We arrived Tuesday to learn that the members of our team who left early to get a good campsite fucked around and didn’t arrive until the last car, the one I was in which left 3 hours later. We didn’t get the campsite we wanted but I think the one we ended up with works better for our group, it’s large and we can be as loud as we want until as late as we want. We got everything set up and had a few beers, the germans brought 400 liters of beer just for us in addition to the hundred+ kegs which will be at the Mahle sponsored party on Sunday. On the trip over we were driving down the autobahn at 205 km/h for a while. Driving here is so nice, everyone knows what to do and follows the rules. I saw a Ferrari 430, Porsche Panamera, and a porsche turbo on the ride down.
Wednesday
Wake up late had lots of organizing and waiting In line to do to get our place, unfortunately we ended up 52nd, some teams had been camping out since Monday morning for their spot. There were a bunch of cars running the race track including an Alpina B6, a Audi R8, a few formula BMW cars, and a misc spattering of porsche’s and others, even a mini. The B6 had the most amazing sound coming from it's tailpipes and was faster than the formula BMW cars!(not the same thing as formula 1, much less power) There was a german car magazine testing out a M5, E 65 AMG, S6, and Jag XF R, later in the day it turned into a drift session...pretty sweet. I got my first look at german cars…wow, those teams have a lot of money, some have double deck semi trailers, deals with companies for testing prototype tires, engines, wheels, electronics, you name it… Some people went out to party with UAS Gratz, and to teach them American drinking games like flip cup and beer pong, they all were fairly hungover the next day and Robert showed up at the tent at 3:45 am plastered. It would have been a fun party to attend but I think it was a better idea to hold off until Sunday.
Thursday
Today I woke up late and went for a run around the perimeter of the Hockenheim track, probably 4.5 miles and I ran a little too late, around 10:30, I was sweating like none other after that run. It felt good for sure and hopefully I’ll get another lap or two in. Today the magazine had an exige, cayman, mini, focus rs, and something else to test out. Again there was some drifting attempts, mostly including failed attempts spinning into the grass and around on the track. I spent most of the time waiting around, taking pictures of other people's cars, and watching the magazine car test.
Friday
Early morning for design, business presentation, brake test, sound, tilt, and final inspection. It looked like the presentations went well but we ended up 26th, I think the judges are biased towards 4cyl cars with aero and just don’t believe we know what we are doing even though we have the best vehicle dynamics guy in the world currently.
It took us 22 tries to pass brake test, next year we are NOT going to run the hope in the rear, probably the AP Racing or something similar. If the brake test was reasonable and was a stopping distance from a speed then we would be fine, the brake works great while driving, just not on baseless tests. That was the drama of the day, we had the brake line ferrule fail twice until we got a new one and are still running it, again, we will use a proper brake set up next year, hopefully I’ll be doing that, and no cast iron.
Started the official Girls of FSG folder, giggidy giggidy goo!
I’m getting lots of great ideas for the 2002 and our next years car, also for the 06 car if george and I can buy it. There is a BMW M3 GT4 car here and it has the coolest doors, all fiberglass or CF with lexan windows, they weigh nothing…, there is also the X5 4.4L twin turbo V8 here and the packaging is amazing, it’s just a fucking square block with the turbo’s hidden under the plastic cover.
Saturday
Today was the first dynamics events, acceleration, skid pad, and autocross. We did very well in everything but skid pad which we still did well, just not what we could have done. Today we officially went from a team no one knew to the most talked about team after coming in second to stutgart who has been winning consistently over the last 5 years, they have a 4cylinder engine with a lot more power and we were able to pull out a 54.307 just behind their 54.188. The next fastest was Delft who has been using the single cylinder for a long time now, they had 54.887. After that there was one 55.8something and a few low 56's but we really destroyed everyone today. Acceleration we ran 4.228 which beat Delft by .149 seconds and came in 8th, skid pad we were 17th maybe, it was good enough to keep us in contention for the podium but not that great overall. It was a long day and the party we ended up at was well deserved. Late to bed, early to rise. Endurance is tomorrow and we have to wake up at 6pm for no other reason than the drivers have a meeting and they think everyone needs to be awake. Since we were top 6 we will be running last in endurance tomorrow.
I'll post up pics when I have time after competition.
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