Grand Prize of America track at Hutchnson Island, Savannah, GA
This past weekend we had a relatively rare experience on December 3, 2016 at the Grand Prize Of America Avenue Track in Savannah with Jzilla Track Days. Back in the mid 90s, a group of Savannah businessmen convinced the county to build a 1.965-mile road to serve as a 10-turn circuit - apparently the first time a public road had been pre-designed with the intention of also using it for racing in the US. Little to no runoff, bumpy, and lots of concrete walls, but a heck of a fun track to drive. It only held one Indy Lights race, the Dixie Crystals Grand Prix in 1997, before falling into disrepair. The full track now only sees use a few times a year for special events, vintage and historic races such as the Savannah Speed Classic. (Majority of the blurb lifted from Kevin Patrick of Exomotive)
Here is a satellite view of turn 8, you can see how it is part of a public roadway:
The course is owned by the Westin Resort and part of the deal for getting the track was that we had to rent a block of 25 rooms. I stayed offsite, but next year they are going to try and negotiate a better rate, and if so I might stay there. It looked very nice.
This picture does not convey the banking or the amount of concrete walls, barriers, and bumps in the worst possible places (on the clubhouse back straight and leading into the braking zone into turn 3 after all of the high speed banking).
The driver's meeting was conducted from the back of a pickup truck during a track walk of the 2 mile course so we could see all of these features for ourselves. They said that the track was very wide, but once you are off the track you are out of room. They said the dangerous spots were first entering into turn 1, and the barriers at the outside exits of turn 8 and turn 9. I took it easy there, and by the second session when I was familiar with the track, it turned out not be an issue (at least at the pace I was running). After the track walk there was a 30 minute warmup session for all cars, under standing yellow, for folks to get used to the track. This was black flagged after one lap because a Lemons car racer (the same yellow and black one you will see in my video later) had its front left wheel fall off as soon as it got on track for the first warmup lap... I never did find out why, but since it was back on the road shortly I am guessing they forgot to torque that wheel?
My run group had 7-8 challengers in it, including the "regular" Hemi V8, the big 492 V8, and even a Hellcat. 2-3 of these cars were driven by very fast drivers, and the rest were parked in the corners but roared away on the straights... I overheard the organizer talking with them at lunch and they all got better with point bys later in the day. Also in this video a mustang loses it and after a short tankslapper goes off in turn 8.
That phone sure blocks the view from the camera I have mounted on the roll bar, but when I'm driving the camera doesn't obstruct the view at all. I also recently changed the FOV on my Mobius and so it didn't pick up the oil temp and pressure gauges for these sessions. It was around 60 outside and the water stayed right on the 180 and the oil temp never got over 220 so it was all good.
Here is the final session of the day, a combined Blue (my run group) and Yellow (the next group up which contained the Yellow/black Lemons car and several of the other cars that were passing/being passed in this video). This view is from inside the car, so you can see some of the speeds and g-forces (depending on how trustworthy the accelerometers and algorithms in Harry's Lap Timer/Android BLU Amazon phone are).
Right after I passed that yellow and black lemons car, my fuel light came on the next lap, so I let off and that string of cars all passed me again... I never really did pull much distance on them. This session had my best lap of the day, a high 1:37 when I was chasing the yellow/black car (the same one that the wheel fell off of earlier in the day)
Here is a view of my car from another car that passed me, a Viper. You can see me in this video starting at 3:28, I am the tiny speck up ahead of the challenger that gets larger and larger until I am passed. In my "defense", I always take 2 warm up laps before getting on it, but it wouldn't have made any difference here as these guys were on fire. I lift to let the Challenger by in the short passing zone but can't get them both by so I stay out of it (no brakes into the next turn which is usually a hard brake) until the Viper is by as well.
Here is a photo that was taken by Danny Sawyer, one of the other drivers, and it is now my favorite photo of the car, this is heading into turn 8 after the back clubhouse straight, and the suspension is heavily compressed and my front left tire only has a tiny bit touching the ground.
If they run this event next year I will probably be back. It was a lot of fun
I never really did pull much distance on them. This session had my best lap of the day, a high 1:37 when I was chasing the yellow/black car (the same one that the wheel fell off of earlier in the day)
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