In preparation for this Thursday's racing I thought I'd share some more in-depth analysis on the track.
No this isn't a boring graph, though graphs can be very interesting you know.
Anyway, I took what I reckon is a reasonable TC500 candidate, ditched it, and moved to this beauty:
Yes, it's front wheel drive. But it is compliant, this season we allow 2 door FWD cars.
So this bad boy is 500pp and frankly a bit mad (
as Clarkson will testify).
And so here it is, a replay of that car doing a hot lap. If I recall it was around 1:18, so not shabby by any stretch. Note the corners are called in the video, this is for a virtual walk around.
Almost corner by corner:
Turn 1. Don't overshoot the lead into this corner. It's far better to go in slow and tight than fast and wide as over shooting here can really slow the resulting down hill dash. Also, it's possible to cut the left hand jink on the way out a fair bit (as I did) - it's rare to get that so out it's a cut penalty.
Turn 2. Quicker than it may look. A higher gear than suggested (normally 2nd is suggested) and low revs will take you through this corner well. It has a wide exit, but it's hard to make use of it as often the entry is too fast as a result of the downhill dash over accelerating the car and going wide.
Turn 3. All about flat out. If you're having to let off here your car is badly set up.
Turn 4 - S Bends. This is the make or break on this track. It's possible to carry a lot of speed through this, but only 1 in 5 times seems to work, the others result in being spat off on the exit of the first left hander (over crest).
Safe racing has a gear dropped going into the initial right hander, and then accelerate through the left. Even then, as it's an over crest bend cars can easily go wide.
Best tactic to practice is not taking the initial right jink too tight, don't over throttle it and try and keep the car neutral and don't throw it into the right or left hand bend. With luck you'll get high speed through this set - gaining an easy 2 seconds on the lap as a result! The remainder of the set can be taken flat so long as you've not stuffed the initial left hand over crest.
Turn 5. This can be entered flat and speed carried through a good half of the straight. However, if you're at all out of shape from the previous bend it'll end badly.
Also, as you go exit the initial right hand bend now is the time to get the car straight and drop a couple of gears. Get it right and the car will start to step out a bit, setting you up for the next up hill right hander. Going into the uphill bend you need to be scrubbing a fair bit of speed off, a good line seems to see the car tight to the track on the left and cut across tight to the right ready for the final set.
Turn 6 - Final set. There are two clear lines on this set. Taking a wider line on the initial left hander will set you up for a better line onto the start/finish straight and that can really help, or a tight line in is I think quicker around the initial bend, and guards against diving down the inside. Not sure what the quicker line is, but I do prefer the inside line in racing as it's safer to drift wide. In the video you'll see I take this line but have to reset the car before the final bend, this costs me time for sure.
Of course every car is different, and this car is most different of all (one reason I used it). Also, driving styles will predict some of the lines we take. Hope it was helpful and gets us ready to race in a few short hours!
Race on.
