PCA: Carrera of the Americas 2013 (COTA)

Circuit of The America is a 3.4 mile (5.5 km) long circuit track and would be made up of 20 turns with an elevation change of 133 feet (41m). This is the new home for the Ferrari Challenge Trofeo Pirelli located in Austin, Texas USA.

May 10th thru 12th, 2013 was the Carrera of the Americas: Porsche Club of America (PCA) Club Race & High Speed DE – Sponsored by Park Place Motorsports.

We had three 15 min. run sessions in the Advanced Yellow Run Group each day. Friday was practice for the race cars and in-between was our DE runs. I spend most of Friday trying to learn the track during wet conditions! When the weather did clear up on Saturday my brake system was fully tested to a new limit. I had the car prepped with Motul RBF 600 Racing Brake Fluid as there are three major turns where you will brake hard reducing off some major speed in a relatively short distance before entering an acute angle turn (T12). Some new components were added to the suspension, H&R Spring which lowered the car about one inch and added 20% more stiffness thus reducing roll in the turns by applying more load transfer to the Trofeo R tires. This made for some fast runs thru T2 thru T9 and the Pirelli P Zero Trofeo R lived up to there name once again. Fuel this time was Shell V-Power 93.

Traffic out on track was just too thick to get a solid run and while combined with very short 15 minute run sessions it was even harder to get going faster. Just when you thought everyone was picking up the pace we would encounter a much slower car out on track in the sections where there were no passing zones? That made it very hard to get a clean run in all weekend. On the flip side there were situations when things got really fast which almost felt like we were actually racing! That CoTA F1 track is just Amazing! It’s smooth and those corners are technical which take time to learn. The change in elevation throughout the track is an experience in itself. On the back straight between T11 & T12 I was able to hit 135+ mph before slamming the brakes entering T12. With each lap attempt exiting T11 I would try going faster out and break much deeper as I approach T12 while not trying to overshoot the apex, I could smell those brake pads roasting!

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I have some HD videos that I am working on to add the AiM Solo DL data overlay for lap times, speed and rpm, track map info which will be uploaded to youtube when I am done.

I truly made the most of the limited track time available. Big thanks to all that helped pull this off. To be a part of the history in this exciting new venue is a bonus chapter to an exciting season to come. We even had a F1 Garage with 2 private bathrooms! The infield facilities that are not open to the public during F1 were open for us during our Club Race/DE weekend at COTA. Absolutely Amazing!

Ciao,

SRR