Calabogie Motorsports Park / Bimmershop Racing / April 30

[snid]

Calabogie Motorsports Park

I'll have more later, including video, but here's the first report:I think I'm going to have to look at my video before I try to do a turn by turn description. From memory, I'll probably get something wrong.

We ran without turn in / apex / track out cones, so the blind turns were even more difficult because there was no handy cone that screamed "turn in here!"

Kink could be taken stupid fast. But, it's downhill with the crest of the hill at the begining of the turn, and there's a big cement wall right up against the left side of the straight between Kink and Jacques. So, don't mess up. Or, if you do, drift off to the right side of the track - don't try to save it and wind up on the wall on the left.

Jacques is simple and straightforward. You can even see the whole thing when you're setting up for it.

Gilles is quite blind. You cannot see the track at all when you need to turn in. The turn itself isn't that bad, but finding the timing is.

Easy is - well - easy. At least in a slow car

The "driver's guide" talks about a downhill braking for Mulligans. I guess I did it wrong because I was braking before the downhill.

Big Rock is a long turn, and you need to go late so you can end on the right side of the track for Candy Mountain.

Candy Mountain is another completely blind turn. There are some trees you can use for landmarks though.

Temptation - I have no idea. I tried a lot of different lines, but I still don't think any of them were right. To make things even harder, the true apex, or at least the "last" apex, is blind because it's blocked by a piece of armco.

Deliverance was never an issue since I never had enough speed coming out of Temptation.

Crown and Brow can be taken as one double apex turn with no adjusting of line between them. They can probably also be taken much faster than I did. It took me a long time to come close to finding the line to make them one turn. Or perhaps crown is a "nothing" turn and Brow is a double apex... looking at the map, there are three "turns" and two names. It's one of those cases where the map doesn't reflect the track as I remember it.

The Beak is very tight and needs to be taken late.

The Throat you can see the entrance to, but the exit is a bit blind, and there's not much room between the exit of Throat and the entrance to Hook, and you need to scrub off some speed for Hook.

Out of Hook and through Spoon, I was able to take flat out. But flat through Spoon was kind of scary even in my car. It was moving around a bit at a pretty high speed (90-ish?).

The braking zone for 4-Left is the one that is uphill with the crest of the hill in the wrong place. Waiting until after the hill didn't give me enough time to slow down comfortably. Braking before the crest made things seem to slow. Braking a bit going up the hill, getting off the brakes for the crest, then braking again after the crest almost worked. And I could probably carry much more speed through 4 Left than I did.

The last section is another slight mystery. Setting up so you're not lifting for the last left (Wilson's) seems to be the most important part, but that left is just blind enough that it takes some commitment.

Your first day there, it's going to take a lot of laps to remember where you are and where you're going. Looking ahead (way ahead) seems to help a ton here, but with everything so blind it takes a while to figure out which direction is "ahead".

Runoff room seems pretty good around the track. The wall on the left heading into Jacques is the closest thing I can remember. But having the wall right there when you blip the throttle to downshift is nice.

The paddock is a big paved lot, no shelter is available. Porta-potties. Gas is a 5 minute drive away (more or less). There is no food available at the track. Very limited picture taking opportunities. The wall between the paddock and the track is tall enough that you cannot see any of the track from the paddock. You have to cross the hot pits to be able to see anything, and some organizations don't allow this at other tracks. I don't recall seeing air / electricity available, but I didn't look. There's no sign for the track, so get directions.

I'll post more later... including video. I screwed up with the remote mic a few times, so there might not be sound.

[LePew]

Thanks for the report! Wow, sounds like a great place. They'll work out any kinks no doubt as time goes on.

[snid]

hmmm... I guess I did end the report with all the negatives. That might be misleading.

The track is brand new, and they're still buliding some of the supporting infrastructure, so that will get better.

The track surface is (currently) immaculate. Perfectly smooth. No bumps / cracks. The best pavement I've been on. I'm not sure how harsh the winters are where the track is located, so I don't know if the great pavement will last or not. But currently, there is a ton of perfect pavement there.

I listed out the negatives just so that if someone who is used to NHIS heads to Calabogie, they won't be completely suprised.

[snid]

Here's a lap of the track from my car. Google video seems to have done a horrible job on this video. The stuff I've put up there before didn't seem to look this bad. And the cheap remote mic I bought at Radio Shack seems to be even worse than using the built in microphone on the camera. Sorry...


Calabogie / Bimmershop Racing / April 30, 2007 - Google Video

[faster,Tobias!]

Where is Calabogie?

[snid]

Calabogie Motorsports Park is in Calabogie.

Calabogie is about an hour west of Ottawa.