wallypiper
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A suggestion for racewatching at Barber:
Don't bother staking out a single area. You will end up wanting to go watch somewhere else. Barber is not condusive to watching from one spot because you can't see much of the track from any one spot. They run a shuttle around the track during races.
Good spots are:
On the hill looking over the downhill/uphill run leading to pit-in (turn numbers are screwed up at Barber, it depends on who you ask.)
On the hill looking down at T2 and the run uphill to T4 (OK, these turns are pretty much the same for everybody.
The backstraight, where the map is marked.
Barber is a great track to ride but, IMHO, is one of the worst spectator tracks ever. There is no place for spectators to watch the front straight, turn one, T5 (the hairpin), the "rollercoaster", the chicane on the back straight. It really sort of sucks. The best places on the track to watch are only visible from very limited spots that get hopelessly crowded on race days. This is one of the reasons, I imagine, that MotoGP has not embraced the place. There are other reasons, but MotoGP wants to attract huge crowds and those folks have to be able to see the damn race. If they really want Barber to get duty as a spectator track for professional racing, they need to do a lot to improve spectator access.
Not saying "don't go". Just that you will get bored watching the pros exit the chicane and scream past you over the top of the hill. You will not see any passing there among the top riders unless somebody makes a mistake in the chicane, and even then you don't have a very good view of it. Plan to move around.
Don't bother staking out a single area. You will end up wanting to go watch somewhere else. Barber is not condusive to watching from one spot because you can't see much of the track from any one spot. They run a shuttle around the track during races.
Good spots are:
On the hill looking over the downhill/uphill run leading to pit-in (turn numbers are screwed up at Barber, it depends on who you ask.)
On the hill looking down at T2 and the run uphill to T4 (OK, these turns are pretty much the same for everybody.
The backstraight, where the map is marked.
Barber is a great track to ride but, IMHO, is one of the worst spectator tracks ever. There is no place for spectators to watch the front straight, turn one, T5 (the hairpin), the "rollercoaster", the chicane on the back straight. It really sort of sucks. The best places on the track to watch are only visible from very limited spots that get hopelessly crowded on race days. This is one of the reasons, I imagine, that MotoGP has not embraced the place. There are other reasons, but MotoGP wants to attract huge crowds and those folks have to be able to see the damn race. If they really want Barber to get duty as a spectator track for professional racing, they need to do a lot to improve spectator access.
Not saying "don't go". Just that you will get bored watching the pros exit the chicane and scream past you over the top of the hill. You will not see any passing there among the top riders unless somebody makes a mistake in the chicane, and even then you don't have a very good view of it. Plan to move around.