Light and Dark

Free Practice 1

Having a night race on Saturday has shifted the weekend’s programme forwards by at least 24 hours, so first and second practice sessions took place on Thursday afternoon, starting with and hour of Free Practice 1 at four-forty-five. With all the preliminary set-up work to complete, Tommy was out for almost the entire session, with Mike managing just half a dozen laps at the very end.

“It was soon clear that we were going to have to change a lot of things on the car,” said Tommy. “We had the basics of a half-decent setting based upon the data we’d collected here in February, but we’ve moved on a long way since then, and learned so much more about the car. It was pretty clear that we were well short of our true potential, but it was an encouraging start.”

After half a dozen exploratory laps, Tommy brought the RML Lola back into the garage, and the team spent fifteen minutes or so tweaking some of the settings before sending the Brazilian back out again. As a “stage two”, the changes had certainly helped, and Tommy’s first flyer was a 1:38.416, and quick enough for third-fastest in LMP2, 12th overall.

It wasn’t all plain sailing, however, and there was one incident in Turn 3 that kept Tommy on his toes. It was shortly after a red flag restart, and he was following the two Aston Martin Lolas back out onto the track. “A GT2 car had spun out of Turn 3, and I could see it just round the corner ahead of us. The first Aston braked hard, but the second was directly behind, and maybe hadn’t seen the spinner, and he just ploughed into the back of his team-mate,” said Tommy. “It wasn’t the hardest of bumps, but it was quite entertaining to watch!” Both AM Lolas went into the pits, the 007 bearing some front-end damage.

LMP2 Free Practice 1

Free Practice 2

During the break between sessions the team worked again on detailed set-up adjustments. “We’ve made a stack of changes,” said Tommy before heading out for the start of the night-time session; Free Practice 2. The sun goes down very rapidly in the Algarve and what passes for bright daylight at eight has descended into almost complete darkness by nine, punctuated by glorious deep orange and pink skies that cast dark shadows beneath the silhouetted undulating hills that surround the circuit. By half-nine, when the first cars were heading out onto the circuit, it was already night.

Tommy completed five more routine laps to establish the effectiveness of the alterations, then headed back to the garage where the engineers effected another set of revisions. His next flyer was a 1:37.868, and set the #25 car third in LMP2. “The changes worked well,” admitted Tommy, “but that time is still not representative of what we can do round here, but we’re getting closer.”

It would be his best of the evening, although he got very close on several further occasions, but a succession of stops for more changes, and a lengthy red flag period, meant it was difficult to establish a rhythm. It was sufficient to determine some preliminary impressions of the circuit at night. “They’ve added lights to the circuit, but only in very small areas, and it’s very difficult to see. We have the advantage of having tested here, so we do have some idea of the layout, but for those who’ve not been here before, it’s going to be a challenge,” observed Tommy.”

When RML was here in February, both drivers commented on the irregular surface and the severe ridges that punctuate the main straight. Over the months other teams have tested here, and many drivers have voiced their concerns over two bumps in particular – one in Turn 16, and another jaw-breaker just after the finish line. “The bumps are absolutely horrendous, and the one along the pit straight is actually so bad it’s dangerous,” suggests Tommy. “I’m so disappointed that they’ve not made any attempt to address this problem since we were here in February, and in the months since then the severity actually appears to have increased. It’s truly horrible.”

The issue over these bumps has been the subject of widespread debate, even in the Portuguese media, where the issue has been seen as a significant detraction from what is otherwise a fabulous circuit. “I did manage to find one line down the start-finish that didn’t knock my teeth out!” said Mike Newton.

Mike went into the car for the final forty minutes, but didn’t enjoy the experience. “I don’t think I’m going to enjoy this race,” he said. “The visibility is so poor at night that it’s almost impossible to gauge the correct line, especially with the number of blind crests and hidden apexes. The trouble is, if you go off the accepted line you end up picking up loads of rubbish on the tyres, so you’re penalised twice over. It might be better when I’ve got the track better in my head, after another daylight session perhaps, but the illumination is appalling – quite inadequate. It’s the darkest I think I can ever recall for a night race, and it’s horrible.”

Both drivers shared similar concerns about the lighting and the surface, but Tommy was also thinking ahead to the race. “The circuit is very tight for this kind of racing,” he said. “I think we could see a lot of incidents here. All it will take is one car to lose it over the brow of a hill, and the next car through at full chat will have no chance.” It’s a great circuit, with a stunning future, but this might be a bit early in its life to be hosting a night race for 35 of the world’s fastest sports and GT racecars.

LMP2 Free Practice 2

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