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28th April -Castle Combe Test: |
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We had a very early start to get to Castle Combe for noise testing - It was an ominous start to the day in that it was wet, windy, and raining pretty much the whole way up and I had no idea what noise level the Tuscan was putting out at the moment. As it was a pre race testing the noise level was 108db which was great as the Tuscan came in at 104.7 db, so no problems there. And an awesome day lay ahead. There were a number of 'firsts' achieved at Castle Combe. First time out on this circuit, first time out in the rain, first time on wets, and first spin in the race car!
I took the first session very gingerly in
order to learn the circuit and the best line to take and also get used to
the fact that the car was sliding all over the place. Even after coming
through Camp Corner onto the Paddock straight it was nigh on impossible to
put the right foot down as the back wheels just had no grip in the wet and
the back end was moving all over the place. On my 15th lap as I was trying
to put more and more speed on, I got it slightly wrong coming out of The
Esses. A combination of a little too much lock and putting the right foot
down a little too early suddenly meant that I could see Castle Combe from
a whole new perspective - Backwards! During my second session I began to get used to the track which was also beginning to dry a little and without any further 'moments' managed to better the fastest time to 1·19"19 secs. By the end of this session I could feel that the tyres were beginning to melt and we were losing grip, after a consultation with Andy (race engineer) we decided that it was time to put the slicks on. What an amazing difference the slicks made - It just felt like a totally different car. There's no doubt the Race Tuscan was built to perform on slick tyres. Even during the first six laps, just to break the tyres in we immediately took a further 3 seconds off the lap time. Despite the fact the track was still a little damp, the grip just felt incredible and gave me the confidence to keep going faster and faster. In the end we managed a fastest lap time of 1·13"84 secs, some 15 seconds faster than our first one. Today was a fantastic learning experience and I feel like I'm now controlling the car rather than the other way around. |
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