VIR - looks like I'm the first one in this morning, so here's what went down. (edited)
04-30-2003, 05:12 AM
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VIR - looks like I'm the first one in this morning, so here's what went down. (edited)
A ton of people showed up for the event. I saw plenty of S4s, a few S2s, the entire range of A cars, some older S cars (one was a fire-breathing red dragon), a bunch of American muscle, some Beemers, and a 360 Modena. Randy Pobst made an appearance and signed autographs and took people's cars out for a few laps. He took KJ's Porsche out also (I'll let KJ tell you about that one).
UROTRASH paid $260 for a golf shirt autographed by Randy, but he was a bit in his cups at the time... My beginner group had 6 run sessions on the full course and some of us were signed off to go solo (not me, though). The course is beautiful. I've never seen better pavement, there were plenty of manned flag stations, and the facilities were top-notch (clean restrooms were a plus). Lots of us were running in-car cameras and we had a few spectators on the front straight shooting video of high-speed passes, so the videos will soon be posted I hope.
I learned a lot about track driving and got much better from when I started. I rode along in an E46 M3 (awesome on the track), an S2 (great seeing what Quattro can do), a Mustang Cobra R (ridiculous power and an aggressive driver), a 30-year-old BMW (can you say massive trail-braking and drifting?), and one or two others that I can't remember. My lines improved after watching these guys do it, and I was able to put some of the ride-along experience to good use, although they were taking the downhill roller coaster at about twice the speed that I could...
Oh yeah, and I put my car into the wall right before the bridge, black-flagging the session. Ambulance and tow truck (not a flatbed - grr) came out, but it was driveable, so I cruised on in.
Damaged the front bumper, hood, and entire right side. I'm sure someone snapped some pictures of it. Going in for an estimate this week. My second run of the first day on the full course, and I was getting too ballsy. I should have just run off the course and into the grass, but I tried to save a mistake, and went spinning out of control and into the tire wall. I went out on foot with my instructor afterwards and videotaped the scene with 2k2s4's camera, so maybe you'll get to see the series of turns that did me in as well as my skidmarks (not the ones in my boxers) and dirt tracks into the wall. No injuries, no airbags, no CELs, no thrown codes, and I drove four sessions on the second day w/o issue. Well, other than the old Porterfield pad that broke and decided to meet an early grave somewhere around turn 3, which relieved me of significant braking power the rest of the run. The pads were three- or four-times hand-me-downs, and were on their last leg anyway. So I swapped in the stock pads for the last two run sessions, and didn't have any troubles. I think my rotors are warped now, though. ;-)
I ran the stock chip the entire time, and saw a max speed of 115 on the back straight coming out of the Oak Tree turn. For comparison, the Cobra took that back straight at 140+. And when I rode along in the S2, a Porsche 911 Turbo blew by us like we were standing still.
In regard to the much-hyped roll-on race between me and the ABT car, well, let's just say that ed@4induktion.com will never be ed@professionalvideo.com. We did two runs from third. I botched the first 3-4 shift, so we scrubbed that one and ran again. The ABT car did the honking, and I jumped on the honk, he after the honk. Not really fair, so I got the jump and it was even after that as far as I could tell. But he had the better view because I was 1/4 car length ahead of him and couldn't see him in my mirrors. I think we both agreed that it was even but for the honk jump by me.
Anyway, I'll add more later, I'm sure. For now, it's off to the body shop...
UROTRASH paid $260 for a golf shirt autographed by Randy, but he was a bit in his cups at the time... My beginner group had 6 run sessions on the full course and some of us were signed off to go solo (not me, though). The course is beautiful. I've never seen better pavement, there were plenty of manned flag stations, and the facilities were top-notch (clean restrooms were a plus). Lots of us were running in-car cameras and we had a few spectators on the front straight shooting video of high-speed passes, so the videos will soon be posted I hope.
I learned a lot about track driving and got much better from when I started. I rode along in an E46 M3 (awesome on the track), an S2 (great seeing what Quattro can do), a Mustang Cobra R (ridiculous power and an aggressive driver), a 30-year-old BMW (can you say massive trail-braking and drifting?), and one or two others that I can't remember. My lines improved after watching these guys do it, and I was able to put some of the ride-along experience to good use, although they were taking the downhill roller coaster at about twice the speed that I could...
Oh yeah, and I put my car into the wall right before the bridge, black-flagging the session. Ambulance and tow truck (not a flatbed - grr) came out, but it was driveable, so I cruised on in.
Damaged the front bumper, hood, and entire right side. I'm sure someone snapped some pictures of it. Going in for an estimate this week. My second run of the first day on the full course, and I was getting too ballsy. I should have just run off the course and into the grass, but I tried to save a mistake, and went spinning out of control and into the tire wall. I went out on foot with my instructor afterwards and videotaped the scene with 2k2s4's camera, so maybe you'll get to see the series of turns that did me in as well as my skidmarks (not the ones in my boxers) and dirt tracks into the wall. No injuries, no airbags, no CELs, no thrown codes, and I drove four sessions on the second day w/o issue. Well, other than the old Porterfield pad that broke and decided to meet an early grave somewhere around turn 3, which relieved me of significant braking power the rest of the run. The pads were three- or four-times hand-me-downs, and were on their last leg anyway. So I swapped in the stock pads for the last two run sessions, and didn't have any troubles. I think my rotors are warped now, though. ;-)I ran the stock chip the entire time, and saw a max speed of 115 on the back straight coming out of the Oak Tree turn. For comparison, the Cobra took that back straight at 140+. And when I rode along in the S2, a Porsche 911 Turbo blew by us like we were standing still.
In regard to the much-hyped roll-on race between me and the ABT car, well, let's just say that ed@4induktion.com will never be ed@professionalvideo.com. We did two runs from third. I botched the first 3-4 shift, so we scrubbed that one and ran again. The ABT car did the honking, and I jumped on the honk, he after the honk. Not really fair, so I got the jump and it was even after that as far as I could tell. But he had the better view because I was 1/4 car length ahead of him and couldn't see him in my mirrors. I think we both agreed that it was even but for the honk jump by me.
Anyway, I'll add more later, I'm sure. For now, it's off to the body shop...
04-30-2003, 05:25 AM
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It looked like an S6 Avant, but it was unbelievably fast, and was an instructor's car.
Someone else probably knows better than I do, but on hard shifts, he would spit flames. I just now named it the red dragon, hehe.
04-30-2003, 05:27 AM
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A few pics from VIR...
Me leading O.W. Kenobi around the oak tree (notice the nicely loaded stock suspension):
<img src="http://2k2s4.portfolioland.com/audiworld/forum/images/vir_oaktree.jpg">
<img src="http://2k2s4.portfolioland.com/audiworld/forum/images/vir_ses.jpg">
<img src="http://2k2s4.portfolioland.com/audiworld/forum/images/vir_oaktree.jpg">
<img src="http://2k2s4.portfolioland.com/audiworld/forum/images/vir_ses.jpg">
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