powhatan, is looking to mount the podium for a third consecutive year as he sets out to defend his title, which last year netted him both the trophy and a $25,000 prize — all for racing go-karts.
Manes faces a host of competitors old and new on the quarter-mile track. “Even as the defending champion, there’s much more pressure on me going into this race, because I know who’s coming from Richmond is good,” he says. “I know who I raced last year in Dulles is coming back, and they’re good as well. It’s definitely one of the hardest states to make it out to nationals because of how much competition [there is].”
Manes, 24, grew up in Powhatan and says he’s “pretty much lived within the same five-minute radius” his whole life. His father, Jason, raced go-karts on the national circuit for 23 years, and Manes started driving as a preteen.
He competed in Arena Racing USA at the Richmond Coliseum, piloting half-sized NASCAR-style stock cars around a banked indoor track at speeds up to 50 mph. His first three seasons in the vehicles, Garrett took home consecutive youth championships with Team SweetFrog.
Then, Manes moved on to racing Legends — scale replicas of 1930s and ’40s cars with motorcycle engines — and late models, which are a type of stock car raced on short tracks. He has driven at Dominion Raceway in Spotsylvania, Virginia International Raceway in Alton and Charlotte Motor Speedway.
In addition, Manes is a professional simulation (virtual) racer and coach with more than 2,750 wins to his credit. He says iRacing helps bridge sponsorship gaps while honing his road-course skills. He has logged countless hours and laps learning as many different tracks, racing disciplines, situations, techniques and even specific corners as possible.
“For three or four years, I was the No. 1 ranked driver on iRacing overall, because I did all of it,” he says. “I feel like that’s given me a lot to lean on. … That track time costs nothing. That allowed me to adapt very quickly in real life.”
Manes (center) at the top of the podium in 2025
The K1 Speed championship wasn’t Manes’ only title in 2025. He works for the Richmond-based Sim Seats, which makes racing simulators for drivers and enthusiasts. Company owner, Richmond local and Virginia Commonwealth University alum Zach McAfee bought a Spec E30 (a type of BMW used for road racing) and held a track day; Manes laid down the car’s fastest-ever lap at VIR.
McAfee gave him a deal on the car, and, with support from longtime sponsor Wigen Water Technologies, Manes won back-to-back events the first weekend he raced it. Manes took home the National Auto Sport Association Mid-Atlantic Spec E30 title in October and was named the series’ rookie of the year.
That success has led to more opportunities. This year, Manes will be competing in the Toyota Gazoo Racing North America GR Cup on a part-time basis; the single-make race series began in 2023 and features the Toyota GR86 sports car. Manes will be piloting an entry for RVA Graphics Motorsports by Speed Syndicate, once again backed by Wigen Water.
And then there’s karting.
Manes started racing go-karts with his brother Tyler for fun in 2012, but he didn’t join the competition at K1 until the 2023-24 season. He won the state championship and finished fourth in the national competition at K1 Circuit’s mile-long outdoor track in Winchester, California, about 90 minutes east of Los Angeles.
“I was like, ‘I think I can do it. Like, I genuinely think I got a shot at this,’” Manes says. “Ran it back in 2025, still just doing it for fun, but with the knowledge of, ‘If I make it back, I think I can win the title.’”
Last year Manes took second in Virginia, earning another trip to the U.S. championship. Placing second in the national event qualified him for the same-day world championship race, which pitted him against 11 drivers from the U.S., Puerto Rico, Canada and Mexico.
Manes’ experience racing cars might have been key to his win. Between practice rounds and the national event, he only had an hour or so of track time on the circuit before the world championship. Along with being significantly faster than indoor karts, he says, K1’s outdoor karts “have four-wheel brakes. They drive much more like a car than a normal kart, so there are a lot of braking techniques that resemble car racing and not karting.”
Manes battled into the lead halfway through the race and held it for four laps to win. The second-place finisher, the new U.S. champ from Phoenix, was just 1.110 seconds behind.
“I just felt, going in, that there wasn’t a lot of pressure on me,” Manes continues. “It was fun. I was like, ‘We’re going to go out there, I feel like I have a pretty good gauge of it, and I’m not going to stress it. I’m not going to overthink this … [just] see what I can do.’ We had a pretty good showing in the practices that really allowed me to sleep well and show up on race day. So, I had a good shot.”
Update: Racing against drivers from Manassas, Richmond and Dulles, Garrett Manes won the 2026 Virginia State Championship on Feb. 1, 2026, at K1 Speed Dulles. He is eligible to defend his world title at the K1 Speed E-World Championship competition on May 3 in Winchester, California.
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