Prepare yourselves, because the hair-drawn raceways have come.

"Wheelerguy" (wheelerguy)
10/19/2015 at 05:54 • Filed to: Hair-Drawn Race Tracks, Dump, Long Article, McLaren Raceway-NZ Speedpark Oceania

I have here ten circuits. Or eleven, because the one below is basically two circuits sharing just one ribbon of track. And it’s in New Zealand.

The McLaren Raceway-NZ Speedpark Oceania (formerly known as the Urewara Grand Prix Raceway until McLaren Automotive bought it in 2011) is 7.5 kilometers long, has 18 corners, and has this weird double personality because the circuit can be run both clockwise and anticlockwise. The steep and fast first sector (Start and T1 to T6) in the clockwise format becomes a hard climb when done in reverse, and cars usually run a less-rich fuel/air mix lest they get exhausted quickly. Just about every corner is an event, and a different one at that. The wall seems closer downhill (T9, to T12 on layout R) than it is uphill (T7 to T10 on layout L), and the same story goes for T11 to T16 (T8 tp T3 on layout R). But what you wanna hear is how would T17 and T18 (T1 and T2 on layout R) drive. T17 in the clockwise layout goes uphill and is banked at 15 degrees, which makes T18 both blind and off-camber on entry. Weirdly, that corner becomes essentially a chicane when tacked in reverse.

OK, this one is slightly shitty, particularly the way T2 and T3 looks (like an erect nipple), but past T8 the circuit comes alive, and is capped off with a last corner (T13) that dares you to throttle up earlier.

Never mind the smudges, this circuit’s a keeper. Ever looked side-on to the temple and temple ends of your reading glasses or shades? And then you see the temple ends bend downwards all of a sudden? That’s how T10 to T11 looks like, so that complex is called that (T10 is The Hinge, the straight is the Temple, and blind, super-fast T11 is the Temple End, the highest point on the circuit). Not surprisingly, the compression at T12 is brutal, but T13 is much easier and faster to tackle because it slopes gentler, but you’ve got to be smart on the brakes so you can carry enough speed to get through T14. Also, just one DRS zone.

Now these two are shorties, just 3.0 km and 3.2 km, respectively, but the uncanny part is that the homeowners who live near these circuits aren’t just OK with the noise, they thrive on it. The left one looks quite Tilkean, but unlike his other tracks, the big straight is banked at 20 degrees, and the corners don’t look too contrived. The three corners on the right-tile track, meanwhile, partly surround a monument.

Here’s one (6.0 km) of the two circuits I’d propose for Saudi Arabia, and as you can see, I did it properly. The circuit, which shall be planted in Riyadh, comes out of the gate with a high-compression T3, and features the aptly-named Flight Deck at T7, and a challenging Sector 3 (T11 to exit of T15), where courage in committing to every corner and smart braking and throttle control can help you gain three positions at once, as Esteban Gutierrez will attest.

Only eight corners on this track (5.5 km) aren’t part of the Sidewinder Esses complex, which start from the technical T7 and goes up and down in each turn. See if you can spot the error in my ways in numbering the corners!

A Nicaraguan racing circuit? Yes, really! It’s a miracle that the people who envisioned the circuit ever even got to make the track at all, but the end result is an even greater miracle. Bluefields Circuit of Nicaragua can be called a street circuit, as traffic come out of a tunnel that comes out at T14, where the Bluefields Scenic Route begins. Yup, in ordinary days the circuit is a B-road, although only light vehicles can use it. Being a mountain road the track can only fit two cars, and until 1999 there was nothing more than Armco surrounding the track. It’s predominantly uphill, too, so past T1o and all the way up to T13 the track drops sharply.

Well, here’s a wicked one. And I mean it, because Kimi Raikkonen died here after Carlos Sainz Jr’s car exploded next to Kimi’s cockpit as the latter made a move on the inside of the high-compression T13. OK, morbid story out of the way, on to the description. T6 to T9 is a gently-sloping uphill set and T11 is blind, but the 2-kilometer straight between T12 to T13 is a downhill run. The kicker? The last two corners go sharply uphill and are banked. They’re high-speed corners, these, with top drivers hitting 230 mph just entering T15 .

Here we have a much simpler-looking track, but don’t let the number of corners and the shape fool you, because it’s 5.5 km long and 75% of the race is spent going uphill and on full throttle. T3 and T4 is a test of grip and commitment, T5 is extremely off-camber, and T7 is one of the more common—and surprising—overtaking areas.

Finally, here’s my second proposed circuit for Saudi Arabia, this time in Jeddah. The second DRS zone is Tilkean, yes, but you wouldn’t complain if the rest of the circuit is a handful in itself and is well-done overall. Take T4 to T7, an undulation section with varying elevation changes that was influenced by sand dunes. Or Sector 3 (T11 to T14), that combines compression and off-camber construction to surprise drivers.

Well, that’s a lot of stuff. I hope you looked past the medium and appreciated the tracks themselves. Also, please direct me to Jason Torchinsky and a GT6 Track Path Editor app. Please?