Ok so I am going to take delivery of MY08 Exige S next week. Its with Dick Lovett and being delivered to my Ventureshield chap this Friday.
I will pick the car up next week and get a 1000 miles on it asap.
I’ve tracked my M3 CSL countless times and taken it to the Nordschleife over 15 times.
I chose the to move to Lotus to primarily develop my driving skills. The CSL is an awesome track car and very quick in skilled hands.
I orginally made the decision to move out of it to develop my corner speed in a slower car. I started looking at old S1 Elises and then moved into looking at S1 Exiges.
I moved to the S2 Exige S when I analysed the Lotus market and decided to develop Simtis products for the Lotus S2’s.
My biggest concern would be the lack of straightline speed on trackdays. So the supercharger will help and hopefully we can add some more power.
Enough of the waffling…
What are going to be the main differences I am going to experience?
I can imagine I will be braking far too early, scrubbing off too much speed and thus not carrying as much speed through the corners as possible.
I am also concerned that I’ll spend the trackdays getting out of the way of GT3’s etc on the straights and then hassling them in the corners. That’s going to be a little frustrating as I want to improve my driving techniques as much as possible and want to minimise compromising my laps.
I have plenty of tuition planned and will be data logging (for offline review after the day).
So what are the typical transition issues when coming from a powerful trackcar to a Lotus (albeit fairly powerful)?
I am also concerned that I’ll spend the trackdays getting out of the way of GT3’s etc on the straights and then hassling them in the corners.
Don’t know who you used to track with but you could try going with the Lotus on Track guys - LoT - and then there won’t be any GT3s at all or someone like Bookatrack , where the driving etiquette is such that there’s very little chance of being held up by anyone.
So what are the typical transition issues when coming from a powerful trackcar to a Lotus (albeit fairly powerful)?
Blimey, one could write a book on the differences - from my own perspective coming from Audi Quattros to M3’s to mid engined Porsche’s, they handle all very differently and all very positive as you adapt your style to what the car demands.
I’m sure the Exige will be just the same, but just more ‘positive’ as in feed back and feel more connected with what you are trying to do.
My M3 was a hoot, but at times just abit too much and at times ‘on the ragged edge’ a tad to extreme and as a result I found the car unruly, but hey, maybe my style just did not suit the M3.
The Porsche again was great (except for that ‘one’ occasion) very predictable and you knew exactly where you were (except for that ‘one’ occasion) and now with the Exige and what I want to do with the car I’m sure it will be testing me for a few years to come.
Go out there and explore what the car can do, not what you can do, but what the car can do.
I’m off to Snetterton on Friday so I’m eager to try my new toy.
I’m sure you will have sooooooo much enjoyment at learning what the car can do… I know I will.
