Quote:
Originally Posted by TF110
Sounds good for the Lexus. So they haven't lost much aero performance? Looking good in testing too.
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The head of project at TRD (sorry, I've forgotten his name already) said that although the 25% downforce cut relative to this year's car had a negative impact, they expect to get a significant amount of that back from aero work in the off-season, so the deficit will be significantly lower than 25% by the start of the season. The focus has also shifted towards efficiency rather than outright downforce, particularly to avoid the cooling issues of the RC-F. TRD also have full use of the 50%-scale Furyusha wind tunnel (that was Dome's) whereas they could only use it 30% of the time for the RC-F.
With the LC500 already lapping Suzuka ~1s faster than predicted, the car's showing stronger pace than the TRD expected at this stage. If Nismo and HRC are making similar progress with the 2017 GT-R & NSX-GT, GT500 may not be slower even around the tighter circuits - the predicted time loss [for the LC500] around Okayama/Sugo is only ~0.8s/lap, and IIRC no car has tested there yet.