So yeah, I kinda got wrapped up last week and wasn't able to do my weekly TDT, although I did race it and make a review video. Last week was the Audi R18 GTI prototype and this week was the ridiculous Koenigsegg Agera R. The reviews are below:
Audi R18 GTI
So, last week was the Audi R18 - a 24hr of Le Mans prototype contender. From a looks point of view, well, it had 16 headlights...... it was very strange and my sentiments are about the same for the driving style. The rev limiter is *very* low, and pretty much as soon as you got onto the power, you had to shift up again. To put it into context, the rev limiter is 5000 rpm - the rev limiter in my Mini is 7000! In practice, what it means you need to take a whole different approach to driving a track. Generally, one thing that is conserved between cars racing on the same track is that the gear you take on the corners is usually the same. Sure, the speed is different, and you can take a different line or have a different braking point, but the Evo and the Indycar both the first corner at Watkins Glen in 2nd gear! In the Audi, however, you don't (except in the first corner at Watkins, so perhaps that was a bad example :p)! Because you are shifting alot earlier, you end up upshifting in the middle of the corner, which can destabilise the car mid-turn. So you have to relearn all the gears on a track from scratch for this car. Another thing about the gearing is that because you are upshifting so early, it lures you into a false sense of security that you can just slam on the power because you are in a high gear and consequently you'll end up exhaust-forward if you're not careful coming out the corners.
Another point of contention for me was the brakes. While it's not easy to lock up, the car becomes very unstable on braking and can make setting yourself up for corners very tricky! Overall, once I got to grips with the car, I found the car to be very fast, and it topped the tables at Bristol, Martinsville and Watkins Glen, and came a close second at all but Daytona. Sadly, I don't think I enjoyed the car enough to really recommend it and I spent most of the laps living in fear of the brake and accelerators. Which ties me nicely into (and you'll see why in the video):
Koenigsegg Agera R
This car made me sad. Having seen Top Gear once upon a time, I knew the presenters were very keen on the Koenigseggisseggggnignigsegigisegggnigseggniggsegg......... erm Koenigsegg, and I know it's a seriously fast car. With 850 kW of horsepower and 1627 NM of torque, the Agera R doubles the stats of all of the Test Drive Tuesday cars to date. With a 7 speed semi-sequential gearbox, this car has a top speed of 273 mph, so you would be forgiven for thinking it would blow all the other cars away. But when I saw the stats, that amount of torque sent alarm bells off in my head, and indeed, it was all too good to be true. The car is in fact *so* powerful, you can barely lay down the power without spinning out. Even as high as 4th gear, it's all to easy to spin out in a straight line. This trait meant that sadly, it is actually the SLOWEST of all the TDT cars I've driven, except for Daytona.
Even at Daytona, the fastest track in the game, you cant get close to the top speed of the car, with ~250mph being about the fastest I ever got. In fact, it was only AFTER I closed the game to write this did I discover it has a 7th gear. There is no possible way I could have used it on any track I visited though as it was just too fast. One oddity I did notice was that gears one and three were fairly standard, but gear two is a very very short gear, which took a little bit of getting used to!
Ultimately, this car could definitely go much much faster of these courses, but without traction control on, I'm not the one to do it and the best I could manage is very much sub-par for this car. As you can tell from the vidoe, I ended up getting very very.... I can't even say frustrated - just angry with this car! It wasn't a particularly enjoyable day, and I'm no hurry to purchase it!
No comments:
Post a Comment