Grand Sambuc

Pitlane exit leads to the main straight on the left hand side, but when already on track you want to stick to the right hand side all the way down the long straight line until you make it to the right bend, which is full throttle, that you exit letting the car go smoothly to the left for the right hairpin at the end of the straight. On the straight wind gusts can upset our cars, so you want to keep right side course while leaving a bit of play in the steering wheel to copensate for the wind.

The right hairpin at the end of the main straight is a classical one: dive deep on the left near the armco, late turn it and late apex on most cars in 2nd gear. However, as the exit line widens somewhat and the exit curb is flat, you can benefit on some cars of having a slightly earlier turning point and apex than usual.

You then head in direction of the first S bend, you want to be on the right hand side to turn very sharply to the left for the first S section, cutting speed and keeping close to the left hand side at the exit to allow an early acceleration and little steering wheel movement to the second part of the S bend. This is a classical case of slow in, fast out, you are already on full throttle between the two corners of the S bend and runing wide at the exit on the flat curb.

The next S bend is somewhat more different and you have also to consider 3 corners and so to include the one after the S bend. Therefore, you want rather to start the S bend at the middle of the track and head to a quite early apex on the left, trying to make as few as possible steering wheel movement to get to the next right hander which has flat curbs you need to target. You are on full throttle again between the two corners of the S bend and you exit it runing wide on to the apex (flat curb) of the third left hand corner, switching gears up.

You then enter a small hill section with a blind corner. You have to brake before the summit and turn BEFORE to point the wheels exactly where you want to go downhill before the summit or you will end up in the gravel trap. In fact, you want to give uphill a bit of left steer to head to the right hand apex/cone and once done correctly simply accelerate the car in a staight line to the turn-in point downhill. That corner is a sharp hairpin, you want to make it fast out, running wide, as that dictates your speed in the main straight (the very last left hand corner being full throttle and more taken like a bend while getting to the main straight line).

Words kindly provided by Claude Gonzales