Chomondeley Track Guide

It’s a really fantastic course at the Pageant of Power. it doesn’t climb quite as much as the hill climb course at Goodwood, but it’s very undulating and punishes any weakness in the driver or car.

1. Plenty of wheelspin off the line as you head towards the bridge. In the BAC Mono you’re just changing into second gear as you get there so it’s like a short 0-60mph sprint in front of the crowds.

2. For me this is the best bit because you can tell how conident the driver is. You can’t help but get a bit of air over the bridge so you have to watch out for under-steer coming out of here.

3. You then accelerate down Chestnut Avenue and head towards the two left-handers Lodge and Vicarage. They are pretty much 90-degree lefts, but as you’re going into the irst one the road bends to the right so you have to brake and turn. You’re braking pretty heavily so you’ll see the ABS kick in on a lot of the road cars. The Mono doesn’t have ABS, but it gives you so much feedback it’s quite easy to balance this.

4. You give it a short stab on the throttle between the two corners. However, you want to try to keep the weight on the front of the car, so you’re going to have to brake, even if it’s just a tiny bit. The weight’s then on the front for turn-in and you can get on the throttle nice and early for the long straight up towards the Chicane.

5. There are loads of different ways you can take the Chicane. I was changing it every run when I did it in 2011! The irst day I was there it was wet, and in those conditions you just want to be careful on entry so that you can get on the throttle on the exit. If it’s dry you want to carry as much speed into it as possible because it’s a shorter straight after the Chicane. You’ll see the rear of the car stepping out here on entry.

6. The road goes over quite a big crest on the Chapel left-hander and then it immediately dips again. Most of the road cars have problems here because they lose all the weight over their front wheels and then understeer towards the exit.

7. Lozenger isn’t really a straight, but it’s almost flat if you’re brave enough. It does tighten up, so you have to watch out.

8. Into the final part of the course and you’ve got a downhill braking zone here while bearing slightly to the right before the left-hander.

9. It’s not a very long straight after the inal corner and the longer-wheelbase cars have to lift before the bridge here. The rear of the car gets kicked up and then you can land quite heavily on the nose if you’re not careful. The Mono is very well-balanced over here, so I managed to take the bridge flat and get all four wheels off the ground. It’s then a short 50 metres to the finish!