First DE
 

I did my first DE over the weekend. Driver's Training was on Friday, then the DE event was Saturday and Sunday at Brainerd International Speedway (road course).

Here are some of my thoughts after the weekend:

1) I met so many great people. Everyone was very friendly and helpful. I didn't notice any ego issues with more experienced drivers. Great way to meet lots of people with a common interest.

2) Sweet cars everywhere. I spent alot of time just walking around looking at the cars. To name a few - 986 GT2, about 5 GT3 Cup cars, Panoz, Lotus, etc.. Lots of highly modified cars (sponsored).

3) I have a whole new appreciation for the capabilities of my car. WOW! :eek: One of my first hurdles when I was driving at speed was to trust the car. It was perfect, very stable with no issues. I am especially impressed on how fast you can stop. We did some braking exercises and this car stops on a dime.

4) I think I will be a better overall driver now that I know the capabilities of the car and how to handle it.

5) Fun :D Driving into a banked turn at 130mph is just really cool.


So I strongly recommend trying a DE if you haven't done one.

I did a once over on the car last night and the damage from the weekend was minimal. My new tires now have some nice 'melted' effect on the outer edges. I played with tire pressures to minimize this so it isn't too bad. Couple of rock chips in the front - very small. One scuff mark on a wheel. Not to bad given three days of very hard driving.

drburton-chips or scars
 

Those aren't chips, think of them as well earned battle scars

Forgot to mention my wife had a pretty cool experience at the track. I signed her up to be a passenger with one of the instructors for fun. She ended up in a GT3 Cup car.

She had to climb through the window to get in, door wasn't working right, then had the five point harness on. They ended up going 170mph on the straight and took turn one at over 160mph :eek:

Then, to top off the experience, after 4 laps they ran out of gas and had to get towed in. She thought it was pretty cool. The driver was catching crap all day for running out of gas and they were towed in by a Scion which made it even worse.

scion,haha, awesome

glad u had fun man, i cant wait for mine, 8 more days