AIM Autosport: Halfway Home - Pirelli World Challenge Progress Report with Always Evolving Replay XD Nissan GT Academy
Exclusive by RaceCanada Staff
July 7, 2015
The Pirelli World Challenge Championship 2015 tour has now passed the halfway point of the season and AIM Autosport is coming off one of their best weekends so far with podiums in all three rounds at Road America a couple of weeks ago. Things seem to be coming together for the Woodbridge-Ontario based AIM as they come to grips with running a new car in a (for them) a new series.
In our continuing series, we asked AIM Autosport pricipal Ian Willis for some updates and how the team feels going into the final seven races of the year.
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RC: With a second GT win for James Davison on Sunday, and a fourth GTA win for Bryan Heitkotter on Saturday, has the competitiveness of the Always Evolving Replay XD Nissan GT Academy GT-R GT3 to this point surprised you in anyway?
IW: The main advantage of the GT3 platform is that all the FIA approved cars are homologated and the Balance of Performance (BoP) set based on racing experience in the various championships worldwide since 2011. The GTR has been increasingly competitive since it was homologated in 2012 but they have not had as many cars on the grid as other marques so it was hard to judge where we would stack up. To be running as well as we are with 2014 spec cars I must say we are pleased however it has been a challenge with such little lead time before the start of the season and having already run six events in the first three months.
RC: Davison has won at Barber and Road America, Heitkotter won on Saturday and doubled up at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park, do natural road courses favour the Nissan more than street courses?
IW: Certainly Nissan's experience with the car has primarily been on natural road courses in Europe so all the street course development has been done by us. With three of the first six events being on street courses it has been at the steep end of our learning curve on the car as well. I must say that we were very pleased with how we were running at Detroit as it was an indication of how we have progressed in learning the car. James should have been on the podium Saturday but for the splitter failure that affected both cars. Too bad Sunday was rained out as we truly felt competitive on a street circuit for the first time this season.
RC: With the series just past the halfway point, are there areas of the car you have identified that you will concentrate development on for the rest of the season?
IW: Our primary struggle to date has been getting the car to put the power down and come off the corner strong. The GTR engine is a monster and produces tremendous torque but the car is very front-heavy so there is not enough weight on the rear. This is something we can't change, it is the nature of the car design, so we have been focused on getting the car to turn in the corner and have it pointed before the drivers squeeze the throttle trigger! I would say this is where we have made the most gains to date. Now that we are the point of diminishing returns in that area we are focused on the cars electronic systems such as traction control, antilock brakes and specific to the PWC, launch control for the standing starts.
RC: Balance of Power is always a concern when sports car racing has different makes. With the number of different makes in the top 10 at Road America and the competitiveness of the Nissan, does that show that the Pirelli World Challenge has got the Balance of Power mostly correct in the series?
IW: BoP is never going to please everybody and because of the physical differences in the various cars that make up the GT3 category there will be tracks where you are competitive and tracks where you are not. Road America is a classic example with the long straights and the Bentleys definitely had the field covered on pace. That being said, Road America is a strong track for us and we were able to capitalize by executing well in the races. The only problem we had all weekend was Bryan's car broke its driveline at the start of race three otherwise we had an opportunity to podium all three races in GT and GTA.
You just have to get the most out of your package at each track, get the results at tracks that favour your car and minimize the losses at tracks that don't. I think the next step for PWC would be to adopt a similar system to what they use in the Blancpain series of using different BoP's for different circuits to better address the differences in each type of car. This is an added level of complexity and the Blancpain organizer (SRO) has the most experience with GT3 cars so they are leading the way. It looks like PWC is working more with the SRO in future so hopefully they will be able to apply some of the lessons learned to make it even closer from race to race.
RC: What is your biggest challenge for the rest of the season?
IW: Clawing back the points deficit we have to the championship leaders! So long as we continue to execute well during races and get the most out of our package we have the opportunity to win races. The drivers and team have been working very well together to get the most of themselves and the cars so we just need to keep doing what we have been doing.