Sepang Saturday
As a bit of reward for my last-minute trip to Malaysia ("It's 10am, can you leave tomorrow?" Aaah, that "tomorrow" actually means 12:40am.), I stuck around in Putrajaya (about 50km SE of KL) to go catch the Formula 1 race at Sepang.
The local light rail carrier had set up a shuttle to and from the circuit, to cope with the volume of people going to and fro. So I caught a cab from the hotel to the local train station, and went to buy my special race pass. Well, they don't sell that except at the KLIA (airport) terminal, or at KL Sentral Stasen (that's Malay, not a typo). Ok, well gimme a ticket to KLIA then. Boarded the train, rode to the airport terminal, then picked up my shuttle pass. I shared the bus over to the race with half a dozen Finns in SUOMI t-shirts, as well as a few others (who actually looked Asian--perhaps they're just local Kimi fans) wearing or carrying some form of the Finnish flag. The other popular fan base is those people who think that Schumi is better than sliced bread. They all wear the red of Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro.
Once I got to the circuit, I made my way through all of the vendor booths (passed up the opportunity to buy more t-shirts, in an effort to avoid declaring allegiance to one particular team) to the gate. Entered into the main "mall" area where my seat was situated.
I happened to arrive during the second practice session, before qualifying. A few of the drivers were out on the track, testing the settings of the car, as well as (re-)familiarizing themselves with the course. A link to the course map is here; the mall entrance is at the wide portion of the main east-west V. So the sounds that greeted me were the quick gear changes of drivers entering the back straight, or down-shifting into turn 1.
This year, new rules dictate that the power plant in the car has to be a V-8. However, one team (Scuderia Toro Rosso) was afforded a break on this rule, as they were newly formed out of the ashes of the Minardi team. They're still running last year's 10-cylinder engine. However, to ensure that the playing field is (mostly) level, the V-10 has been fitted with an air intake restricter (think sprinting while breathing through a straw), as well as an RPM limiter. That RPM limiter is set somewhere around 16,000 RPM. Yes, that's right, restricted to 16k. One of the teams is reportedly running their V-8 as high as 20,000.
Imagine if you will cars whose output is in the 700 horsepower range (you'll never get a straight answer out of a team regarding its BHP numbers), weighing only 1300 lbs (ish). "Speed Racer in the Mach 5" comes to mind. As I mentioned above, I was welcomed to the course by the sounds of the drivers on practice laps. Turn 14 (before the back straight) is listed as a 107km/h curve, suggesting that the drivers would be in 2nd gear. So as they pass through that corner a little over 60mph(!), the drivers are slamming open the throttle to burn down the back straight. They're churning through gears (most cars are six- or seven-speeds) as they get up to speed, shifting through about four of them in the time it took you to read the words in italics. Kick. Ass.
Since not nearly as many people were at the track to watch the support races and qualifying on Saturday, the grandstands were a bit less restrictive on where you could sit. My ticket was for the 'Sapphire' area, but I was free to roam over most of the adjacent 'Emerald' area as well, and nearly to the 'Diamond' seating. It gave me a chance to get photos of most of the teams' pit areas (coming soon), and to see a bit more of the activity there.
I won't bother with posting qualifying results here, that's somebody else's job.
ObRant: It was 38 degrees on Saturday. Even under the grandstand, I was roasting. I've been reminded that I'm not suited for tropical climes--I started to develop heat rash on Saturday. But a quick rinse and then a dip in the pool at the hotel soon fixed that.
The local light rail carrier had set up a shuttle to and from the circuit, to cope with the volume of people going to and fro. So I caught a cab from the hotel to the local train station, and went to buy my special race pass. Well, they don't sell that except at the KLIA (airport) terminal, or at KL Sentral Stasen (that's Malay, not a typo). Ok, well gimme a ticket to KLIA then. Boarded the train, rode to the airport terminal, then picked up my shuttle pass. I shared the bus over to the race with half a dozen Finns in SUOMI t-shirts, as well as a few others (who actually looked Asian--perhaps they're just local Kimi fans) wearing or carrying some form of the Finnish flag. The other popular fan base is those people who think that Schumi is better than sliced bread. They all wear the red of Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro.
Once I got to the circuit, I made my way through all of the vendor booths (passed up the opportunity to buy more t-shirts, in an effort to avoid declaring allegiance to one particular team) to the gate. Entered into the main "mall" area where my seat was situated.
I happened to arrive during the second practice session, before qualifying. A few of the drivers were out on the track, testing the settings of the car, as well as (re-)familiarizing themselves with the course. A link to the course map is here; the mall entrance is at the wide portion of the main east-west V. So the sounds that greeted me were the quick gear changes of drivers entering the back straight, or down-shifting into turn 1.
This year, new rules dictate that the power plant in the car has to be a V-8. However, one team (Scuderia Toro Rosso) was afforded a break on this rule, as they were newly formed out of the ashes of the Minardi team. They're still running last year's 10-cylinder engine. However, to ensure that the playing field is (mostly) level, the V-10 has been fitted with an air intake restricter (think sprinting while breathing through a straw), as well as an RPM limiter. That RPM limiter is set somewhere around 16,000 RPM. Yes, that's right, restricted to 16k. One of the teams is reportedly running their V-8 as high as 20,000.
Imagine if you will cars whose output is in the 700 horsepower range (you'll never get a straight answer out of a team regarding its BHP numbers), weighing only 1300 lbs (ish). "Speed Racer in the Mach 5" comes to mind. As I mentioned above, I was welcomed to the course by the sounds of the drivers on practice laps. Turn 14 (before the back straight) is listed as a 107km/h curve, suggesting that the drivers would be in 2nd gear. So as they pass through that corner a little over 60mph(!), the drivers are slamming open the throttle to burn down the back straight. They're churning through gears (most cars are six- or seven-speeds) as they get up to speed, shifting through about four of them in the time it took you to read the words in italics. Kick. Ass.
Since not nearly as many people were at the track to watch the support races and qualifying on Saturday, the grandstands were a bit less restrictive on where you could sit. My ticket was for the 'Sapphire' area, but I was free to roam over most of the adjacent 'Emerald' area as well, and nearly to the 'Diamond' seating. It gave me a chance to get photos of most of the teams' pit areas (coming soon), and to see a bit more of the activity there.
I won't bother with posting qualifying results here, that's somebody else's job.
ObRant: It was 38 degrees on Saturday. Even under the grandstand, I was roasting. I've been reminded that I'm not suited for tropical climes--I started to develop heat rash on Saturday. But a quick rinse and then a dip in the pool at the hotel soon fixed that.
posted by Sanford Owings at 12:45 AM
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