I did mostly ok, but not great, I was generally tired and didn't want to push it. I got a few laps down to 1:55, and that's as low as I managed, which is a time I have done in my 650S on street tires (apparently I only got down to 2:00-ish in the 2 sessions I tried in the 650S). I did a 1:53 in a mercedes race car that was slower in 2020. I'm sure the car was good for 1:45 or so, but I was not. That said, I avoided pushing too hard and running out of talent, which is always good.
So yeah, not my best day, but still a fun day at the track and not a super long drive home:
I was excited, this was finally a chance for me to try the F488 at thunderhill to see how it and I did on my home track.
Flight was nice and uneventful, thankfully no overcast in the morning:
trying a new $69 10 tablet
Once at Thunderhill, as usual, it took me a while to re-learn the track, because I was rusty, and somehow got down to a 1:%3 after a few laps although the car had several seconds left in it. Laptimes were: 1:58, 1:59, 1:57, 1:54, 1:54, and 1:53:
Unfortunately, despite the day staying cool, the first set of tires went down while I was relearning to go faster, so my best time got down to 1:57. I then got the tires set to another used set, but they weren't that great either, and got stuck at 1:57 and couldn't get faster both due to grippier tires and lack of guts to go deeper in some turns where I could definitely have gone a bit deeper. I didn't feel my best and I guess it was overall a good idea that I didn't push it. Here's the last session:
The flight back was more interesting than planned, half the bay area was socked almost to the ground, so I had to fly around via livermore, and was unable to descend to cross the bay towards PAO without getting into Bravo airspace for which I was denied clearance, so I had to fly a fair amount further south, cross south of San Jose, and then fly back in towards PAO which worked out ok. There was a good crosswind on landing but I thankfully kept the motor skills and landed straight on centerline.
This was supposed to be my first day with the F488 at Thunderhill, but unfortunately the car suffered a double failure within 2 laps and I had to pull over. I had some fluid leak which in turn fell on the alternator and fried it. That was the end of the day before it started :(
trying to find the fault
sadly that's the most action I got with the car that day ;)
Early flight back, happened to notice a cropduster at low altitude:
I had been there briefly 10 years prior, and had a chance to see it again. It felt bigger and with more displays, either way, it's a cool museum if you are in the area:
In 20 years of track driving, I lost control a few times. Most often it was because I got tired and/or over ambitious. It doens't take much:
Sometimes, it's not me. That day, Fast Toys rented me their expensive car with totally trashed tires. I kept telling them, they didn't really listen until the tires were visibly corded, and then put another set that was also mostly trash :(
This one was my fault, went a tiny bit wide, the underneath of the very low car, caught, spun me, and caused 10K of damage :(
And then, there is snow, I have many more, but just one:
I'm not much of a wine person, but they had great wines
Next morning, we had a quick intro very early (06:15) to go drive before the ice got too hot:
the professional photographer got there before I did and got this nice shot
glad to be back
great to see the cars waiting for us again
We didn't spend much time in the chalet this year, we only had 3 half days with the 4th day cancelled altogether due to bad weather each time (too warm, or even rain):
Just like last years, I had to re-learn how to stup the cars: sport plus (or sport for turbo cars to avoid the spoiler), and disable PSM:
Mike was my codriver this year (the first day at least, after that we got one car each due to having much reduced driving time):
Mike knew what he was doing, I had to re-learn things, but he hit the ground running :)
The first 2 days, we only had half days (2nd day, we actually left at 06:15 to start driving at runrise until 11:00 when it got warm enough to rain, so the day was over).
Lots of exercises and smaller tracks, this one was Day2.3_Drift_Circle5:
Some of the tracks were a bit tricky and I had to re-learn to go much slower to avoid spinning into a snow bank, like Day2.4_Track1_int:
3rd day was cancelled altogether due to rain and warm weather, so we went karting instead:
I'm not that great at karting, but I'm an aggressive passer :)
I had great hopes that day #4 would make up for all the lost track time, but we weren't able to start driving until noon due to the amount of track damage from rain, and then a snow storm. DAy #4 was icy as hell, the bus wasn't even able to drive in, we had to take cayennes for the last leg:
Emilie, working hard as always :)
Day #4 was a bit tough, some of the tracks were too tight due to water damage (too many cones). I did more or less ok on the wider track, and got some nice controlled drifts, but I also lost the car a few times, including hitting ice too quickly and some terminal oversteer that threw me backwards in a snowbank. I unfortunately needed a cayenne to be towed out...
I did a bit better later in the day, but it was still tough:
On this track, I was doing better I thought, but I got over confident, went a bit too fast, ended up backwards in a snowbank, and had to have a cayenne tow me out :( (track1.6_crash_cayenne_int) at the 03:10 mark:
This was my last session on the last day, given that I Was struggling earlier in the day, it was not too bad (Day4.Track4.3_int). The fun parts are the mega powerslides at 3:35 all the way to 4:00, 06:55 to 07:24, 10:25 to 10:55 in Day4.Track4.3_int:
We got plenty of driving for one day (4H, one car each), but that wasn't enough to make up for all lost time on previous days. Oh well, it is what it is. It still was a lot fo fun, because seriously, how can it not be?
Beautiful pictures from our professional photographer, and he got a few of me in action:
Like each time, thanks to all the instructors and to Porsche for letting us drive their cars and make mistakes, so that we could learn in ways hat would not be possible otherwise. This was fun, we should do this again :)
