"The Ring"

I hate you............

not really... have fun....whatever you choose

You may want to spend the money on the GT86.....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSUKASsRG0Y

Suzuki Swift. 4-Laps

October 9th @ 5:15pm

Hot-Damn I'm excited

You're going to love it. Really. A lot.

I'd worry about overselling it, but the hype has already been done.

I'm glad to hear you're getting in a few laps; it's absolutely worth it. When you finish your first lap, stop and think how you'd feel if you were done for the day

Start playing Gran Turismo A LOT. Get the ring memorized. Have a blast!

I don't even own a system to play GT on

I've been watching this a lot though: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6lQL_CP1N8

The more you know of the track, the better. Even after driving a lot of laps in GT5, the latter half of the track looked very same-same to me and I had much less confidence that a corner was the one I thought it was.

One thing that doesn't come through in video games or youtube is the elevation changes. The roller-coaster aspect is quite a shock in person. But it's neat!

Hungary Bill wrote: I don't even own a system to play GT on I've been watching this a lot though: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6lQL_CP1N8

http://youtu.be/mMjUfGpYqgg -

You'll love it- I did four laps in a Stage 2 back in June and it's been the highlight of my year (and that of my friends who rode shotgun on the laps as well). I didn't do nearly enough runs in GT as I should have, but it did help a bit. There's a couple of NASTY hard left turns into long sweeping rights that I wish I'd been more prepared for as I almost put the car off the track after coming into the left too hot. They'll tell you about it in the R4R safety briefing.

The hardest aspect of it for me though was having to be hyper-aware of all the other cars, especially since pretty much EVERYTHING was blowing past me. I didn't get to take the two carousels properly the first two laps because of other cars coming up behind me so fast. I would have had a LOT less fun had I only been able to take one or two laps- it was the third lap before I'd really gotten used to the car properly and the fourth before I was more comfortable with the track and could really start to drive it somewhere close to properly.

HOLE-EEEEEEE_CRAP!!!!

Story to follow. I've been on the road for 12 hours and need to get ready for work first

Hungary Bill wrote: HOLE-EEEEEEE_CRAP!!!! <img src="/media/img/icons/smilies/laugh-18.png" alt="" /

Yeah, that sounds about right. The video one of my friends took needs to be heavily edited sound-wise because basically every time something blew by me he'd yell, "HOLY E36 M3!" It's a great video, but not something I can show most of my relatives as is.

Man, i tell you what

Three things first:

1) Ransom: No way could you have oversold that. That was better than the first time I found out what my "naughty bits" were for.

2) RWD VS Swift: Bollocks! That Swift was unbelievably agile and balanced. The tires really helped too, I'm sure. I was on the tail of more than "just a few" cars that seemed like they were "too proud" to let me by. Porsche Carrera, BMW 3-series something, and a few others but sleep-dep at the moment is making my memory a bit fuzzy. If anyone reading this is debating a Swift rental to get in a few extra laps DO IT! Get as many laps in as you can.

3) Could I have stopped after just one lap? Absolutely berkeleying no! Not no way, not no how. The first lap was a cruise compared to my last two. Which brings me to:

My experience on the ring in 4-laps (my very first 4-laps on any race track):

Lap 1: Not too fast, but putting along quite nice. Getting a feel for the car, while matching what I'm seeing to all the youtube videos I saw. Getting passed, and passing slow people.

Lap 2: Video camera "on", pedal to the floor. Taking turns waaaaaaaaay to hot and sloppy, but man am I MOVIN! This is also where I ran into the BMW (and I might have ran into the Porsche on this one too but can't be sure). But overall it was a fun, if not butt clenching, experience.

Lap 3: Very nice. Still a bit too hot in some of the slower corners, but my familiarization is improving waaaaaaaay faster than I thought it would. I'm driving faster longer, and nailing the brakes less. Turns are starting to "blend", things are getting a lot smoother, and I feel like I'm moving lots faster.

Lap 4: OH MY GOD!!! This is IT! I can't believe this is me controlling this car! I am always right where I want to be, I am always in the gear I want to be in, and I am MOOVIN! What the heck did they feed this SWIFT! Look out, I'm commin through! Where is everybody? I'm having the drive of my friggin LIFE and no one is even here to see it! Those people on the sidelines, they HAVE to know I am friggin FLYIN! Why aren't they applauding? Can't they see that I AM A DRIVING GOD! ? Round the carousel like a slingshot! Look at these people getting out of my way! They must be wondering who's behind this wheel and IT'S ME! Holy crap, there's no way I can keep this facade going for this long, but here I am, it's the last turn, don't let off this time, keep it down, holy crap, drift to the outside, holy crap, holy crap, I'm going to need 6th gear!!! There's the overpass, aaaaaaaand

lift

(when I reviewed the video, I found really great footage of the car's radio... )

When I got to the parking lot I found that they closed the track while I was out, the ambulance was dispatched shortly afterward, and they closed the track about 30-minutes after that when the ambulance returned. I don't have any other details.

The track was starting to get drizzled on when I started the 4th lap, and was all out raining by the time the ambulance made it's reappearance (so it could have been closed to rain). But had I not ran lap right after lap, I would have missed out on the most awesome drive of my life

I just watched the "radio" video, and the run from the end of the cones (1:18) to the scaffolding (12:30) took me 11 minutes and 12 seconds. The track was mostly dry, but I think Top Gear would give me a "Mildly Moist".

I am very happy