by SuperSlab » Wed Feb 28, 2018 6:25 pm
Well, well, well, who'da thunk it!
But let's start from the beginning.
VTECFour Dan enlisted the help of a few of us to run the first leg of the Sprite proxy at Luf's Targa: this is the reason for my unusual mid-week racing opportunity. I thought this would be a great time to run the two Gunston combatants. And a quick recap:
The NSR Porsche had previously done a quite-brisk-but-not-staggering 6.680 second lap with this car.
The Fly Porsche is a brand new car that had never turned a wheel before today, so no benchmark lap time. But a similarly prepared Lucky Strike Fly 917 had done a VERY fast 6.508 second lap.
So: 6.508 was the time to beat.
First up: the NSR Gunston Porsche 917.
The very first few corners with this car confirmed it: the car is significantly improved from before. It was not just the outright speed but even more the smoothness and "drivability". It really runs very, very nicely now: a true NSR.
And it broke into the 6.4 second bracket! Only barely, but still: best of 6.493. This is very quick indeed and raised some serious doubts as to whether the Fly would be able to compete.
And then: the Fly Gunston Porsche 917
What can I say: this was a tall ask of a rather basic slot car: maybe a bit unrealistic to expect it to deliver. But hooboy, did it DELIVER! Like a 6.390 second lap delivery!
This is just extraordinary. Ridiculous. Stupendous. Absurd. All of that and more!
This turned out to be one of the best slot cars I have ever driven. Ever. It handles like it is on rails. Utterly predictable, blazingly fast in a straight line, gravity-defying handling and just a breeze to drive. This is a car with which you can turn 6.5 or better lap times time after time after time without terrors: it is that good.
I am really hard pressed to adequately describe how quick this is. Unfortunately we have only run one fastish proxy on this track since Luf had changed it: that was the Retro Racer TransAm that was run here late last year. That proxy had a handful of exceptional cars. And the best lap time we got out of the group was a 6.867 second lap with Radarek's excellent Camaro. The Fly Porsche was pretty much a full half second a lap quicker. And need I remind you: a half second per lap on a 6.8 second lap is a HUGE difference.
I have to say again: who'da thunk it...