Strict track limits sting at Le Mans

The sixth and final round of the Nations Cup was held at Le Mans with a selection of group 1 prototypes to choose from. The Nissan GT-R LM Nismo was the meta car, according to the leader board, but I'm not interested in the meta, especially when it's an ugly front wheel drive shoe of a car. Of the remaining cars I chose the Porsche 919 Hybrid over offerings from Toyota and Audi. I was familiar with the Porsche from league racing and secured two podiums with the brand this season, so it was an obvious choice.

Wet weather practice and high speeds down the Mulsanne straight

Race settings and practice conditions suggested a strong chance of rain. Le Man's is not a circuit I practice so rain and a simulated 24-hour day/night cycle had me dreading this one. Le Mans at night in the rain is scary. Making thing worse was the realization that, in VR, Gran Turismo places penalty warnings on the virtual HUD directly in the line of sight when driving the 919 Porsche. Any penalties would not only slow me down for time served but obscure my vision down the road. There was a very real risk of driving blind at night in the wet if I wasn't careful. Practice showed just how punishing this race would be. Track limits at Le Mans are inconsistent. Large cuts through the Dunlop curves are a-OK whereas any mistake on the exit of turn 6 onto the Mulsanne straight or coming out of turn 17 were met with swift 0.5 second penalties. By the end of Friday practice my best clean time was in the 3:35s range under dry conditions. Top leader board times were over 10 seconds faster. Needless to say, I was not feeling confident.

Porsche 919 Hybrid

Saturday practice focused strictly on consistency-- keep it on the tarmac and avoid penalties at all costs. I was convinced my pace wasn't enough to be competitive but by being consistent and avoiding penalties I may be able to manage a respectable result. Fastest lap at the end of practice had improved to the 3:32 range but, more importantly, I managed to run the full race length, 7 lap, without penalty and consistent times in the 34s-35s with traffic. Experimenting with tires and pit strategy showed intermediates as the best strategy for a safe and steady race it the rains came. Deliberate practice had paid off; it was time to race.

Qualifying took place in dry conditions, but with a five-minute qualifying session we'd get one flying lap only. I let the rest of the field go on track first, opting for as much clean track ahead as possible. Mistakes would be devastating, so I put in a qualifying lap at 8/10ths pace to avoid picking up a costly penalty. I qualified 3rd, just 0.044s behind the leader. It would seem I did have the pace to be competitive and pushing just ever so slightly more in qualifying could have put me on pole.

Twilight battle for 2nd to 6th position

The good qualifying result gave me a much-needed confidence boost going into the race. Looking at the pre-race weather radar didn't make tire selection easy. Rain had come and gone, but was more on the way? Dry conditions at the start made it too much of a gamble to start on inters hoping the rain would come again, so I opted to start on slicks. Surviving the first few curves, I pulled onto the Mulsanne straight for the first time in 4th place, but would move back to 3rd by turn 9. I would stick to my strategy from practice; keep it clean, consistent, and in between the lines. The weather radar showed no signs of rain, it would be dry all the way to the finish. With no pit stops to contend with, it was time to put my head down and race my own race.

As the leader slowly but steadily pulled away from the pack it became apparent my battle would be with Diego Luna of Mexico for 2nd place. Running nose-to-tail for the majority of the race, we would swap positions several times as one of us picked up and served our track limits penalties. For Diego, his penalties would come from exceeding track limits onto the Mulsanne straight. I picked them up by running wide at turn 17. By the end of the race we had both served multiple seconds penalties, but I had suffered more. With two laps to go the gap to 2nd was 2 seconds, too large to close unless Diego picked up a massive penalty. I had a comfortable 7 second gap between myself in 3rd and the 4th place driver, who had another penalty to serve.

I would bring the car home in 3rd position, securing my fourth podium in six races. For a race where I expected to finish mid-pack at best it'd be an understatement to say I was happy with the result. I had dreaded this one going into practice but it turned out to be one of the highlights of the season, both in outright result and enjoyment.

And with that the Gran Turismo Word Series Exhibition 3 Nations Cup comes to a close. Stay tuned for final results and a post-series retrospective.

Turn 17 track limits strike again