Thunderbolt Raceway Line and Video

[steveh]

You're right -- this whole discussion started around where you tracked out from 4 to enter 5.  The "conventional wisdom" says you should throw away a little speed in 4 to get a good set up and as much exit speed as possible in 5, and certainly in a DE context this would make the most sense (it's the way I drove it, and I expect most other DE'rs do too). 

It's just interesting to me that the racers take a different approach. There's a long thread on Trackpedia about whether there is just one "line" for every track, and about all of the exceptions that prove the rule, and this is one more example.  Maybe it's just the fact that they're in race cars, or that they're conscious of defending the corners, clearly not an issue in DE, but the Rolex and KONI Challenge guys all seem to have taken a less than optimal line through that combo.