Sweet pictures of me & Cherie (& instructor Don Wentz) from the August 9th HPDE at PIR with the BMW club, which I somehow lost track of until just now…this photographer captured an amazing sense of motion.

Having fun dancing from the first song…

This cartoon is now ancient but it plus Mike’s captioning still cracks me up!

Ah, track days. They bring me such great satisfaction, an experience I’ve yearned for my whole adult life. (Warning: this post is largely car-geek masturbation.) I put on the R-compound Kumho V710s for the first time during this 2-day track weekend extravaganza at ORP (Oregon Raceway Park) September 11-12, 2010. The first day was an HPDE and the second day was open lapping. The sticky tires were much more confidence-inspiring, although Don Wentz pointed out that they will break loose more suddenly. I wiggled a bit sliding out of turn 3 a couple times but it was nothing major. Unfortunately I don’t have video of Don Clinkenbeard going off in the dirt after turn 13 right in front of me, carrying too much speed to keep it on the track but still cognizant of not scratching his freshly repainted Elise. I was sorry he had to exit, as I wanted to follow him for awhile. The camaraderie of the club was entertaining, trading gossip and good-natured ribbing around the vrooms and growls of cars running on the track. (And the squeaks from brakes, like my own Pagid Yellows that shrieked at almost every turn.) I don’t know if I can go back to street tires again, although I have got to get the Cayman’s oil ingestion/starvation issues addressed before I use them at PIR. Then, what wheels to get? Wheel width is open, no SCCA stock category autocross rules hemming me in; the fronts could run 285’s no problem, which are probably happier on a 10″ rim than a 9″ one although there’s weight to consider. The winter season is almost here, a time to tend to the car and pine for my next high-speed fix. How nice it’s all totally legal!

PIR (Portland International Raceway) is my home track. It’s got 12 turns, is 1.9 miles long, and includes two nice straightaways, on the back one of which I’ve reached a top speed of 125mph in my stock 2006 Cayman S. These two laps here from the August 24th PCA HPDE (Porsche Club of America High-Performance Driver’s Education) were towards the end of my first session of the day, accompanied by master instructor Eddie Nakato. I kind of drove like ass for most of this session but gradually warmed up to a decent place. (You can hear him pointing out how I need to work on smoother application of the throttle before turn 6 in the second lap!) These laps are relatively devoid of traffic, so enjoy the sounds of air and engine.
Unfortunately my camera battery gave out after this session. Later in the day, even as the ambient temperatures reached 90+ degrees and my Michelin PS2 tires squealed like stuck pigs around the corners, I had some exhilarating laps where I became fully one with the car. It’s such a beautiful feeling, becoming nothing but movement and power and flow….

Sent to the web by special request of Evelyn

A strong pattern emerged to me from a variety of publications that I had the time to read today. A new potential technological landscape is emerging in the world, and designers need to be vigilant to how we can help people find meaning amid ever-increasing complexity.