Discussion
There certainly seemed to be more build up to this than subsequent fanfare, but Raphaël Astier did fairly well at Pikes Peak yesterday. 9:17.412 put him 3rd overall behind two considerably pottier creations, and differing class regs notwithstanding, a chunk quicker than the likes of Pastrama's Radford and Zwart's 935.
Quite a spread of times you could argue, but it was great to see - even if the charmingly low-rent coverage was a bit light on actual track action. Thought the car looked mega with the Super-Pursuit-Mode aero kit, and I loved the wheel covers.
Felt a bit proud despite it being nothing to do with me.
Quite a spread of times you could argue, but it was great to see - even if the charmingly low-rent coverage was a bit light on actual track action. Thought the car looked mega with the Super-Pursuit-Mode aero kit, and I loved the wheel covers.
Felt a bit proud despite it being nothing to do with me.
ooh a scandal:
Hi everyone.
Ok let's go, it's time to talk about the scandal of the organizers who at the last moment, seeing the enormous performance of the Alpine A110 GT4 Evo + ASTIER, changed it from its normal category which was "Time Attack 1" to place it in the freest of prototypes that the A110 is not (I remind you that the A110 here is entirely derived from the commercial sport car A110) ¨Pikes Peak Open". I'll teach you the real reason here on the organizers channel.
The cars that usually dominate the "Time Attack" class in victories and the best historic chrono are Porsche 911 Cup or ClubSport 4RW.
Porsche, which is one of the main sponsors of this race Pikes Peak, remember that...
As soon as the organizers understood that the Alpine A110 GT4 Evo was going to crush all the Porsche in the "Time Attack" and in addition beat the record for this category held by a Porsche, something impossible for them to see due to the importance of Porsche as sponsor for the race, and also because Alpine is French, and for the very WASP organizers of the race (therefore Francophobes by education), it was impossible and a sacrilege to see a Porsche beaten by a French car...
To avoid all this, the organizers therefore at the last moment found a false pretext on the aerodynamics of the A110 to make it pass from its normal "Time Attack" class to that which is not normally its class of ultra-powerful quasi-free prototypes and without rules "Pikes Peak Open" which sometimes have 3 times the power of the A110!
2WD, 500hp "only" against Pikes Peak Open class cars which are often 4WD and have up to 3x more power than the A110, the organizers probably thought that there at least the A110 wouldn't exist...
But the racing Alpine car have always been for over 60 years, they are very high level chassis, they have a contained mass and therefore a very good weight/power ratio, they are furious and very dynamic "small engines" + here a very high-level driver like Astier. And so, the A110, although much less powerful, nevertheless crushed everyone even in this "Pikes Peak Open" class except a racing Ford Van prototype which had 3 times its power!
Congratulations Alpine and Astier, contract fully completed! And thanks to you, justice has won against cheating.
Hi everyone.
Ok let's go, it's time to talk about the scandal of the organizers who at the last moment, seeing the enormous performance of the Alpine A110 GT4 Evo + ASTIER, changed it from its normal category which was "Time Attack 1" to place it in the freest of prototypes that the A110 is not (I remind you that the A110 here is entirely derived from the commercial sport car A110) ¨Pikes Peak Open". I'll teach you the real reason here on the organizers channel.
The cars that usually dominate the "Time Attack" class in victories and the best historic chrono are Porsche 911 Cup or ClubSport 4RW.
Porsche, which is one of the main sponsors of this race Pikes Peak, remember that...
As soon as the organizers understood that the Alpine A110 GT4 Evo was going to crush all the Porsche in the "Time Attack" and in addition beat the record for this category held by a Porsche, something impossible for them to see due to the importance of Porsche as sponsor for the race, and also because Alpine is French, and for the very WASP organizers of the race (therefore Francophobes by education), it was impossible and a sacrilege to see a Porsche beaten by a French car...
To avoid all this, the organizers therefore at the last moment found a false pretext on the aerodynamics of the A110 to make it pass from its normal "Time Attack" class to that which is not normally its class of ultra-powerful quasi-free prototypes and without rules "Pikes Peak Open" which sometimes have 3 times the power of the A110!
2WD, 500hp "only" against Pikes Peak Open class cars which are often 4WD and have up to 3x more power than the A110, the organizers probably thought that there at least the A110 wouldn't exist...
But the racing Alpine car have always been for over 60 years, they are very high level chassis, they have a contained mass and therefore a very good weight/power ratio, they are furious and very dynamic "small engines" + here a very high-level driver like Astier. And so, the A110, although much less powerful, nevertheless crushed everyone even in this "Pikes Peak Open" class except a racing Ford Van prototype which had 3 times its power!
Congratulations Alpine and Astier, contract fully completed! And thanks to you, justice has won against cheating.
Hoofty said:
Oh I'm with you, fear not! Apols for all the qualifying statements, this is just, y'know, the internet, so in before any joy policing... 
Found the onboard from the run
Starts around 40s in. Great view at 7:50 ish, and a squeaky bit at 9:45. Mega.
Nick
Some very cool left hand only steering going on in there. Great vid.Found the onboard from the run
Starts around 40s in. Great view at 7:50 ish, and a squeaky bit at 9:45. Mega.
Nick
LGC-Adams said:
Did anyone else hear the Pundit on the original live feed say...."it's looks so small", when the car was on the start line. Think he WAS being complimentary.
........just what we all know and love about it .
Ha, I did hear that - then not much later I noticed how much of the track width Astier was using/able to use, and wondered how much time he'd get from that alone. ........just what we all know and love about it .
You can, after all, keep making a car wider to make more grip, but then within a fixed road width, you need to generate more grip because your wider car has to describe tighter corner radii than a narrower one, reducing that advantage...
a110au said:
ooh a scandal:
That true, the class change? I'm not up on the class regs but now you say it, it was certainly the closest thing to its road car origins at the top of the time sheets (I love that E36, but there's very little E36 left in it ) - so yes, does seem a bit more time attack than open. I'll read up on the regs. Think this only makes the Alpine time even more impressive! wow... 3rd is a great result. i just looked at the 2 cars in front and they are anything but standard. A single seater F1 style car and a 1000+bhp electric 'van'
I would be interested to know why the Alpine was thrown out of the 'Time attack' class and put in with the 'unlimited' boys? Does anyone know much about the technical make up of the Alpine, how much of it is actually what you and me drive around in?
I would be interested to know why the Alpine was thrown out of the 'Time attack' class and put in with the 'unlimited' boys? Does anyone know much about the technical make up of the Alpine, how much of it is actually what you and me drive around in?
wow... 3rd is a great result. i just looked at the 2 cars in front and they are anything but standard. A single seater F1 style car and a 1000+bhp electric 'van'
I would be interested to know why the Alpine was thrown out of the 'Time attack' class and put in with the 'unlimited' boys? Does anyone know much about the technical make up of the Alpine, how much of it is actually what you and me drive around in?
I would be interested to know why the Alpine was thrown out of the 'Time attack' class and put in with the 'unlimited' boys? Does anyone know much about the technical make up of the Alpine, how much of it is actually what you and me drive around in?
neil-g8km6 said:
Aha! Dated 2nd May, specifically mentions design for Time Attack 1 class, thanks...Peter.R said:
wow... 3rd is a great result. i just looked at the 2 cars in front and they are anything but standard. A single seater F1 style car and a 1000+bhp electric 'van'
I would be interested to know why the Alpine was thrown out of the 'Time attack' class and put in with the 'unlimited' boys? Does anyone know much about the technical make up of the Alpine, how much of it is actually what you and me drive around in?
There's a bit in this article on the makeup of the car, which chimes with what the Signatech guy said when interviewed on the live stream. Basically an A110 GT4* with R-GT bits, new (big!) aero and a lot of mapping on the engine to deliver power at altitude:I would be interested to know why the Alpine was thrown out of the 'Time attack' class and put in with the 'unlimited' boys? Does anyone know much about the technical make up of the Alpine, how much of it is actually what you and me drive around in?
https://www.motortrend.com/features/alpine-pikes-p...
All sounds very Time Attack compliant to (non-expert) me. A110au's post above suggests it was pulled up on aero - I've not found any more on that yet. At any rate, Alpine seem happy enough with the result given there's been no appeal of any kind.
'* According to this old Top Gear article that's road car body/chassis/engine with race cage/brakes/dampers/aero and gearbox: https://www.topgear.com/car-news/geneva-motor-show...
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