Toscana

Toscana holds a place in Gran Turismo history as being the first track to feature realistic time cycles. It was at E3 2010 when the Italian countryside course featured these time cycles. Late afternoon became a starry night with the track shrouded in darkness. As for the track itself, get ready for an off-road challenge sure to throw you for a loop. When I usually think of Toscana, I usually think of Tuscany- home base to one of Olive Garden's culinary schools. But in the Gran Turismo realm, don't even think about Olive Garden here because you're going to be racing in Toscana rather than enjoy Olive Garden's delicious food. This blog post is all about Toscana.

PLEASE NOTE:
The blog post here is about the Toscana rally course and not any of the generated Toscana courses.

--- Toscana ---

At 2.12 miles (3.41 km) long and with 15 corners, Toscana is an imposing dirt circuit. It features a vast variety of corners ranging from sweeping long corners to tight and technical sections. There are a handful of elevation changes to keep navigating the track interesting. Do not be surprised if you spend most of your time on the outer edges of the track trying to keep your car stable in the corners. The time cycle at Toscana is beautiful in going from afternoon to evening to night. At night, be especially careful navigating this course. I would recommend you not race in Cockpit view in better seeing through the darkness. I especially would not recommend this view for cars that have cockpit views that obstruct the view above you (example: the Citroen C4 WRC in cockpit view).

It is tough to find speed early on in your lap around Toscana. You begin a normal direction lap with a quick chicane that leads to a sweeping right. That sweeping right leads to a sharp left. You must then try to build up enough speed to be able to slide effectively through an increasing radius right. That very long right goes uphill as you enter this zone. At the highest radius of this sweeping right, the radius decreases rapidly and goes downhill. The next section is a "W" like section. The first is a sharp left that leads to a smooth right-hand kink. That right-hand kink eventually leads to a somewhat sharp left. After clearing this sharp left, get ready to meet Toscana's super-sharp hairpin after a brief straight. Get full power out of the hairpin and set yourself up for a brief straight followed by a smooth kink to the left. A rather sharp left follows, and it is attached to a very sharp right-hand corner. Clear that section to make your run down the backstretch. A sweeping left-hand corner awaits you at the end of the backstretch. A long right follows after that. When you clear the long right, a sharp right-hand corner follows. A smooth right-left chicane leads to the finish line.

Lap times at or under 2:00.000 can be expected in some of the faster cars.

Video Preview.

This was the best one-lap video I could find that showcases the full course. This is more of a race than a lap completely run by just one driver. Still, you will get an idea as to what the course looks like:


^ "GT5 - 1 Lap (HD) - Toscana"

Do your best around this course!





That's all, folks! Thank you for reading!

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