K1 Speed - Indoor Go Karts, Corporate Event Venue, Team Building Activities — Attraction in Sterling

I debated between a 3-star and 2-star, but I have to go with 2. K1 recently took over Autobahn, and with their numerous US locations, kart maintenance was still poor. First, they charge a 3.5% credit card processing fee, which is excessive given they have locations all across the US. There's an annual license you can get, but the details are vague and it only provides a $10 shop card and merch, which they didn’t have.

Before my group even had a chance to race, the race before us had a 15-minute delay mid-race so the staff could swap out numerous karts. We sat down for our first race and then had to get up to let another race go before us... no big deal, just disorganized.

All of our 5 races were a letdown between kart quality and the race speed. All our karts were throttled, so we couldn't actually have fun racing (I don't know if they reserve maximum performace to league races), but I know they were throttled because for the last 5 laps of one of our races they did bump our power up and the extra power was substantial. The kart quality was mediocre at best. The steering wheels on some of the karts were loose. The brakes were either overly sensitive to the point you're penalized for using them - they'll basically stop the kart with minimal pressure and then there's like a 3-second delay until you can give throttle again. Or they're nonexistent - you can push it all the way to the floor and nothing happens (I ended up crashing out my friend because I had zero brakes). Coming out of the pit, the entire front end of a couple of my karts was shaking violently to the point I stopped before exiting to mention it to the staff.

That said, the staff is what made the 2-stars, they were doing their best with the hand they were dealt, and they appeared fatigued. They were on top of monitoring the race, making sure to wave the passing flags, and the reason the karts were swapped was because they were paying attention to the race and the difference in kart performance to make sure everybody had a good and fair race.

I really wanted to enjoy it and have a new place to go for a hobby, but it felt overpriced with the added credit card fee and the poor kart quality. I can’t justify gambling ~$70 on three races when awful karts could...

Okay, so, I really don't like to complain. But this was kind of a nightmare. I made a 3:30 reservation for four people, one race and 1.5 hours of axe throwing, as a gift for a friend's birthday. So, $263.09 with all of the licenses and fees for four people. When we tried to be early and showed up at 3, we stood in line until 3:30, because it apparently takes a very long time to check five frat bros in. Then we were sent to throw axes. You would think paying for 1.5 hours of axe throwing would mean you are throwing axes for an hour and a half. Nope. Apparently it means you split your hour and a half with 11 other people because a bridal party gets to take up half of the lanes. So, all told, you get about 10 minutes of axe throwing. After about 40 minutes (we threw once, and were waiting for our turn to come around again), people started lining up for the next slot of throwing. Granted, the employee helping us was a very nice kid. But it definitely felt like a waste of money.

So, five o'clock rolls around and we're still just standing around, waiting to race. We check with the front desk and our race is apparently scheduled for 6:00. Yep. SIX pm for a 3:30 reservation. So we left to get food, after asking the employees if it was okay (I had to cancel our actual dinner reservation since we were apparently going to be spending the entire day at the track). We come back at 5:50, and now our race is scheduled to happen at 6:40. We ended up on the track at 7, done at 7:20. That's insane, y'all. It was a 3:30 reservation. Why did I go through the trouble of making a reservation and having everyone fill out the forms in advance? Was the race fun? Sure. Was it worth waiting four hours for and messing up the plans for the rest of the evening? Absolutely not. Was it worth $260? NOOOOOOOOOOOO. I get that the track was busy. But that's LITERALLY why you make a reservation in advance. If you reserved a table at a restaurant, but were made to wait 4 hours to eat dinner, wouldn't you just leave and go somewhere else? Yeah, except, you can't do that at the Autobahn because you've already paid in advance. Incredibly...

Horrible. Not kids friendly and ableism!

Haven’t seen a place where they give priority for adults over special need kids, i had a reservation on July 15 at 6:30pm for two of my kids to go 3 rounds (races) my daughter is an adult and my son is a special needs kid. My daughter finished all her rounds and my special needs kid had to wait for TWO HOURS to get his last turn.

The person in charge at the front desk kept saying that my special needs kid will go on the next ride for about TWO HOURS until he finally called my special needs kid to go on his last round. When he sat down at the go-cart and was ready to play his last round, the person in charge called him out AGAIN saying that my special needs kid has to wait until they let the birthday party on the race first (the birthday party was a group of adults).

Unfortunately this was a very poor experience for my kids, my special needs kid was very disturbed when i pulled him out of the go-cart, when i complained to the people working at the front desk they literally told me “sorry we can’t help you”, all what i was asking for is for my special needs kid to go on his last round (race) after waiting for TWO HOURS.

I was very thrown away when one of the people in charge was very uncooperative by telling me he wont be able to let my special needs kid go on his last round because he cant let his party wait for 5 minutes while i have been waiting for TWO HOURS. I asked them to speak to the manager and they told me the manager was not on premises, then i asked them to refund me for the round that my special needs kid did not end up taking and they told me they wont be able to help me and that i have to send the management an email. I left my number and i was expecting someone to call me and apologize for this incident but unfortunately no one did.

Very bad experience and very inconsiderate staff. This whole outing was to celebrate my special needs kid birthday but unfortunately no one gave him the attention he was suppose to get. Not recommended at all.

I hope management sees this and respond to my complain. This is my reservation number:...