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+--- Thread: Porsche ownership the way it was meant to be (/showthread.php?tid=3294)
- michael lang - 06-24-2012
This weekend I had experienced a moment of the real Porsche ownership experience. As posted before in other thread, I was going to drive Lightning for the first time. I did do that and it was a lot of fun and I very much cannot wait to go back. More on how that part of my weekend went later. I am referring more to how everything went overall and it started on Thursday. Thank God I ended up taking the whole day off from work and I decided to a final once over on my car because if I didn't I never would have seen these huge cracks in the surface of the rear brake rotors that were not there on Monday when I had my car tech'd. Even luckier was the fact that I started going through my car before 8:00am. So I called a couple of Porsche dealerships and found no one had them. I went online to Foreign Intrigue.com (they are located in northern VA) got there phone number and called three times. No answer, okay it's 9:30 am and time is wasting. So I get back online to OG, look around the website and everything they have on line for brakes is all new stuff. So I decide to take a chance and call them. Bingo, they have exactly what I needed so I pay for them over the phone so they don't sell them from under me while I was on my way there because those were the only set they had. My kids and I jump in the truck and drive to Sterling VA (about 45 min car ride). Crisis avoided, weekend saved!
My son and I left the house on Friday morning about 3:30 to leave for the track. We made really good time, we pulled into the Chesapeake House in Delaware at about 5:00am. Colin slept most of the way to that point. The weather was perfect for the air cooled engine, I love the sound that comes from the engine when the intake is wide open as we pulled away from the rest stop.
We got to the track about 7:15am, it is so awesome going to a place for the first time and seeing everything that they don't show on TV. Not like I felt when I went to Laguna Seca but close to it. The first thing I noticed was that they mean business, the whole entrance to the place said "we are a professional sports facility". That immediately gave me the impression that I was about to drive someplace very special, almost exclusive.
The track stuff was interesting. The first session was horrible. I was all over the place and had no idea where I was supposed to be but I started figuring it out. My left arm hurt from fighting the wind with all the pass signals I had to give. The last thing I wanted to happen was have Dan Petchel come to my paddock and speak with me about watching my mirrors. By the middle of the second session I knew where I was supposed to be and had started learning where I can get on the juice sooner and how long to hold onto it. I also was not scrubbing off as much speed as I did in the earlier session. Thanks to Bob T's video and Tony's advice it made it much easier to put the pieces together. The third and fourth sessions were an absolute blast. I would have stayed for the fifth session as the weather turned on us because I love being on track in the rain but I could not leave my 11 year old in the rain. For those that care, I started the day in the mid1:40's with an average speed of 64.9mph while I was figuring things out. I avg'd in the low 1:27's by the end of the day and my best was 1:26.53 w/an avg speed of 79.8mph. I never thought I would say this but there is something to this data stuff. It really helps the learning curve and I only have Harry's LapTimer on my iPhone.
We were so hot from the heat we could not wait to get to the pool at the hotel, thank goodness I chose a place with an indoor pool because by about 5:00 it was a wall of water outside.
The really cool part of dinner was anything special other than my son and ended up eating wings and playing video trivia for a couple of hours at Buffalo Wild Wings in Millville. I spend so much time at work I never really get in REAL quality time with either my wife or kids and to me looking back on it, was probably the best part of the whole weekend.
The trip home on Saturday morning was uneventful, we made it home in just about three hours. As I was driving home, it hit me. Even though the story might be different for someone else, this is what the Porsche ownership experience is all about.
- CarreraS - 06-24-2012
Mike:
Now you need to come to Thunderbolt and Pocono!
I'm glad you had fun and some Q time with Colin!
See you soon....September Club Race at SP, maybe? I will definitely be there.
Al the best,
"Big Dave"