With track days slowly starting up again and winter approaching, we thought best to give you a few little tips on how to read the weather forecast for Broadford.
When searching Broadford in your weather app, what you are really seeing is a forecast for Kilmore rather than Broadford itself. Generally weather apps use larger area predictions opposed to more specific location predictions.
Our experience tells us that searching Strath Creek in your app will give you a much better indication of the likely weather at the track. For an even better prediction you need to understand a little more about the area and direction the weather is coming from.
For those who have been to the Broadford track many times over the years, how many times have you had a completely dry day at the track then 10min down the road back to Melbourne you find it’s been raining all day? And visa versa. This is because of the nearby mountain ranges and how they affect the weather pattern.
So to get the best idea you need to search Strath Creek and Broadford plus look at the synoptic chart for the day and see where the weather is coming from.
If we take this coming Saturday as an example, the Broadford forecast says 70% of 1-5mm, while Strath Creek indicates 20% of <1mm. Plus the synoptic charts shows the weather coming from the South. This means the rain will be dissipating as the weather approaches the north and the Race Track. So it is likely there will be little rain at the track. There is still a risk of annoying drizzles but unlikely to be the 1-5mm predicted for Broadford itself.
The other key factor is the forecast is for a 24hour period from 12am to 12pm. So looking deeper into when the rain is expected will help you plan for your track day. Unfortunately, this info normally isn’t available until closer to the day.
Sometimes weather is harder to predicate than other times but hopefully this little bit of info helps, if it’s all a bit confusing, just use Strath Creek in your app rather than Broadford. 😊
