Axis 1 Lap: 158.9 MPH in a 155 mph limited car!

First off, I don't care what anyone says, it takes balls to keep the hammer down in a car you don't know at Daytona. Eric, my team mate, had driven Daytona once before, in the 2009 edition of the One Lap, it made the most sense for him to take on the time trial there. I got to drive a couple of parade laps on the banking and let me tell you, even a cruising speed it's intimidating.

So how did the stock engined, CX of a brick MCoupe end up with a genuine gps verified 158.9 mph? That's what, 175 indicated with my car's 10% over speedo error? I don't even think the dial goes that high!!

Perhaps a little help came from my taping job on all the (huge) panel gaps in the front and side of the hood, the car went 3mph faster than the non taped version in the previous session. Perhaps the two Contour cameras hanging off the rear quarter panels acted as vortex generators and cut down on the vacuum crated by the hatchback shape... or at least it's fun to think that.


(Eric praying he does not crash...)

In any case, I suspect the key to a fast lap at Daytona is not just the top speed on the banks but the time in the infield. Eric's best lap, the second was 2:15 which is not that bad considering the car was on stock sized wheels and stock sized street tires. By comparison CG had done 2:07 in his Cayman S race car with Hoosiers the first time he was there. The final lap might have been faster but Eric was balked badly into turn 1 by a clueless Evo driver from the Great White North.
Doesn't matter, the Z3MCoupe was faster than Eric had gone in the super fancy Carbon FIber Z4 MCoupe he drove in 2009....so there, another notch in the M-Shoe!

Well done Eric!

Check out the video with Traqmate overlay.



end of post