why is it so damn slow?

http://www.americanlemans.com/result...MS_TestDay.pdf

i know someone on here works with the car. i wanna know what the deal is.

 

It's not that slow. Just stiff competition. The competitors have 10 year newer car and over 500hp.

 

Is this the same car that ran last year at Sebring, Le Mans, and Petit Le Mans?

 

it is that slow, pobst in the rs6 beat it in wc gt practice. thats pathetic.

 

that is an LMP675(675Kg prototype chassis) car powered by a rotary engine(3 rotor NA I believe). Downing has been running his Kudzu chassis for many years. first this is practice and Downing and team work on a fraction of the budget of most of the regulars. practice is a time to sort out problems and judging from the times they were having some problems. normally this car is a mid pack LMP675 car. this is not an RX7

 

Get your *** in the car and show him your mad skillz then..

PaulC

 

it was doing about the same lap times at the chevy gp, maybe a little faster but i never got it anywhere close to a 1:20 when i was timing it. just figured someone on here would know why the car is so much slower then the rest of the pack.

im not saying i could get in the car and do better but im also not racing in a professional series.

 

The Welter Racing LMP-675 car is a PUEGOET Chassis w/ a Dowing built NA 4 rotor (not a 26b) based on 13b rotors & housings iirc. the chassis was orig designed as a Spec FIA "LeMans Prototype" Class car (w/ a spec. Puegoet V6). (have a picture of one on my computer "desktop" at work

 

http://www.americanlemans.com/result...it/ALMS_P2.pdf

 

When we visited the Downing shop earlier this month Jim Downing told us that the car is way over weight for the class. He's hoping to be reliable Vs. fast. The old "to finish first one must first finish".
Here's a link to a photo of Jim and the car in progress and other assorted shots from the shop visit:

http://community.webshots.com/album/93302184vxSnxB

Might take a few since I just uploaded the photos. The car they'll be running this weekend is the red one that you can't see too much of...

Cory

 

The Golden Rule in autoracing is:

"Whichever auto manufacturer gives the most Gold to the sanctioning body, gets the best Rules!"

 

His point wasn't that the rules were unfair (though he may have a right to feel that way) but that they hadn't had the car that long (they bought it from the French team that ran it at Le Mans this year) and they hadn't been able to develop it fully. He also noted that they had wanted to change to a different transmision but didn't have the time to get it sorted before the race this weekend.

 

They bought it from WR who built the chassis.

They are very slow. They where being passed by GT cars. The sad thing is, they where about 10 seconds faster than they where last year.

The biggest thing holding them back is the fact that the engine has to breathe through a 42 mm intake restrictor. A high power 13b couldn't breathe properly through that and they are running a 4 rotor.

It's the most unfair restriction I have seen in the series. They are several hundred HP down from the Dyson car.

They could be very competitive if they where allowed to make comprable hp to the front runners.

The crazy thing is, they still managed to finish 3rd at the Petit LeMans in Atlanta. Mostly due to the fact that they had almost no problems and the rest of the cars broke.

They had second for a while but with about 10-15 laps left they where laped 3 times by dyson who had major problems and was out of the race for a long time. Thats fucked up!

Mike

 

yeah i believe there were only 3 675 cars left on the track at the end. they had no problems other then a few spins and ended up something like 76 laps down on the lead audi. thats about 1.5 hours behind the leader!

the car is down on HP for sure. but thats not all. i dont keep up with drivers too much but none of them really seemed to be consistent. i was watching from turn 5 and they would take a different line each time, usually it was way early compared to the rest of the LMP cars. there was one driver who was a good bit better then the other two, but im not sure which one it was. either way none of them were at all aggressive.

they were getting outbraked by GT cars, even through the esses the GT cars had no trouble keeping up.

the dyson 20 car had some huge problems, came back to pass the downing car with like 10 laps to go. i was sitting in the complex and watched the effortless pass under braking into 10a. there was nothing the mazda could do.

im not trying to bash the downing team, i think its awesome there is a 4 rotor out there. i just wish it wasnt the slowest car on the track!

 

Downing may not be as fast as he used to be but between the late 70's to the mid 90's he has won almost every major title, race, and series that a driver could win. He was factory backed by Mazda through the eighties. You should check out some of the stuff he has done. It is quite impressive.

Terada is from Japan. He was a test/ race car driver for Mazda in Japan through the 70's and eighties. I don't know much about what he has done but from what I've heard he was Mazda's top driver.

I don't know much about Katz but I was told by someone that works for downing that he has turned the fastest lap times that car has ever seen. (Wich sadly, probably wasn't that fast)

I think The car is too restricted. Talking to Jim I got the sense that they may be driving conservitive to save the car. They know that their only chance of placing well is by being more reliable than the other cars. Thats what got them third at RA.

There is supposed to be some rule changes next year that will effect their power output. Hopefully this will give thim the boost they need to run up front.

If they can't be competitive in 675, I'd like to see them move to something that they can compete in. It would be nice to see downing on top again.

Mike