On the way to the track, in "auto" mode, (first time I have driven it in Auto mode!), all switches set at "N", driven like an E class, very comfortable, noise very decent, gas mileage brilliant at 9 l/100 km or 30+ mpg!
At the track, as I suspected, no better mpg than any other high power cars when using all the power - got 50+ l/100km or 5-6 mpg. Ran out of gas in about 25 laps!.
TRACK:
Very fast! terminal velocity on the straights highest of any car I have taken there. (Tied with the ZR1). Brakes (steel) took a while to bed-in, but overall very good. Front end bite, better than all the European cars with skinny front tires (235's) that I have taken there. Traction mid-corner and acceleration out of corners very good. Brake steer quite useful to rotate the car and reduce understeer, but feels somewhat un-natural and intrusive.
The track I was at is relatively tight, with short straights and tight corners. It is apparently quite bumpy ( although I never noticed this before to the same extent).
Set to Sport setting for suspension, the car handled the corners pretty well, but traction control was pretty intrusive. Set to Race setting, the car bounced around a lot - very choppy, jiggly - made it very difficult to be smooth and carry a rythm through the corners. Quite twitchy. Felt artificial. Never got fully comfortable with it, before running out of gas (and scuffing the front tires pretty badly).
So in conclusion, the car is clearly capable of being very fast. Like driving a high power Porsche, getting good at driving this well, will take time and commitment (and lots of tires). I can see why certain reviewers had mixed feelings about the car on the track.
And by the way, it seems that the gang in Wokking had a bad day when they put my car together, because there is something loose inside my dash that keeps (very noticeably) rolling side to side in all the corners, and something very creaky in my rear driver side suspension - neither is confidence inspiring when driving at 98%!
By the way, as a heads-up to other that may want to adjust tire pressure at the track, I decided to drop my pressures between laps. The computer did not like it - it set a code, and prevented me from going above 4500 rpm. Had to go back to the pits, pump up the one tire that IT thought was too low, and eventually, it allowed me to access the full rpm range again! It appears that it wants to maintain a 3 psi spread between rears and fronts, and that the balance accross any axle be within certain ranges.
At the track, as I suspected, no better mpg than any other high power cars when using all the power - got 50+ l/100km or 5-6 mpg. Ran out of gas in about 25 laps!.
TRACK:
Very fast! terminal velocity on the straights highest of any car I have taken there. (Tied with the ZR1). Brakes (steel) took a while to bed-in, but overall very good. Front end bite, better than all the European cars with skinny front tires (235's) that I have taken there. Traction mid-corner and acceleration out of corners very good. Brake steer quite useful to rotate the car and reduce understeer, but feels somewhat un-natural and intrusive.
The track I was at is relatively tight, with short straights and tight corners. It is apparently quite bumpy ( although I never noticed this before to the same extent).
Set to Sport setting for suspension, the car handled the corners pretty well, but traction control was pretty intrusive. Set to Race setting, the car bounced around a lot - very choppy, jiggly - made it very difficult to be smooth and carry a rythm through the corners. Quite twitchy. Felt artificial. Never got fully comfortable with it, before running out of gas (and scuffing the front tires pretty badly).
So in conclusion, the car is clearly capable of being very fast. Like driving a high power Porsche, getting good at driving this well, will take time and commitment (and lots of tires). I can see why certain reviewers had mixed feelings about the car on the track.
And by the way, it seems that the gang in Wokking had a bad day when they put my car together, because there is something loose inside my dash that keeps (very noticeably) rolling side to side in all the corners, and something very creaky in my rear driver side suspension - neither is confidence inspiring when driving at 98%!
By the way, as a heads-up to other that may want to adjust tire pressure at the track, I decided to drop my pressures between laps. The computer did not like it - it set a code, and prevented me from going above 4500 rpm. Had to go back to the pits, pump up the one tire that IT thought was too low, and eventually, it allowed me to access the full rpm range again! It appears that it wants to maintain a 3 psi spread between rears and fronts, and that the balance accross any axle be within certain ranges.
