I just thought I would share my thoughts on my third Lapping Day over at the wonderful High Plains Raceway, in Byers, Colorado.
Earlier in the year I went with a friend of mine, and his recently purchased VW GTI, along with my Boxster, and got acquainted with the track. I lucked out, ans that weekend, they were having the Rocky Mountain PCA car club racing there, so there were many many Porsches to follow behind, and drool over. There was a black Boxster with the numbers 166 on the side.
Then in August, I went again, this time with my girlfriend, and her Chrysler Crossfire, plus my Boxster, and got to tool around the track piloting both cars. Thats when I killed off the outer edges of the front tires. Shiny new Falken Ziex ZE-912's came with my car when I bought it back in February. Those 205/50-17 tires are just too thin for serious track abuse, in my opinion.
So this time I went prepared with a fresh set of Falken Azenis RT-615's, and upgraded the front tire size to 225/45-17, while still keeping the 255/40-17 in the rear.
Much much better overall than the stock sizes with the ZE-912 set.
I could carry quite a bit more speed into the high speed sweepers, and I wasn't washing out the front end on the couple hairpins and decreasing radius turns on the track waiting for the front end to bite in. Also, the tires didn't get as greasy feeling when they were up to temp as they did on the 912's.
This was my gf's first time driving on HPR in her Crossfire, so I started out in her car as a passenger while I helped her work on some initial lines, and turn in plus exit points. The smile on her face and the excitement in her voice at the end of the day showed me that she had a fantastic time tearing around the track at a fun, safe pace.
Here's a video that I took in the last session of the day.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAw6qPVptGg
I mounted my Sony digital camera on the front bumper of my car using the tow loop that screws into the front bumper.
Sorry about the wind noise, as that's just about all you will hear in the video, other than the tires working for grip around every corner.
When I hopped on the track, I lucked out, and got in behind the Black 166 Boxster, and a Silver Boxster S. I kept them a safe distance in front of me, and rocked off a couple 2:20's around the track. Unfortunately the video cuts off at 9:50, and we don't get to see what time my 4th lap was, as at the end, I had closed the gap pretty good on the Boxster S.
Enjoy,
BC.
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