Paver Sets Slowest Lap Time in Track History as Laguna Seca Is Reborn

WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca is getting a total makeover: new pavement, a new pedestrian bridge, and some new buildings, as part of an approximately $20 million renovation. The pedestrian bridge at start/finish was torn down last November and replaced with an all-new structure for both pedestrians and golf carts. Repaving is going on right now, as a giant steam roller slowly circles the historic track laying down nice new asphalt for you to race on.

As you can see in the above video of the paver dropping down the Cork Screw, that work progresses at a snail’s pace. Watching the video, and assuming the width of one of those red and white curbing panels is, say, two feet, and it takes maybe 30 seconds to pass one curbing panel, and the track is 2.238 miles long (doing math) that would give the paver a lap time of 49.236 hours. The official course record for Laguna Seca was set by Alex Zanardi during the 1996 CART race at 1:10 in a Reynard 961. Your lap time is probably pretty close to that. The paver, less so.

Much work still lies ahead.