QUAL: 1 min 14 sec 779 Qual standard menu Qual advanced menu

RACE: 1 min 18 sec 918 Race standard menu Race advanced menu

Note

If you have downloaded both setup for QUAL & RACE, you'll find a huge difference in the setups, mainly anti-roll bar changed, and to prevent tire wear, i had to work hours to get the chassis to work in my favour, and getting decent lap times. I have to admidt although i find the race setup has a good car balance, the only way to preserve tires in a two stop strategy ( recommend ) is preventing tires lock-up at the last chicane. Take a look at my qual & race advance setups menu (previous pages), and you'll see some aspect on springs that may defies logics, since on one side (left) there's only 200 lbs difference between F/R and on the right, it's 400 lbs between F/R. The reason for this is after practicing over 200 laps ( in 3 days ), i've found the best trade-off to get most of EQUAL TIRE WEAR. The way i've build the setups, is to sacrifice some left (slower) corners (more understeer), and having a very predictable chassis, for right corners ( mostly Estoril ). I've "rework" dampers setting, to prevent overteer when braking hard while entering some slow corners ( Adelaide hairpin ). The best advise is doing lots of laps with a good amount of fuel, and you'll get cornering entry correctly, without overlocking all the times. One more concern, is when you enter the last chicane ( before Lycee bend), you'll find it's almost impossible to lock the LEFT FRONT TIRE, ( during qualification it's ok), but my advise is brake real hard at the entry, then gradually lift the brakes while downshifting. Make your engine do the work, you'll need to practice this over and over.

Introduction

Le circuit Magny-Cours is not my favorite, although it has good mixture of corners, some at high speed on the limit like Estoril bends ( which i prefer ) and a nice S sweep bend at Nurburring chicane, there's also that very frustrating last right hander lycee bends taken at very slow speed, and also the never-ending 180 bend, which i find difficult to get it right, because of lack of reference point, if you over take it, your out of pace, also just before the last corner , there's the most difficult section called Chicane, very unforgiving if you miss the entry. In French Canadian CHICANE means 2 thing, the one that describe the most of this one is as a translation, it means FIGHTING, actually you have to fight your car to get right lap after lap, The other meaning is in terms of racing, is as you know it, a series of S bends.

I consistently ran in the low 1 min 19 to low 1 min 20 range all the time, I even made a 1 min 18 sec 954 after 2nd lap while Jacques Villleneuve was pussing hard, (with good tires & fuel load). If your "gentle" enough on your tires, choose to go for 2 pitstop during a full race. If you find your setup though on tires, go for 3 pitstop, but you may be not in 1st position after your last pit. The asphalt is very abbrasive, and you can "burn" your tires if not carefull. Also there's a HUGE DIFFERENCE IN PRACTICE TIME COMPARED TO RACEDAY, i had to "retune" my setup because of the track surface being more slippery. Back to race times, if your consistent, without mistakes, you'll pace at around 1 sec a lap faster than the top teams. I've notice the winning combination is 2 pitstop strategy, my suggestion is using 31% race distance for 1st pit, then 66 %, and at the last pitstop, the sim will give you 27 fuel lap, just remove some amount to finish the race with the minimum.

Track Guide

Lets begin on how to go around the track as smooth & fast as possible. Passing starting line you'll reach around 282 kph at the apex of corner #1 ( in 6th gear ), just accelerate up to the entry of corner #2 ( Estoril bend ), you'll reach 293 kph then lift the throttle and downshift to 5th then 4th ( the engine torque will do the deceleration ). I have found that all the CC cars keeps a constant speed while negociating the turn. It's not the best way to do it, while touching the apex, you'll be slower, but you can accelerate sooner and at the exit you'll be at least 15-20 kph faster than the competition. Be carefull when trying to pass other car, unless you're very close at the exit and then surprise them before they hit the next cerbstone ( on the right ). If you are just 4-6 car lenghts behind, be patient and overtake them just after that cerbstone. Also since this straigth is actually a long bend, study your opponents before overtaking, they have a tendency to push you on the side of the track. Also another good place to pass the CC car, is at the end of straight before entering Adelaide hairpin, keep an eye on your braking points, to prevent you to overbrake and find yourself in a uncomfortable position ( gravel trap ). Brake hard just before the 100 mark, and then gradually lift the brake, to save your tires. This corner is off-camber, and if your not carefull you can spin-out easily. After the chassis is settled, accelerate smoothly, i also suggest you to use the cerbstone on the exit, i found you can accelerate harder at the exit, and give you a good speed coming to the next chicane ( Nurburgring ).

This portion is taken flat out, just clip the first apex ( left ), then exit touching ( barelly ) the cerbstone, you'll reach around 293 before entering this challenging corner ( #6 ), the apex is found later, and the worse about this section is the lack of reference points for braking, also you'll have to adjust your driving style when braking here, again use the engine to slow you down, but be carefull not to downshift too fast, the rear will get loose. You'll be at the apex at 100 kph ( in first gear ), then accelerate smoothly up to 4th gear ( 215 kph ) touching the next apex ( corner 6a ). Continue accelerating up to 6th gear ( up to 289 ). Now here comes the Imola bends, there's a tendency of chassis upset here, due to the rapid change of altitude and direction. Before entering lift the throttle, down to 5th gear then 4th at exit of the 2nd bend ( #8 ) (outside cerbstone on your right), then brake and downshift to 2nd, then 1st to take corner # 9. You should touch the apex at 115 kph, then accelerate up to 5th gear, you'll reach 260 kph, then comes the famous CHICANE ( #10 & 10a). To gain time, start to brake just before you touch the outside cerbstone. Brake real hard then gradually lift the brakes, and USE THE ENGINE TORQUE VERY CAREFULLY, the purpose of this is removing pressure on the LEFT FRONT tire. And when mastered it's very efficient. Now the last corner ( Lycee ), taken at around 75 kph, you can touch the exterior cerbstone while you reaccelerate up to 2nd gear and then comes the front straight lines. VOILA!

Race Setup

What's important here to get good grip is having different SPRINGS setting , both rear and front & left and right, i keep a good ratio of ARB REAR at 100 and ARB FRONT at 1500, to get good grip at other portion of the track (and less tire wear), also don't use hight # here to prevent chassis upset . If you want to change wing angle (not shown here), keep a differencial of 5 to 6 deg between front and rear, then adjust car height to prevent plank wear. Important note: While working my setup here in this portion of the track, the big task here is to prevent car upset, which lead to spin-off, IT'S NOT OVERSTEER, so i found that by actually reducing spring load in left front, the tires has less wear, ( actually before making that big change compared to QUAL setup ), tire wear were very uneven in front, so i've compensate with by fine-tuning the dampers.

NOTE: this setup and the qualification setup are not symetrical. The reason is on the right side of the car it's evenly match, but on left side tire wear showed good amount of understeer. It' a trade-off!

Just look at the difference of setups, also the wing angles are the same, and i've changed a little bit the brake F/R ratio (not shown here)