Weekly Roundup: Understeer At The Limit Edition

When is a $117,000 Lotus three seconds a lap slower around Mid-Ohio than a Honda Accord? When the Accord is a caged race car on Toyo Proxes RR slicks and the Lotus is in street trim on Michelin Pilot Sports, naturally.

The above video is from the twilight session that ended my cross-country, two-track Evora torture test. It was a "torture test" for me, not the Lotus, which had no trouble whatsoever. I'm getting a little old to run two trackdays in a row with eleven hours of freeway driving and four hours of sleep in-between.

As you can see, the Evora UNDERSTEERS AT THE LIMIT a tiny bit. But a more attentive and rested driver would have done a better job of mitigating that. For a comparison video, you can check Ralph Gilles in a Viper ACR on Pirelli World Challenge slicks; he runs 7.8 seconds faster around the same track layout, reaching about 20mph more on the back straight and 10-15mph more between each of the turns. I'm sure Ralph had a good time in his video --- I know I had a good time in mine.

In addition to the Evora test, I told R&T readers about what the West Virginia fracking boom is doing to their roads.

My Cycle World feature on the Yamaha FZ-1 is now available online.

I didn't write anything for TTAC this week, but brother Bark discussed the disappearance of Ford cars.

Tomorrow, right here at Riverside Green, we will be covering one of my all-time favorite cars --- the early downsized Oldsmobile Ninety-Eight. Come on back, why dontcha?