Goodbye and Hello.

Alex Roy recommended the southern route

There is a reason Axis has slowed down recently:  life decided a major change of direction was in order and I am moving from New York to...

California!

That's right, Axis is going West Coast.

It will be fascinating  to live in one of the cradles of automotive culture, the land that gave us the Zero Fucks Given RX7  and Singer 911s and where are both celebrated in their own ways.
California is also the land that will likely destroy the car as we know it, transforming most into robotic delivery appliances, possibly in my lifetime.

But not quite yet.

To me California will always be the impossible cool exemplified by Stephen Mitchell and his GTO hooning friends in the early 70s.



In the meantime, I look forward to meeting new friends, learning about local car culture, canyons and hopefully getting tips on California tracks like Willow Springs....waking up three hours earlier to watch F1.

And yes, I WILL drive Laguna Seca!

So if you see a funny looking M car running around,  by all means come say hello and point me in the right direction.

Ciao!

Performing Stunningly

Merry Christmas from one of readers, Jim Shepard who sent in this picture of his daily driver as he says "..performing stunningly". Very nice!

Don't forget to send us pictures of your rides, daily drivers to full out race cars for out Axis Reader Rides set on Flickr. email pictures HERE




end of post

Another great trip!

I'm still away but we will do some nice write-ups with videos and telemetry over the next few days. In the mean time enjoy some pictures from our trip, after the jump....

Axis Ringball 09-Day1: We made it.

CG, Andres and I met in Frankfurt and made it to the 'ring in no time, thanks to the awesome moosepower of the rented Volvo SUV. Pretty soon CG got excited and pretended to race a Ferrari Scuderia on the back roads around the ring as we were making our way to lunch. After some tasty grillhaxe , we stopped by to say hello to our friends Ron and Dale at RSR Nurburg. The have some very tasty new cars for rent, if you plan on a trip here, do look them up. After a look around the carpark we went for a track walk with the RSR crew and finished the evening with a classic "Steak on Stone" at the Pistenklaus...

Tomorrow we pick up our cars and hope we find some room in the traffic!

And yes , that is a 3.8 997 GT3, the RS is wishful thinking though.






And here is the rest of it.






And here is the rest of it.

Just a Friday afternoon, ripping on a GT2.

CG and Stee managed to sneak up to Monticello Motor Club last friday for a little test and tune on their race cars. They managed to break both (hey, that what test sessions are for, right?) but that only meant it was an excuse to rip on CG's GT2 on the North course!.

CG:

We had a fun day yesterday at Monticello. What a great handling track.... I love the facility.

We even manage to sneak in a few laps in the members only track in the GT2 thanks to the power steering of my Cayman racecar (yet again failing through another hose...). Check below the first couple of laps with Stee on board.

The OEM tires are the worst R-comps ever, especially the fronts (a howling herd of 25 cats).Beyond 9/10ths it understeers like a pig on slow corners (70mph or less). Nevertheless, it's a ton of fun and brutal power with a playful rear end. Also the speed is deceiving in that car, consider that 2nd is good for 80, and 3rd for 112, and it doesn't really come across in the video (we didn't know the new Chasecam had accelerometers we just threw the PDR on the floor so not sure if what shows in the video is meaningful at all)..

Home

Your Rides...

Since we started it not so long ago, the Flickr gallery with Axis of Oversteer readers rides has been seen an amazing 89000 91000 times.

How cool. Want to add yours? Send us your pictures HERE






Home.

First Tire Smoke from a Team Axis Spec e30!

We will follow NASA's Spec e30 very closely this season with some exciting surprises for our readers.

Here is one of the Team Axis cars coming to life for the first time and, appropriately, laying rubber and contributing to Global Warming....in a good way, it's been very cold here!

Stay tuned!

And here is the rest of it.

Show us your Garage

Our old friend Jeff Gabel suggested the idea, I had expressed full blown garage envy after seeing a picture he had sent to our "Axis Reader Rides" group.
Look at this awesome "M-House" ... there is even a hidden lift to go along with the built in air line....check out more pictures after the jump.
Share your garage? email us

Reader Rides Update...

Flickr set has had 9129 9746 11263 13,238 views already! YES, Go Axis, keep them coming...






Axis Reader Rides on Flickr

Axis Reader Rides are fantastic!

Great submissions so far, check out this one from Kevin Baillie for example.
Keep them coming! Axis Reader Rides


Flickr Slideshow


home

Axis' got your stimulus plan right here...

You're telling me a remote albeit beautiful corner of Portugal can build what has been described as the best new track on the planet but the mighty United States cannot come up with a way to construct one in every state of the Union?

Think about the upside, massive construction jobs, employment for local communities, easy availability of track time would cut down on idiotic street racing, Mechanics would be busy, body shops would be extra busy, gasoline would be burned, tires shredded, brake pads vaporized... 

And, of course, facilities would be built to strict "green" standards thereby suggesting, in the immortal words of Private Joker, "something about the duality of man, sir."

Seriously, do we have to fix everything?

Autodromo Internacional do Algarve





And here is the rest of it.

Axis Reader Rides

Send us a picture of your ride! I added a Flickr slideshow to the sidebar to feature your rides.
Send your pictures  HERE

Great response so far! Keep them coming and let us know where you are from. Very cool to everyone's toys!

Snowy Bastards

We're bastards, it's true. We really should be doing this to our poor street cars but, take a look at the video and tell me it does not look like it's worth it!

This past week end, the Freep, Adil and I headed back to Monticello Motor Club for another day of fun in the snow banks. Their Winter Driving Series is becoming quite popular despite arctic temperatures and to accommodate the crowds, MMC opened up the north course along with the south.  The clip shows you the North course which is usually reserved for MMC club members.

Snow banks were especially deep and stuffings were plentiful but the recovery truck crew good natured and in the end fun was had by all.  Even the Freep had fun despite banking the car in the first turn of of the first run to a collective groan from the grid... our Alabama Stig was available for autographs after that one!

I had to be towed out once as well but in general I was super impressed with the grip my Continental Extreme Contact all season tires were capable of.  W rated, can drive on snow and reasonably priced? Highly recommended Shop for Continental tires at Tire Rack.

Lots of pictures and a video from inside Adil and Dan's Subaru after the jump.

More pictures...

Teaser

Just a tease while we sort through our pictures...

home

Happy New Year from the Axis!

Thank you to all our old friends and our many, many new ones, all 246,752 of you from 162 countries, for helping this fun little space grow exponentially in 2008.

Burn rubber and keep the shiny side up in 2009!

Happy New Year
Buon Anno
Feliz Año Nuevo
nav varsh ki subhkamna
bonne année
feliz ano novo
prost Neujahr
عام سعيد
שנה טובה
akemashite omedetô
szczęśliwego nowego roku
С Новым Годом
xin nian hao
kali chronia
seh heh bok mani bat uh seyo
gott nytt år
blwyddyn newydd dda




Back

The best lap CG never did at VIR: Porsche 997 GT2 2:06

CG was at VIR yesterday and set us this video illustrating Traqmate Studio's "Theoretical Best Lap" feature. The software will take the video from your session's best segments and paste them together. (which is why you see cars appear and disappear!)

You are riding in a Porsche 997 GT2 and CG reported the track was very cold and grip was marginal. He also is not a fan of the OEM version of the Michelin Pilot Cup tires. The car still needs sorting as it understeers too much in the slower turns. However power is certainly is not lacking when he can put it down, I see a 156 mph (251km/h) on the main straight. That's about 20 mph faster than Stee's old e46 M3. His actual times Friday were in the 2:07 range.

Below is a graph comparing speeds between different cars and track days at VIR:

Red and Blue: CG GT2 (2:07s)

Black: Matt Becker (Lotus test driver/engineer) in CG's Exige S 2:11.9

Green: CG Exige S 2:13

Cyan: Stee M3 2:17

As CG commented (having been in the car with him) Becker is still the king of the "esses" his speed through that tricky section is just phenomenal.



You can see this video on your iPhone at this LINK
for other smartphones, choose this other LINK
when prompted choose "feed me Axis"




Back to the main page

Axis Makes the News!

A newspaper in Vancouver BC carried our "Driver jumps under the hood" story. How cool is that?

Thanks David for sending us the scan!



FLickr



And here is the rest of it.

What's My Line: Thunderbolt Edition.

I truly enjoyed New Jersey Motorsport Park's Thunderbolt track. It has a bit of everything and it's not a track that is much more fun if you have a monster horsepower car.

As it's a rather new track I though I would do a track guide like I did for Monticello. Keep in mind this is MY line and lines are like..... everyone has one. To that effect I would encourage you to share your own version.

The line I describe is not the strict "driving school", safe line, please keep that in mind. It is always useful to learn the official version first before you start exploring what might work best for you and your setup. Safety first, don't forget. As coveted as th title may be, there is no sponsorship deal for the Track Day World Champion.

After the jump you will find a video of three laps, each faster than the previous, from my last session on Sunday. My fastest time over three days and I had a passenger with me, guess I need a little more work down there! To my chagrin I was not able to fully destroy my now ancient v710's which though certainly heat-cycle'd out, stubbornly refuse to chord or become fully gripless. Amazing tire in my opinion, now I'll have feel bad about buying a new set come next spring.

You can download my Traqmate file HERE.
And if you are a sick bastard you can download Stee Traqmate file for the Cayenne Turbo which he ended up running HERE



For the Video ->
PDA and NASA put on a great show, we had open track, NASA races (Congratulations Spencer Lo-Buk Anderson for your third in the Honda Challenge Championship!) HPDE, demo rides...and a beyond awesome BBQ. Joe Cassella truly threw the gauntlet down on NASA Mid-Atlantic with that feast!

Great way to end the season.



(Additional pictures by The Dough)


more pictures at TrackTime Photos.

Thunderbolt!

We're probably the last people in the whole of the North East to finally get to New Jersey Motorsport Park's Thunderbolt track, better late than never I guess. I'm at the track all week end with NASA and PDA trying to destroy what is left of my remaining Kumho 710's. I chrded the fronts at Monticello a few weeks back but I had one more pair of used fronts in the garage, left over from last season. Waste not want not, the Freep would say. In fact, new tires would help a lot on this track and its long, long corners.

For now just a quick video of a couple of laps from Friday's open track day, more during the week after I come back.



.

Monticello Motor Club Videos and Traqmate Data

Lapping MMC South Course on October 24, 2008. BMW M Coupe.

CG and I were at the Monticello Motor Club on Friday, first time actually driving. It was a NASA/PDA track day on the South Course but the club's management was kind enough to give everyone a taste of the full track in the afternoon. Then, apparently, some clown ruined it for everyone and we were relegated back to the South Course for the rest of the day...oh well.

It's a very exciting facility, the full track is spectacular and even the smaller south course is fun to drive. At about two miles it has a great variety of turns that reward good lines and trail braking. Prospective members should note we found proposed future improvements to the track layout spot on and that those designing the course are very much on the ball.

The track will get its final paving layers and curbing next year and when complete it will really be something special. If you get a chance to drive any of the courses at the Club, don't miss it. As a reference, I annotated pictures with some hints that might save you precious laps when you finally do get there. We saw many people struggling to find the line all day and we so hate to see laps wasted, trust us, painted lines are OK to drive over!
The last four frames pertain to the full track. A video lap of the full track is after the jump HERE
Download my Traqmate files for the SOUTH COURSE and the FULL COURSE.



In the parking lot there was a very healthy dose of exotics including two factory cars, a Nissan GTR and a bizarrely optioned Corvette ZR1 there to do a comparison test for Playboy of all things. The driver evaluating the cars was described to us as "an intermediate student over driving the cars"... see why we want to do our own tests?