MOUNTAIN PASS

Mountain Pass climbs and falls through 13 corners of tight switchbacks cut into a cliffside, with elevation changes that lift the car light over crests and compress it into dips. Guardrails line the outside — brush them and you scrub speed, hit them square and your race is over. Along the way the road bores through a lamp-lit rock tunnel, passes a roaring waterfall, runs under a swaying rope bridge and climbs toward a radio mast on the ridge.

It is a Hard-rated track where handling beats top speed: a grippy car like the Vento RS will out-run a faster Brute V8 here every time. Handbrake drifts are the intended way through the hairpins.

• Tap the handbrake at the entry of each switchback — a short drift rotates the car faster than steering.
• Never boost before a crest; land first, then hit nitro on the way down.
• Follow the inside line on blind corners — the outside always ends in a guardrail.