It’s considered one of the most iconic racing tracks in the world, and we’ll be driving it as fast as we can at the Kyalami Extreme Festival this weekend.
It’s Round Two of the Toyota GR Cup Challenge, and the stakes couldn’t be higher.
Round one in Cape Town at the Killarney Racetrack was our first outing as GR Cup drivers, and my nerves only really settled after the qualifying round.
It was also our first race in the manual all-wheel-drive Toyota GR Yaris with the GR86 Development Academy youngsters and Dealer Challenge drivers in GR Corollas all going hell for leather at the same time.
Think of it as a traffic jam, but going as fast as you can.
16 corners
I reckon we now have a clearer idea of what to expect although surrounded by other cars all going for a podium place doesn’t make it any less daunting.
Kyalami has 16 different kinks, corners and bends and at 4.5 kilometres is the longest track we’ll be competing on.
At this stage of the season in the Media Challenge SuperSport’s Nabil Abdool is the driver to beat followed closely by Kyle Kock (CAR Magazine) with Phuti Mpyane (TimesLive) pushing hard as well.
Lawrence Minnie (Auto Trader), Charl Bosch (Citizen) and myself (Independent Media/IOL) have our work cut out but with more confidence no doubt we’ll be pushing hard in our GR Yarises.
I know it will be noisy and hot inside the car and also that I need to focus on my own race and not be too concerned about my rear view mirror and side mirrors being filled with another car wanting to pass or dive bomb me.
Rain, rain, stay away
I’ve also been watching in-car footage from around the track to get a feel for the corners and especially the right-hander at the bottom of Mineshaft which by all accounts is terrifying.
No doubt, everyone is holding their thumbs that the rain stays away because that will be an extra factor that will throw a rather large spanner in the works.
I’ll reacquaint myself with Car #60 for two practice sessions on Thursday morning. Friday sees one practice session in the morning and then qualifying in the afternoon.
Saturday, 20 of us will be chasing each other, going bumper to bumper and apex to apex for two races around a track that could well see a South African F1 race in the not-too-distant future.