Just as planned I hit the track at Barbagallo Raceway today.
It was undeniably a very cold and extremely windy day, so much so that when I arrived at the track it was just me and one other car in the pits. Got myself setup very quickly and despite having my stuff blown all over the place I jumped in the car and onto the track.
On my 1st of four stints at 9am and with ambient temps of just 12C, I comfortably slashed my previous best lap record (of 1'08"77) in 3 consecutive laps but with laptimes still remaining above the 1'08s I wasn't quite there yet. Great but where is that elusive 1'07 I said ?? Well I didn't have to wait long ! Being the only car on the track at the time on lap 8 I recorded my
new personal best of
1'07''78 !! Followed by an equally impressive lap 10 but just 4/100s slower though. (The difference came down to later (and harder) braking into the last corner on lap 8)
I pushed very hard today and I was on the verge of drifting but I had nothing in my way except the wind so I pushed like there was no tomorrow. I felt the wheels sliding sideways around the 1st corner, the long uphill lefthander and the last corner, tyres squeeling and understeering to the point where I knew I was on the edge! Either I hit the wall or I record my best lap ! Best lap it was !
Here are the times from the stint :
It was very difficult to get the tyres up to their optimum temperatures today. My ideal tyre pressure is usually 200kPa for the front tyres but for some reason today I couldn't reach that and the most I got was 190kPa. I upped the air pressure after returning to the pits but still couldn't get to the ideal level. Tyre temps were much lower also and quickly dropping.
In the remaining 3 short stints I consistenly recorded 1'08s but couldn't get into the 1'07s again. Around 10am the track saw a lot of cars ranging from a few 911s, a couple of Holdens, a Civic and a few open wheelers and the track became dirty. I was done !
Here is what my YH semi-slicks look like now.
The picture shows my front left. I now have slicks :)
Not to worry. I have a pending shipment coming in from Japan with brand new YH A050s (M compound) at a fraction of the cost but I won't see them till maybe end of July beginning of August.
I ended the day by lending my Performance Box to a friend of mine who eventually recorded a very respectable lap time in his Civic and ended his stint in a spectacular fashion drifting his way out of the last corner..Was fun to watch !
So, I'll post a video of this new insanely quick lap in the days to come.
Till then !
- Rod
