We had the opportunity to drive with Club M France at the Le Vigeant circuit, also known as Circuit du Val de Vienne.
Early July and on a weekday, it wasn't possible to get a big chunk of the Team together, so we made the trip as a small group.
We met up with a few acquaintances and some other tuning professionals there.
Yann's Civic FK8 and Mike's M3 E92 were the only ones there for this discovery trackday on a track known as a training circuit and a very technical one.
After the reconnaissance lap, the layout isn't hard to memorise: it's flat and offers a wide variety of corners. Some corners have telling names that make the difficulties clear from the outset = the Trop Vite (too fast) and the Trop Tard (too late) being the most famous.
The differences between the 2 cars quickly become clear: the front-wheel drive is agile and gets through the slow, tight sections with no trouble at all thanks to its ultra-effective limited-slip diff, while the rear-wheel drive swallows the big sweepers and other much faster sections more easily.
But overall the layout really tests you, and it has plenty of traps and subtleties that make a change from a simple parabolica, or from the left-right chicanes you blast through like a wild boar, riding every kerb in sight!
On this layout, the idea of sacrificing a corner is essential if you want to set a decent lap time. Forget the kerbs, which are more like pavements than kerbs (we thought of our motorbike friends who ride there... no room for error, because it won't forgive).
Another thing that will throw some people off is the number of blind corners. There's little visibility, so you can't do much with your eyes, and a good number of apexes are blind. So you need to find braking / turn-in markers and a rhythm to be consistent and improve.
While the straight may feel long for cars with more modest power than our 400 hp track tools, the slow, twisty section will easily make up for it.
Worth noting that the circuit has very good facilities: a hotel in the sports complex, a restaurant, large modern paddocks, a petrol station 5 km away, a big car park for trailers... for what you get it isn't that expensive, but its location may put more than a few people off.
The trackday ran as one of the most successful in a long time, with a mindset perfectly suited to this type of day: fun and good company, and while everyone chases the clock, it's always in a gentleman-driver spirit.
That's why we try to favour this type of day. They're not always the cheapest, but the quality of the driving you get there always tips the balance in their favour. It's an expensive hobby, too expensive to ruin a day over a few tens of euros given the overall budget for the day.
A circuit we can't wait to go back to, but with the Team friends, for fun.
The Team's little tip if you're driving there for the 1st time:
an abrasive circuit for tyres, demanding on the brakes at the end of the straight (around 240 km/h with the M3 and barely less with the Civic). Check your consumables and fluids carefully, and if possible always bring a spare set of pads (even €40 Ferodos... enough to get you home).
Photo credit: https://www.spyk-photo.fr/
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