Have you ever considered running the corkscrew in the dark?
Oppositelock presents An Evening at Leguna Seca. The third round of the Oppositelock Miata Championship takes us to out west for a battle under the fading sun (we though it might be a bit too mean to run in pitch black). This event preview consists of some information about the track, race admin notes (rule changes, caution areas, etc.), and a few tips and tricks to make sure you have a good race.
EVENT PREVIEW
For a long time it was called Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca. The perfect home for racing Miatas. Though the name has changed, the racing stays the same with Laguna Seca being one of the most notable, yet challenging beginner tracks on the iRacing service. The breadth of the track really tempts you to drive hard and fast, but the shallow runoff areas quickly make you regret that decision. Personally, I struggle with Laguna Seca; so I am going to turn it to the experts to show you what a lap is like here
For being a starter track on iRacing. Laguna Seca is very challenging. The shallow hairpin turns 1 and 2 after the long front straightaway really throw off drivers. Turn in too quickly and you have to correct midway through the corner. Turn to late and you are trekking across the dry grass into the tire wall. Of course the most prominent feature of Laguna Seca is the corkscrew. Featuring a massive elevation and directional change, mastering this portion of the track is critical to success. Cut the corner and you will end up with a huge penalty. Miss the corner and you will be in the tires without touching the ground.
Laguna Seca is very accommodating to a large field of cars. Many areas for passing enable drivers to make up lots of positions. However, traffic management and patience is still paramount because pushing to hard can destroy your race.Of course, the best way to eliminate the need to pass cars is to qualify up front. Pole time is expected to be in the high 1:30s to low 1:40s.
Fully utilizing the newest feature of iRacing (day/night transitions), the race will take place during sundown. Laguna Seca does not have lights so only the headlights of you Miata will guide you around the track. The goal is to finish the race just before complete darkness, we don’t want you flying through the corkscrew in pitch black.. This added variable is sure to make the race interesting. The primary effects expected are increased grip due to track cooling, and reduced visibility of trackside features.
As always, fuel is restricted to a maximum of 40 minutes. This presents you with 2 options
- Stop with ~20 minutes left in the race after your tank is empty
- Stop with ~40 minutes left in the race and don’t worry about fuel
Remember: Official Miata races don’t have pit stops; because if this, they don’t have quick pit crews. Fueling up the car should take approximately 20 seconds.
We are excited to host and hope to have a large turnout. Find us in the hosted section on Wednesday Night. If you want to join Team Oppositelock, find us in the Teams section on the member site. All Team Oppositelock members are granted admin rights for all Team Oppo events.
Below are some admin notes for Wednesday’s race...
RACE ADMIN NOTES
Race Times
- Race Start: 9:15PM EST, Wednesday, December 12th
- Race Duration: 1 Hour (plan around 10:30PM EST)
- Practice: 8:15PM EST to 9:05PM EST, 50 minutes
- Qualifying: 9:05PM EST to 9:15PM EST, 10 minutes
- Format: Open Qualifying
Rule Change
Drop Weeks
- Last week at Summit Point, we only had a couple drivers show up. This is most likely due to the quarterly iRacing build release and associated events that come with it. This presented an opportunity to address this issue. In the event that there are not enough cars for a competitive race, participating drivers will be awarded a drop week and enable them to improve their points total. Further details and implementation of this rule is to be determined
Caution Areas
This section details the areas and situations where yellow flags will be thrown.
There are 0 caution areas in this event.
As always, Yellow flags will be thrown for...
- Any incident of several cars consisting a large percentage of the field
- Any incident that blocks the track or cause major hindrance to race traffic.
Remember, yellow flags will not be displayed unless there are multiple reports of a severe incident. Yellow flags will not be thrown for single car off-track incidents. All yellow flags are displayed at the discretion of the race admin.