ECRL: The Wonderhawks

by WildFire15

ECRL Round 4: Dodge Junction - Practice

Rainbow Dash stood in her race suit and boots at the front door of the team’s stable the next morning, gazing up at the towering snake like cloud structure they’d be racing around. The track was wide enough, but almost every inch of it was surrounded by wispy clouds as a catch net to prevent flyers who fell off course from hitting any of the grand stands, some of which were made of more cloud while others were raised wooden platforms.

The beginning of the start straight was at ground level, the lowest point on the track, before ascending slightly to the end, where the first corner was. It was a long-ish right hoof, slightly descending corner that led into a long, ascending left hoof corner. After coming around a full one hundred and eighty degrees it straightened out for a moment before turning left again and heading into the first of the track’s loops. It was an angled horizontal loop that exited towards a sharp upwards corner.

The track continued to ascend at a gradually increasing incline which she’d have to barrel roll around to get on top of before getting towards the top of the track, where it flipped back on itself in a medium length corner that led down a short distance into another hairpin. This brought them back up again before turning left and down towards the second loop, this one vertical. The loop exited into a fast right hoof corner before entering the long last left hoof corner.

The last corner, which came onto the bottom of the start straight, had no run off and instead let you get as close to the ground as you dared. If anything went wrong, you’d get a face full of sand and likely a few injuries.

Still, the constant climbs and descents meant she couldn’t use a full speed. Even in the sublime physical condition Dash was in she’d exhaust herself pretty quickly on the climbs if she pushed too hard for too long, while she had no choice but to maintain total control of her descents in order to avoid crashing and staying within the rings around the track which dictated the track limits.

She looked over at her team mates, who were distracted by different things. Lightning Dust was reviewing a track map while Spanner talked her through it, though she likely wasn’t listening. Meanwhile, Concorde was seemingly in two minds over what goggles to wear, either with slightly tinted lenses or with fully darkened ones.

While they weren’t going to spend as much time as they could going straight up and nearly facing at the sun, it would still be advisable to take the darker option.

Almost the moment she’d made up her mind, a pair of dark goggles levitated in front of her with unicorn magic. After a moment of surprise she looked over to see Ratchett was stood beside her.

“Trust me, these are the ones you’ll want.” He stated.

“Thanks.” Dash smiled, taking the goggles and looking through them.

“Are you ready?” Ratchett asked, in his usual ‘no nonsense’ mind set when Dash was about to go out on track.

“Naturally. How long until practice starts?”

“Two minutes. Your helmet’s on the table so let’s get you kitted up and out there.”

***

Rainbow Dash, Concorde and Lightning Dust made it to the end of the pit lane in order to join the queue of racers ready to start practice. They could hear the currently small crowds whooping and cheering as they could see the racers prepare themselves, with a few hats tossed into the air from the grandstand on top of the stables, Riggwelter taking a moment to return one of the hats that landed near him.

Soon enough the green flag was waved and the racers flew out onto the track, joining it mid-way through turn two. Concorde was feeling confident about the track, even if his top speed hadn’t improved much. The sweeping corners, climbs and descents had a few things in common with his home track of Windy Valley.

Turning to fly up through the rising turn two wasn’t too dissimilar to flying up the valley, but it curved far more and forced him to roll around the snake like main track’. The short straight between turns two and three was just assay long enough to require Concorde to straighten up before heading into the first loop.

As he flew through it, he took a few moments to look around to see how much of a view he could get both behind and ahead. He couldn’t really see directly behind, but he could see who was two second or more behind him, which could potentially prove useful if he was being chased down or trying to escape someone.

It wasn’t long after exiting the loop that he encountered the hairpin bend that started the second ascent up the track. The track defining rings were quite tight now he was on it, trying to ensure the racers stayed close to the track but gave enough room between the track and the track limits to slip above and below opponents for overtakes. It would give plenty of overtaking options but make defending difficult.

As he exited the hairpin, going around a slow moving Aperto Jnr, he barrel rolled around the track to get on top of it before heading up the increasing incline towards the top of the track. It was a long climb, but staying this side of the track set him up for the top corner, which he flew on the underside of upside down. On the exit he barrel rolled around to his right again to get on top once more for the second hairpin. Again on the exit he barrel rolled around the track to get upside down underneath it as it curved back down, though he had to alter his position slightly as he entered the second loop to get the best line.

The downward loop was trickier then the horizontal one as he had to control his speed as he entered. If he took too much speed he’d end up hitting the track, but he needed to keep enough to do the loop fast enough as he felt his momentum taper towards the end of the loop, some two hundred and seventy degrees through it, on this first attempt.

The right hoof corner immediately upon the loop’s exit invited a lot of speed and, after losing so much Concorde was inclined to hurtle into the corner as fast as possible, but he realised early on he was taking too much speed and threw his wings out to slow down, moving to the side to avoid flying into the track as it turned away.

He looked over his shoulder as he headed back towards the racing line that led into the final turn, an equally inviting corner, and allowed the quicker flying Wildfire to pass him. He followed her through the corner, taking care in case she backed out from taking too much speed but they both got through without issue.

The actual cloud track disappeared as they reached the ground at the beginning of the start straight, starting again at the back of the grid before it steadily ascended to the first turn. The straight wasn’t long enough for supersonic speeds, but it was long enough to worry Concorde as they approached turn one, the sheer number of potential lines worrying him further as he rolled around to get on the inside of the track.

As he went through the corner, he realised just how quickly turn two came up and realized his positioning fully on the inside of turn one meant he had further to go to get to the inside of the much longer turn two. By the time he’d moved back into position Wildfire had already gained over a second on him, for what it was worth in practice.

He completed a few laps of the track, passing Wildfire on his third full lap as he was able to climb faster than her which put a bit of a smile on his face. He pulled into the pits entrance, midway through the final corner, and saw Maffett run over to the stable as he slowly glided in.

“Not too bad, you’re seventh.” She told him as he pulled his helmet and goggles off.

“Anything in particular standing out.” He asked.

“Not yet, you’re not doing anything massively different to anyone else.”

“What’s the gaps?” He asked, checking the timing screen at the back of the stable which Fleetfoot was watching.

“You’re only three tenths of the fastest time at the moment.” Maffett replied, though that became four tenths as Rossi put in a faster time.

“Looks like it’ll be close. Wildfire couldn’t keep up with my climbing speed so I might have more of a chance.”

“I told you you didn’t need to worry.”

“And I’m sure you’ll remind me at every opportunity.”

“Only when it’s really inconvenient.” She smiled.

Concorde considered a response, but his attention was grabbed when he noticed the fastest time for the third sector drop by nearly two seconds. He looked at it in surprise, before turning into shock at the fact it was Lightning Dust who set it. It put her fourth fastest overall but it likely meant her first and second sectors weren’t particularly great.

Without a word he, Maffett and Fleetfoot left the stable and stood on the pit wall next to Ratchett and Spanner, the team boss picking up a pair of binoculars to see what Dust was doing. They spotted her at the top of the track, taking an unnecessarily wide line into the hairpin before getting back on line on the way down.

They followed her through the second loop, thinking as she turned into the penultimate corner that she’d hit the track with the sheer amount of speed she was taking. They held their breath as she hurtled past the track, coming close to touching one of the track limit rings as she pulled up but staying just within before heading into the final corner.

As she finished her lap and disappeared through turn one, they overheard Spanner answered a question over the radio from her.

“You’re fastest.” He said simply. “But everyone in the pit lane was watching.”

Concorde looked around to see quite a number of the other racers had indeed been watching before heading back to their stables. Picking up on what others were doing to do a fast lap was essential in racing and it seemed Dust had just given everyone an early heads up as Concorde joined those getting ready to go back out on track.

***

At the end of the session Dust sat looking at her times, irritation sketched into her face. Ten minutes into the session she had been the fastest, but at the end of the session she was back down in fourteenth.

It had been an amazing feeling knowing something that no one else did, much like when she performed her secret signature move, but now everyone else knew it and were copying.

“Don’t look so annoyed.” Spanner offered. He was sat with her going over her times. “Your climb speed’s good, as is how you’re handling the long corners. You’re only a second down on the fastest time, which is a really impressive rate of improvement.”

Dust just sighed in response. With so many cloud structures around her it was difficult to keep track of exactly where she was on the track. More than once she’d found herself surprised to actually be in one of the loops while most of the long corners blended into each other without standing out. She wasn’t fond of the hairpins though, nor some of the downward corners.

“I think you might have gone a bit too soon with the wider line in turn eleven.” He stated.

“It was your idea.” Dust said hotly.

“I doubt me and Ratchett were the only ponies to realise. Somepony was bound to figure out that line at some point in first practice.”

“He knew too?”

“We worked it out together, though I don’t know if he told Rainbow yet.”

That was at least a silver lining of some sort, the fact she had beaten Dash. Concorde was still somewhere near the top of the table, but she’d wheel him in in time. Still, Dust wasn’t sure how to feel about Spanner colluding with Ratchett.

“Did you tell her?” Dust asked, indicating to Maffett.

“No, she doesn’t like us giving her advice even though she could use it. Bit like you, in that regard.”

Dust wasn’t amused by the sniped remark nor by being compared to anyone else. She found the Yorkshire mare to be annoying, her voice especially and being compared to her annoyed her further.

“Regardless Dust, you did well in that session. We’ll need to work on the hairpins, as well as your consistency, but I think you’ve got good pace and a good chance, possibly even for points.” Spanner offered as Dust got up and headed for the stable door to look out.

She had to admit as she gazed up, though not out loud, that she was actually quite enjoying this particular track. It actually required some form of athletic movement rather than just flying straight and banking occasionally. She wanted more than just miserly points, but maybe this was the track where things would start going to plan.