What is Gurston Down’s Course like?
It’s fast! The course record produced an average speed of just over 85 mph and the fastest recorded speed over the finishes over 160 mph. The course starts downhill, dropping down to Hollow, where the fastest cars around doing around 120+ mph, round a sweeping left-hander of Little Hollow and Hollow Bend, braking very hard into the sharp and steep uphill section of Karousel. Speeds through Karousel are down to 25 mph. After the second right-hand part of Karousel there is a short straight with a bump, Deer Leep where cars and bikes can get a little air, before the hard left-hand corner of Ashes.. After Ashes, it’s uphill again to the finish.
SPECTATOR IMFORMATION:
Spectators have great access to the course. There are plenty of viewing points from the start line to passed Ashes bend. They also have full access to the paddock areas where cars, drivers, riders and bikes will be happy to chat and show you around their cars or bikes.
Event Days:
These usually run 0830 until 1700 with a break for lunch. Each car will usually have either three or four runs.
Practice Days:
These usually run 0830 until 1500 with a break for lunch. Each car will usually have three.
The Track
The Start is crucial to a good time, drivers striving to get just the right amount of wheelspin to get a good “launch”, and then they take the downhill plunge, a unique feature in England, accelerating rapidly up through the gears. A time of 2 secs to the 64 feet mark equates to an acceleration of 1G.
They pass through the first “speed trap” at the bottom of the hill, where the fastest cars reach over 130 mph, and then the deceptively difficult Hollow Bend looms rapidly. With a slight brow on the first apex and a radius alters around the bend, Hollow Bend is a high speed challenge all of its own.
Next comes the critical approach to the Karousel, which requires late braking on the ideal line to be well placed for the second part of Gurston’s slowest section, a very steep, sharp right hander.
This leads immediately to Deer’s Leap, where the most powerful cars can get airborne whilst approaching the braking point for Ashes Bend!
The left-hander at Ashes, a critical corner to a good time at Gurston, is a prime viewing point where you can see the drivers trying to prevent their cars running wide on the corner exit whilst attempting to get a good slingshot for the long drag over Burke’s Rise to the Finish, recently renamed Stones. This is the sting in Gurston’s tail, with a deceptive kink over the last few flat-out yards to keep the drivers alert until the end!
The Cars and Bikes…
Hillclimb cars come in three categories, split into smaller groups according to the rules of championship at a particular meeting, and then into classes according to engine capacity. The main categories are for production cars, sports racing cars and single-seater racing cars. The programme usually opens with production cars, divided into road-going or modified categories, and split again into ‘series’ (high production volume) and ‘specialist’ (low production volume), classes sub-divided by engine capacity.
More Details of Classes and Regulations
The sports racing category encompasses the Hillclimb Supersports class and the Sports Libre classes. These sports racing machines are purpose built racing cars with enveloping bodywork, or at least, enclosed wheels, and highly modified engines, aerodynamic wings and so forth, and they can and do challenge for FTD.
The single-seater racing cars come in all shapes and sizes, starting with the historic 500cc cars run to the 500 Owners Association rules. The modern equivalents, the 600cc racing cars, are powered by two or four-stroke motorcycle engines, and use a high power to weight ratio to produce remarkable performance. The 1100cc and 1600cc classes are also dominated by bike-engined cars, and there are some highly sophisticated machines competing nowadays.The 2000cc racing car class, until recently still the domain of the automotive-based engine, is increasingly being ‘invaded’ by supercharged and turbocharged bike engined cars of 1300-1400cc capacity, there being an ‘equivalency factor’ of 1.4 applied to pressure charged engines.
The pinnacle of four-wheeled hillclimb machinery is the unlimited capacity single-seater class. Many of these cars are propelled by ex-Formula 1 and Indycar V8 engines, some enlarged in capacity to generate more power and torque. Huge, soft “slick” tyres develop tremendous grip, and large aerodynamic wings and cleverly shaped bodywork generate aerodynamic downforce to help create even more grip. Every bit helps when you’ve possibly got over 650 horsepower, you’re doing maybe 140mph and the road is only twelve feet wide!
