DSC’s Stephen Errity arrived in the Middle East a little worse for wear this morning following a sleepless overnight flight, but there would be no easing into things – after an ‘interesting’ drive from the airport in DSC’s asthmatic (and rather elderly) Toyota hire car the first item on the agenda was a lap of the Bahrain International Circuit in the passenger seat of an altogether different beast from the Toyota range, a Lexus ES350 hybrid piloted by Toyota LMP1 man Nicolas Lapierre.
Howls of protest from the front tyres through the tighter corners confirmed that the portly luxury saloon was perhaps not the ideal choice for an attacking lap of a deceptively technical track, but Monsieur Lapierre’s insightful observations more than made up for it.
Of particular note are the incredibly tight turns one and ten, as well as the disconcerting blind uphill approach to nine, with the apex almost jumping out at you as the car crests the rise. “It’s really, really difficult to see from our cockpit,” notes Lapierre. Threadneedling a prototype through these sections must be thankless work, but there is reward for Nicolas and his colleagues in the form of the sweeping turn five-six-seven and dramatic uphill turn eleven-twelve complexes. “Easy flat in our cars,” he says with a smile.
Seven hybrid activation areas, three properly ballsy braking zones and plenty of opportunities for tripping over lapped traffic – the Bahrain International Circuit is definitely not the dull desert wasteland some make it out to be
SE
