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Following a thread on RX8Club.com, I was excited to find a more convenient location for another High Performance Driving Experience (HPDE) - this one a mere 4 hours driving time from home compared with 14 hours to Indianapolis Raceway Park back in May - Rotary Revolution 2004. I remembered all the fun I had then and couldn't wait to duplicate that feeling. This gathering was organized by NASA (no, not the space agency, National Auto Sport Association) and cost me $35 to join so I could participate in the HPDE. The first day was priced at $175 and the second day would have cost another $150 if I had chosen to stay a second day. Since this was Monday and Tuesday, I chose only to lose one day's pay.
I bought a small tent to stow my car's loose contents while on the track. I learned this from experience - it rained at IRP. You are required to have everything out of the car to be on the track - including emptying the glove compartment, center console, trunk, map pockets etc. even the floor mats had to go. I installed my special brake pads - Project Mu Titan Kai from Vivid Racing before the trip. The night before we left, I fabricated a crude but sort of effective video camera mount. I took out the removable rear seat center piece and built a gizmo that bolts to the spare tire rack center hole. I used a bunch of perforated angle steel that I had lying around the shop. My gadget rests on the trunk floor and brings the base of the camera up to even with the rear package tray. It has a great view out the windshield. Only problem is that the setup vibrates significantly at speeds (as does the rest of the car). I did grab some video and am trying, so far unsuccessfully, to convert to DVD. It is not as good as any racing movie I have ever seen but at least it was me behind the wheel. I will have to produce a DIY segment on the bracket.
On the thread, it sounded like a large group was going to meet and stay at the Longhouse Lodge Motel, about 3 miles out of town overlooking beautiful Seneca Lake. Turns out it was Roy "Speed Racer" who was leading that group. He still hasn't gotten a harness bar for his "8". His group consisted of 3 RX-8's and a Porsche 944 Turbo. We checked in at the track around 6 AM, signed a WGI liability waiver and a NASA waiver, and got our wrist bands. We shared a pit garage bay at the Glen. We bumped up our tire pressures to 38 psi and using a click release torque wrench, checked our wheel lug nuts. Curious note: the locking lug nuts on three of the four RX-8's had the same key - mine was the only different one. We cleaned all glass surfaces, taped up all exterior glass - headlights, fog lights. Then we applied numbers in tape to the sides, 10" minimum letter height. We also installed our tow loops front and rear in case the unthinkable happened.
We attended a brief drivers' meeting addressing track rules and flags. The novice group, HPDE-1, went to class, while the others gridded and then hit the track. We cycled from classroom to grid to track and back to class 4 times, spending about a half hour on each for a total of 2 hours on the track at speed. We got an hour at lunch to grab a bite to eat in town and to gas up. An hour total on the track burned up about half a tank of gas!
For HPDE-1, the instructor would do his own tech inspection of the vehicles and then drive our cars for the first two laps to show us the "line" around the track, then we took over. They guide us to the braking points, the apexes, and the run out points. They call attention to the flaggers - at speed, they are easy to miss but critical to observe. At this facility, the classroom was more of an open forum of problems, where people would spin out of control, and how to handle some of the tougher corners. The HPDE-1 field included: 4 WRX, Integra, Focus ZX3, Cooper S, 3 Civic, 240SX, 2 Miata, 2 Mustang GT, RSX, 2 RX-8 6MT, RX-8 4AT, S2000, Evolution VIII, 944 Turbo Porsche, 318is, MR2.
The track was 3.40 miles long with 19 turns, with 100' elevation changes overall, some nasty cambered turns, some short radius turns and some sweepers. Best I could pull was 106 up the first 1800' straight coming into the "Bus Stop" which is a set of 4 back to back 90' radius turns. Despite this being a non-competitive event, the urge is still there but I learned some humility having the slowest car on the course. I did a lot of "pointing by" which is signaling to the car behind that you are expecting them to pass safely to one side or the other as you indicate. You can stay in your proper "line" but back off the throttle to ease the pass. The car handled superbly and braked well. It was, as my driving instructor observed, "horsepower challenged" - Ouch! That may be, but it was still a blast screaming around the track.
At the conclusion, my wife and I packed up the car and headed home without incident.
By the way, November 8, 2004 (Monday again - drat!), there is another NASA HDPE at Lime Rock Park, CT. Fee is $200.00. You owe it to yourself to try this at least once and push your car to the limits LEGALLY.
Happy Cruising!
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