Secrets Of Speed: Unfair Advantage

unfair advantage is every racer secret dream a special bit of technology that gives you such superior speed that you're literally able to blow the doors of the competition the term was coined by the late Mark W who enjoyed such an advantage in his turbocharged Porsche 917 that dominated can-am racing and seven new speed records in the early 1970s the engineering genius behind this awesome 917 was dr. Ferdinand piak the grandson and namesake of dr. Ferdinand Porsche shortly after achieving such great success with his 917 dr. theic left the ranks of Porsche and joined another German car builder OD his first challenge to his new engineers come up with a breakthrough idea an unfair advantage that will set out a apart from the pack to find such an advantage dr. px engineers look not to the future but to the past to a concept nearly as old as the automobile itself all-wheel drive the idea first appeared in 1902 but the hardware proved so cumbersome had found a home only in in elegant utility vehicles over the years innovators such as Bugatti Miller and Ferguson tried to apply the idea to racing cars but they're machines proved unruly difficult to drive the advantage eluded them then in 1967 the idea resurfaced at Indianapolis when Andy Granatelli introduced a radical turbine powered all-wheel drive machine and driver Parnelli Jones came within seven miles of winning the 500 before the failure of a trivial part sidelined him all-wheel-drive was soon banned from indie competition as being outside the mainstream of automotive design and racing engineers turned instead to aerodynamics in their quest for the unfair advantage in 1981 howdy engineers felt they had found the secret atlast a center differential a new way of distributing the power between the front and rear wheels they call their system Quattro to prove the worth of their new system they entered the World Rally Championship where a vehicle must demonstrate speed over some of the roughest slipperiest roads in the world if all-wheel drive would be an advantage it would be here Quattro's were showing their heels to the competition driver Walter röhrl describes the experience in oedipus like an exclusion ice skate maybe let's say like a rocket taking off that's how you could imagine it it's really nothing like ordinary acceleration sit back and enjoy altar girls balancing act driving at the limit of disease basically with these cars if you start thinking you're through slow what you need is a kind of sixth-sense little bit it has to be one step ahead the whole time with this car if you wait till something happens then it's too late you have to anticipate and all this talk you used to hear about driving by the seat of your pants if that's how you feel but the car is to waste then it's probably the last time you'll ever feel anything because if you wait that long you'll go off the road all-wheel-drive also required a different driving technique left foot braking to turn the car as waka roll demonstrates here that one camera and all set the fastest time on the stage for World Rally championships in the record book the Quatro turned toward America the target the Pikes Peak Hill Climb an event dominated by single purpose single-seat sprinters with rear-wheel drive American Rally Champion gone buckles first to try the Quattro here the Audi four-wheel drive very very important because when you have a lot of horsepower you need to get the horsepower to the ground and you'll see as that as the open wheel cars and even the stock cars when they start they spin their wheels furious this is very exciting but it doesn't get you to the top since 1985 French Rally Champion Michele Mouton drives a Quattro to overall victory at Pikes Peak trouncing over 60 conventional machines in the process you're always sliding one side the other side is like a ballet is like a dance and it's fantastic I'm not the guitar and I watched his love did a very good job in her driving the car was very very very much yet of anything that I've ever seen before Adi has done an awful awful lot of work on all-wheel drive and I saw things too just sounded thing and I started doing a lot of thinking a lot of talking about a study and trying to see the best way to come back and get the record back in the attorney seen him every time he's the that he's done this and the record that was set in 85 most of the people around here thought well it's that's about it that's if anybody's gonna go evidently of this car is even impresses him and he's hard to impress in 1986 unsurprised the Quattro for himself and since the fastest time network in the race to the clouds waterworld followed a year later with another record and since then every Pikes Peak winner has turned to all-wheel drive for their advantage next putting the power to pavement all-wheel drive had proven an advantage on dirt but wouldn't work on pavement by banked Talladega Speedway in a secret test Bobby unser makes an attempt at a world closed course speed record in a specially prepared Cointreau despite the aerodynamic disadvantage of the boxy four-door sedan he breaks 200 miles per hour and sets 10 new international speed records confident that they had an advantage here as well the engineers decide to enter a production based patro in the 1988 Sports Car Club of America Trans Am series it was also the first time the team drivers pearly Haywood and Hans cook had tried racing an all-wheel drive machine my competitors found they're going to be racing an Audi and they and they took a look at the car the first time they kind of laughed and said you got to be kidding this is a car that we raced it looks very much like the sedan that people can buy I in the showrooms everything was new to me and I thought to myself oh is that the right thing I might have towards the end of my career with 37 nevertheless we didn't know where we are till we came to the first practice in lungfish the first race the streets of Long Beach let's ride with Hans stuff because he makes his qualifying run five cylinder turbocharged Cointreau is no match for the more powerful v8 s on the straightaways its advantage comes in the tight turns I have to adjust my style of driving because trends and drivers are hardwired stuff powers they don't look right off in the mirror if you come from behind especially with a car like the Audi you can brake very late that they don't expect you to come so close to the brake so late oh right by the way was good the fourth starting position in the race Heywood surprises everyone with a second-place finish still most experts regarded this as beginner's luck then of a twisty Dallas Street circuit as track conditions begin to deteriorate and others were slipping and sliding Haywood uses a superior traction to record the first victory for an all-wheel drive system in such a major production car race the track was very slippery during the race and I just cruised around the car because of the all-wheel-drive system I could put it any place at the racetrack and get away with doing just about anything that if you tried it in the conventional car you would have crashed he follows with another victory on the streets of Detroit taking the lead on the very last lap then at Niagara Falls Rally Champion Walter röhrl tries his hand at road racing and runs away from the field making it three victories in the first five races meanwhile unstuck one of the fastest men in the world in a rear-wheel drive race car is still struggling to come to grips with the all-wheel drive system holiday I thought I have to innovate Howdy's paying me a lot of money so I look like a fool look at her win a race now suddenly he figured it all out and went on a tear first place Cleveland first place Brainerd of the three at the Meadowlands is secret it's a left foot braking you have this turbo lack you know when you go off the throttle and you go back on again it takes a little while before the turbine blades up some pressure so on these sort of chicane we don't have shift down I go on the brake with the left foot and stay on the throttle in the right so I still have my post pressure and then when I leave the brake off the car moves forward like a skyrocket this was all about it Ohio Ray ideal conditions for all wheel drive and Sunday morning when they got up at about 7 o'clock I saw the radio said crash that's what we need the other struggling to just stay on the rain-slicked track stuff enjoys a Sunday Drive just has always the feet on the ground fantastic collection and testy cornering very very good and with the four wheeler you know it was the experience of one my life we always had reflection could go the hill with all the cars lighting with the power on so just great fun I know the competition was beginning to feel that the Quattro's were enjoying a bit too much of an advantage they accused the team of sandbagging holding back in practice not showing their true speed then turning it on late in the race the other teams lobby for a rule change need all the help we can get to keep our Goodyear tires under our cars we don't have the advantage of the all-wheel drive bodies we can't go head-to-head with the Audi are the v6 is because of our added weight it's no way that we can run at the end of the race with the Audis I expect Constitution seal servers the Sports Car Club of America officials agree and decide something must be done to negate the all-wheel-drive advantage they handicap the Quattro's with additional weight smaller tires and a reduced turbo inlet but still isn't fazed Pete dowdy they can give us as many weight as they want they can restrict our tires as long we can run a four-wheel drive car we look very good even with the handicaps the quarrels prevailed and by season's end howdy had won the manufacturers championship and the hard charging stuff captured for first places the strategy my driving strategy is to go always 100% all as close as possible I stood in a racecar adjustable sometimes it's good sometimes it's good but if I'm as a professional racing that we have to be like this who's the steady Haywood however who brought home the drivers title this strategy was a bit different the championships are points game and you have to get the points in each race you have to protect you I found that it was very beneficial for me to make my move in the latter part of the race protect my car keep it in good condition and then make a charge in the latter part of the stage as my two teammates Hannes and Walter would do the charging for me and in many cases they were the competition out the Trans Am officials the Quattro's advantage seemed just a little too unfair they aren't invited back by next year coming up next the inside GTO in 1989 the Quattro's enter the insta GTO championship series where the rules and different the cars are allowed wider tires wide enough so that the others may have all the traction they need with just two wheel drive instant officials feel competent the all-wheel drive Audi's won't enjoy an unfair advantage here but the Audi engineers have no intention of giving up their edge to build a pair of exotic tube-frame cars complete with a space-age telemetry system to monitor every aspect of their performance we're all pretty much excited because as you know we haven't had a new car Ukraine chassis a new engine a fourth engine and then in the first official practice session we were almost floating off the pace and we were right there you could hear the stones falling down from the heart they were happy and pleased that the car is right with the pace they gave you on the streets of Miami despite strong competition from other high-tech factory teams we all wheel drive Quattro's again appear to have the upper hand impressing veteran ESPN commentator bill Adam in the process this car is doing things I have never ever seen any vehicle do look at this pulls the inside late-breaking look at the car lately stable under braking no problem at all the racing luck turns against the team both cars are forced out of the race the team must regroup we didn't finish Miami because our gearbox broke we found that we had too much horsepower for our gearbox and driveshaft and then I must say from my Miz the next race to Summit point there was only about nine weeks in between but what the Audi crew was able to achieve in these nine weeks was the maximum I've ever seen in my 20 years of racing they were working so bloody hard day and night I felt it actually working for some point we're gonna run longer than longer than than one hour sumit point the quadros not only run for an hour they go the distance finishing first and second it was that competition I was very very pleased to win the second place for for the Audion 89 after Sammy's point we went straight to mid-ohio believe it a lot another win which was a little bit of a problem with my friend Wally Dallenbach because I had him off the track which I do very very a few times in my life in my whole racing career but I had to I saw we were actually travelling both along side by side and I saw a small car almost stopping on the left side of the track and I had to move to the right not just not volley off and as I was spinning on 120 my speed and banging right and left oh Jesus Christ whatever done now and I was lucky to win the race in the end and on the podium I apologized immediately to Wally but I think still up to now he owes me one as things pretty much his own way running up a string of victories at Topeka sears point whitens Glenn lime rock than Laguna Seca and in some races like Sears Point toughest competition turned out to be his all-wheel-drive teammate early Haywood I was something like thirty seconds behind my leading teammate Hurley Haywood and believe me I had to take all the tricks I know to get him back and I got him to left on the end in a very strong maneuver by now still had clearly become comfortable with the car adjusting his own flamboyant driving style to the all-wheel drive system to adopt my driving style to always drive suspension in cars was not so easy because my style August was little bit spectacular like going sideways and people saying he has more flies and park sanda on the tortillas on the windscreen by driving so much sideways and it also helped me in my sports car a little smoother and more not so aggressive and not so how can I say not so twitchy driving style he proved everything it teaches you to drive a car smoother the secret of speed until you gotta have a sensor in a certain place of your body which is behind yourself you know what I mean and this sensor which you have which you must have been in the Popol as we say Germany I think this is the most important thing to go fast to feel the car sliding that's why I have no poster in my driving seat if you ever check this out you know I only have a little layer of some cotton or whatever it is so it's it's and it's and it's an ohmic stuff I don't want to have some poster in the city as I have not enough contact them this is I think so you must feel it with your back when the car starts to smell everything and this sensor is specially working under wet conditions wet conditions rain that can strike fear into the bravest of drivers what are drivers doesn't hate we took a somewhat different view it is the nicest feeling it is nicer than Christmas holiday birthday and doing everything together to pass a cougar on this on the outside of the corner yes that's a great feeling your own opinion it's so much fun driving these cars and when you can pass guys on the outside or the inside really doesn't make any difference and go by them with such speed that we have it's really it's tremendous fun how the advantage paid off at GMC truck we make you'll economy a priority before a single truck is built and our 1991 Sierra proves it with four-wheel drive get 16 city and 19 highway and with two-wheel drive models get an amazing 17 city and 22 Highway GMC truck it's not just a truck anymore it's quality on the road I am the soldier I am still then smart I've got a train I am a soldier rising to the challenge the resurgent Dave Winfield of the Angels is showing he still has some left in his back he'll face the homerun power of Cecil Fielder and the Tigers live at 8:00 Eastern on ESPN Sunday Night Baseball after a decade competition all-wheel-drive hat without a doubt proven itself to be an unfair advantage under all conditions outrunning the competition across the parched deserts of Africa up the ice-covered hours through the tight twisty streets of Dallas and around the high-speed curves of Laguna Seca get on any given day the Koch brothers really excels at raw speed their secret was different others were able to go out and set a blistering pace in the beginning the tracks usually get slippery as the race progresses tires lose their grip and when conventional cars were forced to slow down the Quattro but they're consistently superior traction went on the attack when the going got slippery twattle didn't they this proved to be fair unfair advantage their secret of speed people can go fast in a race car for one lap and they can beat the race car and use the curbs and bounce off of things and as they wear themselves down I just simply attack and you can do it so easily and so effortlessly and and they just don't know what hit them and we could spray our power over four different corners you know so our tires in the end lasted longer and when the conditions got worse with oil increase and some debris on the track we had a better traction on our car this gave us an advantage you

Channel: Alex Ranarivelo

Views: 1,169,125

Rating: 4.8727756 out of 5

Keywords: Audi (Organization), Quattro GmbH (Organization), Auto Racing (Sport), Rallying (Sport), Pikes Peak (Mountain), michele mouton, Walter Röhrl (Person), Turbocharger (Fuel Delivery Method), International Motor Sports Association (Organization), World Rally Championship (Sports League Championship), Grand Prix Of Long Beach (Location), Secrets Of Speed

Id: p10m0Jdk8tc

Length: 23min 38sec (1418 seconds)

Published: Sat Mar 08 2014

Reddit Comments

[u/ahalfdeadhorse]

Seems like the turbocharged I5 played a pretty big role in the Quattro's success and need for a different driving style as much as the AWD system. Loved the defence force recruitment ad left in.

[u/[deleted]]

Jeremy Clarkson did a great piece on the early days of rallying on TGT. Highly recommend it.

[u/mikasaur]

Another one of these self-promoters posting their own YouTube channel...