Cars I'd like to drive one day, part XXVII...

Tell me this does not look like a fun challenge: a Caterham R500 on a cold december day, 265hp, 1100 lbs... track is not crowded and there are no safety nazis warning giving you "excess of oversteer" warnings.

Clip is from Italy's Track4Fun.com, trackday organizers and now also official Caterham importers. Great commercial for your product guys!





And...yes It doesn't always work out perfectly.... and it certainly isn't the fast way around, but it sure looks fun.

The Return

Tracktards also come in the two wheel variety...

Sixth Gear writes:
"My return back to track riding after my infamous crash in Turn 1 at Jennings. Special thanks goes out to Kelly at TTRMotorsports.com for all the hard work the week before putting my bike back together. You're awesome!

All footage was taken on a 2007 GSX-R750 with either a GoPro Hero Wide or Vio POV.1 camera. Track was Jennings GP, on the weekend of 7 Feb 09."






And here is the rest of it.

We do sideways here

Let's ride along for a lap of the "Circuito Enzo e Dino Ferrari" in Imola, Italy in Zampa's tail happy Porsche 996 GT3.

Our friend does a great job carrying speed though the many left-right chicanes. For sure he would be severely reprimanded at Porsche Club of America's track days where our own CG was once sternly scolded by a PCA official with a "we don't do sideways here" warning!

Zampa tell us he was on Michelin Pilot Sport Cups that day. Tomorrow we will show you a lap on the same track but with a 997 GT2. It will be a good illustration of what about 200 extra horsepower can accomplish.

For now enjoy this ride on this fantastic track, as you will see Zampa is quite comfortable with high speed oversteer.

The data system he is using is from RaceChrono a system which uses a GPS enabled smartphone and the overlay done with RaceChrono2AVI which Zampa describes as "the poor man's Trackvision"!





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Hypnotic.

Brilliant, sometimes a simple yet twisted idea can result in hypnotic zen like this.

"Zampa" is one the original tracktards, if you are familiar with cinghialoni.org and track4fun.com, he needs no introduction. We have have featured some of his, mostly sideways, antics here before. It's a long drive from Milano to Nürburg, why not make an arty tracktard stoner film out of it?

Part 2 and 3 are after the jump. Be sure you stop by and see some of Marco's excellent automotive photography on his web site too!

Don't presume.

Let's continue the series of articles about getting ready for track season.   

The vast majority of the time things go smoothly on the track but there are times when things go wrong.  It's just the way it is and as CG says, if you track often enough it's not a matter of if but of when.

In this article about open passing I mentioned awareness, let me show you what happens when you take things for granted.

I was at Summit Point last year, running in the instructor group when I came, with a group of other faster cars, upon a car running very slowly off line, letting everyone through.   Like a fool I presumed he was doing just that, running slow, maybe with a problem and pointing all traffic by... so I followed.   What happened next is, as they say, history.

I was mad at myself for trusting the other driver had seen me,  I was pretty pissed the other driver turned in without looking and his explanation that he was showing his passenger the racing line...

In the end you have to be an adult and accept that this kind of thing will happen and you just take it as it comes.  There was some explaining to do but we both took our lumps, shook hands and went on our way.  I used a hammer to bend back the sheet metal, got a new tire and drove just fine the next day.  

I was quite lucky to have friends who helped me fix the cosmetic damage perfectly and at a very reasonable cost.

Next week we will see what can happen when things go REALLY wrong.

.

Think Speed

With February, at least in the part of the world we live in, comes the recognition that track season is just a few weeks away. Time to make sure your car will at least pass tech, that you have brake pads and tires, maybe time to wash your sweaty helmet and to study videos of the tracks you plan to visit.

It may very well be that this is the year you finally run out of excuses and go to the track. Once there you might find yourself asking why it is your GT3 got passed by that dude in the dodgy looking Honda Civic? Well, chances are that you probably just suck but that would be a natural thing, nothing to be ashamed about.
You can suck less the first time if you are prepared and do your homework. Axis recommends you read Jeff Gabel's Rookie Chronicles. Jeff did a great job summarizing the track day/driving school experience.





Download The Rookie Chronicles Part I
Download The Rookie Chronicles Part II

Mosport and the Glen

It took a while but I finally straightened out the issues with the embed code in the Brightcove player so without further ado I wanted to thank Jeff Gabel and "shiners780" from Rochester, NY for uploading videos on the new AxisTT* TV.

Jeff uploaded a video from Mosport, a track we had never seen. I thought the Glen was intimidating with it's baby blue ARMCO all the way around...looks to me like Mosport's white cement walls might hurt even more!

Jeff captions:

Second time tracking the M3, this time with the GVC BMW CCA at Mosport. B run group.

The other ride is on board a 944 turbo at Watkins Glen. I always loved 944s, one of my favorite car shapes...and I've never even riden in one...so many cars, so little time.


Jeff and "shiners" should cantact me via e-mail and as our first featured reader videos will receive Axis stickers in the mail.

You can upload your video to Axis TT TV HERE
* Axis Track Tard

Tracktard TV

OK fellow Tracktards, because there are SO FEW video sharing sites on the internet and because it is SO DIFFICULT to share your latest HPDE championship winning moments with the world, we proudly offer you the chance to have yet one more password and share your moment of glory or infamy with us.

On the sidebar you will find a link to upload and a small player. Upload your videos and if not excessively offensive, they will become part of the Axis TT Channel lineup.

Let's see how it goes, maybe we can have some of you write about your clips in the main window or have a tracktard video of the week...give away stickers...that kind of thing....

have fun!

GET ON THE AXIS

This is the default player used to display virally syndicated titles via the Get the Code button. http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1137770048http://www.brightcove.com/channel.jsp?channel=1137846677

In case you are wondering...

...why it is that we have not posted much Axis generated material lately. Well, here's the thing, when you drive street cars at the track often....they break, and at the moment most of our cars are just that, busted!

The Mcoupe has a bad clutch and in need of some buffing, the Spec Boxster has a bad cam position sensor, the M3 and Exige S have some overheating issues... think the Spec e30 is also getting some work done. As fas as I know the EVO and the 997 are the only cars that is running properly at the moment and that's probably only because they are not used as often! Of course we probably all need newbrake pads and tires...

No worries we are working on the "fleet" and we'll be back in action ASAP!.

This is why we do it...

because once in while you have the perfect day, with the perfect group of people and you don't have anyone bugging you or slowing you down, you are free and your worries ground into the pavement under that stripe of rubber you left in turn 6.

We had two days like that with Group52 earlier in the month, this clip is from the second day. Two and a half laps of Watkins Glen, in the first part we are playing around trying to get good camera angles. We all bought ChaseCam PDR 100 recently and we have them tied into our Traqmates so that when you start the GPS data recorder the video starts automatically, a very convenient feature.

The second part of the clip I try for a fast lap, hit all my marks and run a 2:12.350. Considering my car has a radio and air conditioning I think that's pretty good.
The first time I went to the Glen a few years ago my best time was 2:26, last year I could not believe I was down to 2:16. Now both Stee and I can lap in the 2:14 with relative ease and both had 2:12 laps. Part of it is due to running Kumho V710, part is just that we learned a lot. Having Traqmates has helped immensely in figuring out where we could improve, they are a fantastic tools. V710 and Performance Friction PF 97 pads also made for some dramatic slowing down, 1.35G on my car, we call Mo and Walter at Off Camber Motorsports for the best deal on PF.

I recommend downloading the high resolution version but if you are in a hurry, here you go.

A track-tard's checklist

I'm actually writing this to myself. Perhaps this will help my feeble mind to remember half of the items I will need to gather for the next 7 days, 2 of which will be spent travelling and 4 driving at the track.

SO what do I need to bring?

OK,

tires...Kumho v710 still have plenty of rubber on them.

brakes...check, or favorite brake specialists at Off Camber Motorsport set me up with a spare set of Performance Friction PF97 (apparently there is a shortage of PF01 at the moment)

Helmet, gloves, neck roll thingy (for instructing)

Aluminium jack and assorted tools, screws, sockets allen keys, torx bits, spare wheel nuts, spare studs, breaker bar, lubricants, lock-tite.... zip ties, flashlight, scary knife, all that junk

Cordless impact gun and charger

extra Motul Brake fluid, extra Castrol RS 10W60 for the S54.

Glass cleaner and microfibers, some car cleaner to get the rubber boogers off.

Traqmate...updated to latest firmware (1.30)

MiniDV video camera+tapes+ microphone. My MicroDVR and my collection of cheap security cams to stick in unlikely places on the car.

New entry: ChaseCam PDR100 and (finally) a good external camera. this system will be tied and controlled via the Traqmate (traqcam).

Ipod sorted and refreshed for the ride, phone charger, bluetooth GPS thingy for my blackberry....

Axis stickers...

I'm sure there is more....