Eric W Clements wrote:
> Yes they were fun... but the number of DNF's would indicate that the
> courses could have been fine tuned to cut down on the amount of
> "potential gates" visible to you as you looked ahead.
I'll agree with this. Both courses were intensely fun. But Bob
Barone's A course had way too many cones, and way too many features
that looked way too similar. And given that, it was simply way too
long, and had a starting interval of roughly 45 seconds. It needed
some variety.
It also wasn't a Solo II course. Of the 65 seconds I spent out there,
I wouldn't be at all surprised if 40 seconds of it was flat out in
4th gear. I am not exaggerating. Top speeds were reasonable -- I was
probably in the low 70's -- but I was there for most of the course.
Paul Zahornasky's B course was a bit more like a Solo II course. It
had the typical runway course problem that there were only two turns
in it that actually mattered, and it was fun braking down from 70+ mph
into a 180. But the transition-intensive, pylon-intensive nature of
the course, coupled with a high tippy econobox on sticky rubber with an
inexperienced driver, was a textbook example of "rollover-prone". The
top speed of the course was similar to the A course, but we didn't
spend nearly as much time up there.
Randy Chase followed up:
> The course must have been tough for drivers that were sitting really
> low. F125 Jr seemed to have a lot of DNFs.
The A course had a fast flatout-in-4th (for me) sweeper from one
runway onto the next, about a 90-degree turn. The grass was so tall
that when it was time to turn in, you couldn't see the exit, so it was
a matter of faith. Yes, sitting low was tough on these courses.
There were a lot of good drivers who DNF'ed on both courses, even on
2nd and 3rd runs. On the A course, it was often because it was so
visually confusing, especially at that speed. On the B course, it was
usually because drivers were just going too fast and gave up rather
than trying to make the gate.
Mark
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