Grapevine: Ricardo does Monterey - Part 3

The Panasonic Toyota Racing team gave me a great car, with perfect Bridgestone tyres, and I was able to push it confidently - although the car still had to contend with the bumps, mostly in Turn 9, which I decided not to take completely flat-out.

We weren't aiming for a specific mark anyway, and I was just trying to go as fast as possible without taking any unnecessary risks.

Now let me take you though a lap of this challenging circuit.

It all begins at the main straight, were I reach 300km/h (185mph) in sixth gear, before braking really hard for the Andretti hairpin left-hander - a tricky, double-apex corner taken in second gear.

A small straight leads into a right-hander, Turn 3, also taken in second gear. Turn 3 is very slippery, with all four wheels sliding as I go around it.

Another small straight and another right-hander, Turn 4, a fairly quick corner. I manage to reach sixth gear very briefly before braking for Turn 5, a third-gear fast and long left-hander.

The straight that follows it is also short, and soon I'm braking again for Turn 6, a very tricky third-gear corner in which you can't see the exit from the braking point... You also can't see the apex because of a dip in the pavement.

Then the Rahal Straight climb begins, leading into the Corkscrew braking zone. The Corkscrew is a downhill esses, very unusual and complicated, because you can only see the apex for the first left bend; the right-hander portion is pretty blind. It's a slow corner, taken in second gear.

What follows is my favorite part of the circuit, the downhill straight leading into Turn 9 or the Rainey Curve, a fast downhill left-hander with significant banking, which would help the car carry a lot of speed if it wasn't for the fact that it's a bit too bumpy for an F1 car.

I was really bottoming out here when trying to attack it hard in my TF106. But it is the one part of the track, along with Turn 5 perhaps, where a great driver can make up a lot of time on a merely good one...

Turn 10 then is a short, third-gear right-hander leading into another small straight and Turn 11, a slow, first-corner left-hander, and then you're back into the main straight to finish a lap of Laguna Seca.

In all, it isn't a very fast circuit, because the straights are generally short.

Overtaking is also tricky; the braking zone for the Corkscrew would be the best opportunity I guess, and maybe you could pull it off before Turn 11, but definitely you'd have to force the issue a little bit to get it done there. But having said that, it's challenging and a lot of fun.

Racing being racing, the first thing people asked me after I dipped under the 1:07 mark was whether a lap in the 1:05 range would be possible. My honest answer is, I don't know.

But we've still got one set of new tires to put on the car this weekend, which means anything's possible....