Dune Slider

Dune Slider is the gentlest race in Panic Pit and the only one without lanes. You ride a sled 600 m down one long dune to the oasis, carving anywhere across the chute, with a sandworm sliding down after the pack. What costs places is a mistimed jump, a clipped rock and the worm's mouth, and the Boost bar is how the back of the field claws them back.

Going down

The countdown shows the worm charging down the summit before turning to the course; at the start it is 24 m behind the back row.

Your sled runs at 10.5 m/s on its own, so a clean run takes under a minute. Hold A or D to carve sideways at up to 7 m/s. A jump carries you about 6 m. There is nothing to slide under, so S does nothing.

• Crevasses cut right across the chute every 60 m, ten in a race, each 2.6 m across with no way round. Fall in and you go back to the start of that 20 m stretch, frozen for 1.5 s; if the worm would reach that spot first, your race is over.
• Rocks: clip one on the sand and you drop to 7.8 m/s for 1.2 s.
• Green pads throw you up to 14.2 m/s for 1.8 s, even caught in the air.

Boost, and who gets it

Hold Q to burn Boost: 13.9 m/s, or 15.4 on a pad, and it ends a rock's slowdown on the spot. The bar starts with a second of burn, a full bar lasts 2.5 s, and it fills on its own, fastest for whoever needs it. Everyone gets a trickle. It fills faster the further behind the leader you are, up to 36 m back. Drafting adds a lot: within 9 m behind another rider and less than a metre either side of their line. The worm's bow wave adds the most, anywhere within 10 m of its mouth. A leader fills a bar in about 40 seconds; a rider at the back with the worm close, in a few.

The worm

It keeps a lead behind the last rider still going: about 1.8 seconds of plain sliding at the start, tightening to 1.1 seconds between 150 m and 300 m. Inside that lead it slides slightly slower than a plain slide, so a clean run wins ground back; a clipped rock or a fall eats the lead, and it closes fast. It also never lets the leader get more than 2.5 seconds clear, so anyone about 26 m behind the leader has it at their heels. Your screen's edge goes red once it is within 22 m.

A gulp costs one of your three hearts and spits you out 4 m in front of it on a pad-speed burst with some Boost added. It cannot gulp you again for 2 s, and it slows down to chew. The third gulp ends your race, and once you have lost a heart everyone sees a bar over your name.

Riding well

• Jump late. A jump carries about 6 m and the crevasse is 2.6 m, so take off in the last 3 m before the lip. The warning on your badge comes much earlier and is not the cue.
• Do not burn on a pad. It only takes you from 14.2 to 15.4 m/s, where the same burn on bare sand takes you from 10.5 to 13.9.
• Draft, then pass with Boost lit. Boards push each other sideways on contact and the faster board pushes harder. Jumping avoids contact, and a bump never costs forward speed.
• With the worm close, ride its wave: the bar fills there faster than anywhere, so burn as it fills and pull away. Hold B to look back and see how close it really is.

Wider chute, bigger pack

The chute is 10 m wide for up to 4 riders, 14 m for up to 8 and 18 m for up to 16. The worm hunts the back whatever the size of the pack, so in a big room the back is a crowd and the drafting is good. Boulder Escape has a boulder that hunts the same way, on a laned road where rivals block you.