Had the opportunity to run some laps at Gratten this past Monday. I had never been there and had some missed reviews prior to going.

I thought the track was tight but fun because of the elevation changes and you are very busy with all the direction changes.

My first session out I was doing around 1:40 - 1:41. By the end of the day, I had a personal best of 1:37 . Not sure whether that's any good or not.

Has anyone else run there and got times?

 

I am yet to get there. Did you run with a solstice or 2? How do i find out about the events there? I havent gotten a response from anybody up at that track yet.

 

I love that track! I've been there many times. First drove the track in 1979. Twice in the RX8. Someone (a noob) timed me 1:38 on a wristwatch. Did you check your speed going into turn 1. One time I hit 120 mph before braking. Usually it was 117.
BTW: I grew up 25 miles north of there. But, I never saw the track until I moved here. I know the group you ran with (Eric). He puts on a good day.

 

Yes, we ran with a Solstice and a swamp of Crossfires - plain and SRT6's.
I had a buddy call me who knew "Eric" who ran the day....I still don't know the club that he runs....but it was good nevertheless.

It's a nice track to run. ..a good one to run a couple times.....more if you live close, but I'm not sure I would do it often if I was more than 3+ hours away.

 

It sounds like I ran virtually the same kind of times, so I'm not that off. As far as turn 1 speeds, I was far less that you. For the times I checked, I was only hitting 113 mph ....definitely not the 120mph you saw . Did you have a rocket strapped to your car, or NOs?
That's pretty good to get that number....nice job! I would defintely like to have seen how you handled the corners leading up to the front straight . I experienced the car move/bobble and even slammed a few times quite hard right before the straight...I was never able to get much improvement....

How did you do it?

 

I have run with Eric a couple of times now. He doesn't have a club. I think he does it for the fun of it and I can't believe he makes much, if any, profit. He works for Chrysler/Daimler. As you probably noticed, there were a few Neon SRT4's around. He also has a RX7 w/ LS1 conversion.
I had a write up on how to drive this track, but I can't find it. Not seeing how you drive, I don't know what I am doing different. Those last two corners are fun. The first one is blind and you have to know your turn in point. I also hang a front tire off the inside of the track, when going through that complex. I am going through the last corner at about 60 mph.
The entrance for turn 1 is a little ruff on the left side of the track. Not as bad as it used to be before it was resurfaced. I move in almost half a car width for braking. I have a war story from when I road raced about turn 1. Ask me about it if we ever meet sometime.
My first trip there with the 8, there was another guy with an 8. He got about 3 laps in before he had problems in the flywheel, clutch or transmission area.
Last time I was there, I ran with the advanced group. I keep up with everybody in the corners. On the straight they could gain ground on me. There weren't any vipers there that day.

 

One of the guys I ended up talking with that day had a brother-in-law (described to me as a big German guy) had an 8 there and blew his clutch very soon into the first day/first session. I wonder whether this is the same guy....

Any info. you can share about taking the very tight hairpin before going onto the corners leading up to the front straight? I tried various lines and settled on going into 2nd, slow and tight such that I tried to make the angle between the hairpin and the next slight left (before going up the hill and the blind right) as straight as possible....what do you think about that line?

 

I had to go to the track map to even remember the bend your talking about. I guess I ignore it. It is so gentle that it won't slow your car. I would work on your exit speed of turn 10 rather than worry about that "no name" bend.
Turn 3 is my favorite, the downhill/off camber turn. I wait till after the jump, when the car is down heavy on the suspension, before I brake for turn 5. With the RX7 I didn't have as good of brakes and I had to brake before the jump, let off & brake again before the corner. You don't want to have your brakes on while the car is light.

 

I know I didn't do turn 3 very well because I found myself quite unbalanced after cresting the hill and off camber. It felt better when I got about 1/3rd of the track in from the right and hit a certain dark patch. The car was more stable and the corner seemed better after that.

I evolved into what you had described in turn 5. I too found it better to brake after cresting the hill. I headed straight for the next corner rather than driving to the right and follwoing the corner around. A lot of people did that but I didn't see why it was better. I made up quite a bit of time there with that line.