D350 2003 Mini Cooper S – Racing Legends

The British Racing Legends Mini Cooper-S was BuzzDoggs first paint in Forza Motorsports 3 under the Tweaky Tuned banner. It had been sometime since his last effort in Forza Motorsports 2 and one can quickly see Buzz is always on top of his game.

Were real proud of Buzz and this legendary paint, which stands up to the best of paints almost a year later. In terms of design and racing history. The D350 Mini Cooper S was tuned by Tweakys lead tuner Dig it909, and we all like to take this little screamer out on Mazda Laguna Seca.

This historic racing themed paint features Jim Clark, Jackie Stewart, and Stirling Moss. It certainly is a pleasure to drive. The tune and paint are still located in the Tweaky Tuned storefront. So please dont miss out on one of Forza Motorsports 3’s truely classic Mini Coopers.

2003 Mini Cooper S

First Impressions: Tweaky Tuned put out excellent Minis in Forza2, so I had high hopes for this one. The paint they have for it is excellent, and looks fantastic ingame. It does pixellate badly in the big shots though, especially in the photographs. The tune is also top notch with loads of grip, and very forgiving even without any assists on.

On The Tracks: I decided to start a race series with the C Class World Tour, but the tracks in this were not really suited to a grip tuned car as they all have long straights where a speed tune would work much better. So instead I ran a different series which started at Catalunya School Circuit. The mini worked excellently and gave me a new PB for the track with a 48.074 putting me at #200 on the leaderboards. Not great laptimes, but at a track I’m still to learn with no assists that will do nicely.

The next track on the tour was Maple Valley Short Reverse, and after bashing past the computer controlled car which got off the line much quicker I could settle in for a couple of laps to see how I could get the car to go. The answer was very well thank you, it can hold very tight lines and carry a lot of speed into the turns. The best lap was a 43.025 and can be bettered in the Mini with some more laps. That still put me at #313 on the leaderboards though, another top 500 time for me then.

Motegi East is a longer track, and although I have lapped it many times in Forza Motorsports 2 I always used the braking line. So in Forza Motorsports 3 with the line off I am finding my braking points a lot harder to hit. Still after 2 laps it was in a strong top position at #822 on the leaderboards with a 1:35.677 laptime which will improve as I get tighter with the braking margins.

Maple Valley Short I did just to see where I could get with the Tweaky Mini and managed a 42.592 laptime for another top 500 (just) at #416 on the leaderboards. A good result I felt.

The Verdict: Tweaky Tuned have done it once again with another top class Mini tune and paint. An easy to drive car which can really fly around the short to medium tracks. Also works very well without assists, although the brakes will lock up without ABS you will be pulling them hard before they do.

The only gripes I would have would be getting off the line without TCS, but the car isn’t listed as a no assists tune so that’s not really an issue, but the jump between 3rd and 4th gears seems a mite large to me and drops a bit too low in the revs for my tastes. Still an excellent drive, and for those short tracks it will get the job done with ease. Well worth the credits for paint and tune.

Search “Tweaky Tuned” to find the Tweaky releases in the Forza Motorsports 3 storefront. Im out Dougy T