Quote:
Originally posted by Pilgrimage
It was without a doubt bloody fast, but was it at the limit?
My point was that i'm not sure that the cars are being pushed as hard as they once would have been.
|
Undoubtedly, they are. You don't detune the engine, any more than you have to to ensure it lasts the distance, or set the throttle stops to 95%, or anything like that. Le Mans is more of a flat-out sprint for 24 hours than it ever was, certainly since I was first involved in 1981. The cars are tuned for fastest lap-time, which means running more wing than they used to (principally for better braking and lap-time consistency in traffic, as well has high-speed cornering), and that, together with the reductions in power from smaller and smaller restrictors, means lower top speeds. But the cars are being hammered ever harder. Better engineering has helped the reliability.
Andy