03/17/09 There is a new racetrack in these parts - Oregon Raceway Park. OK, it's a little over two hours drive but it looks quite interesting. So we're considering putting on a trackday on April 16 - or a private test day, TBD, but if you're interested in a trackday email me. To get a better idea of what's there the whole PM crew, including Westie the dog, took a trip out to Grass Valley today. After briefly considering Dark Helmet the Rux got the job of transporting us. A very good choice, it turns out.

Not only is the Rux a good freeway cruiser with room for four and a dog, when the terrain gets challenging this car takes it in stride. Grass Valley is a small town in the middle of, well, nowhere. Curiously towns are exaclty 9 miles apart out here and it's the third town from the freeway exit. That's 27 miles on a mildly entertaining road that was a lot more fun a few years ago on the R1 at triple digits than on four wheels today at near-legal pace.

Bret, the track manager, met us there and gave us a tour that consisted of a few follow-the-leader laps in each direction. The track definitely has some interesting features and is very technical. Since at this point the grass has not been planted yet there is quite a bit of dried mud across the track from the recent rains - this is going to get fixed shortly. The Rux felt right at home.

There are no real straights but a lot of elevation changes, camber variations, blind crests and other cool features. The next shot is of my favorite part of the track - that'll be fun at speed!

Aside from a bit of mud on the surface the pavement looks great. It's 40 feet wide along the entire 2.5-some miles and flows quite well. Compared to Thunderhill, for example, which is a series of straights and corners that feel disjointed in a point-and-shoot kind of way, this track is very fluid and offers countless opportunities to experiment with lines and strategies. I'm looking forward to it whether we end up doing it in April or later in the year.

Next stop, scouting lodging and accommodations in the area, was Wild Winds Ranch which is adjacent to the track. Once on the property the lodge is a surprisingly long drive down a one-lane dirt road, another place where the Rux did really well. Wouldn't have wanted to take the Mini on that however. The lodge has mostly catered to hunters so far and it hasn't been an issue for that group but now that they're considering accommodating track drivers they need a solution of some kind (shuttle service to the track is being considered). Fortunately the owners of the ranch have just acquired a house that literally overlooks the track itself and it's a lot more accessible to the street-driven trackday car. Still on a dirt road but a much smoother one.

Overall, a great trip and the track looks very promising. When I have my own track someday this is what it's going to look like. If it weren't for the middle-of-nowhere part I'd actually consider moving here. Don't get me wrong, the town is very friendly and from what we're told vast majority of its 109 residents enthusiastically support the track and welcome us car nuts with what seems like optimistic curiosity. Life is definitely different here and for a bit at a time at least it would be a fun departure from the norm for us.

04/13/09 A BMW trackday and a rainy one at that. So since the Atom didn't get done in time (and the weather would be ill-suited to it anyway) the Rux got the second-vehicle duty. In the first session with the track still wet Karl drove the Rux and M drove the Mini. I rode along with Karl to show him the track layout and point out its quirks. Karl is a very experienced driver and was a National autocross competitor a while back (and Regional champion). So he had the track and the car figured out pretty quickly and was drifting it on the wet pavement after only a few laps. Of course the brakes went away after a lap or two even in the wet so he had to take it fairly easy in the braking zones. For the next session the pavement was dry and while Karl switched to the Mini, I rode along with M in the Rux.

In the dry this car is not happy on the track on its all-season tires and woefully inadequate brakes. Nevertheless M was starting to figure it out and I had her working on pitching the car into turns ant throttle-steering it all the way through. She was making good progress with that. About halfway through she went a bit wide in Turn 7 and went off the track, but was pointed straight and was able to gather it up and then pull back onto the track with no issues. We pull off, talk to the corner worker at the black flag station, then go back out. First lap, on the front straight at over 100 mph - BANG! - and a bunch of debris flying in the mirrors. The car was still tracking straight and there was no vibration but obviously something was wrong. "That was a tire!" M said. From the passenger seat it was hard to tell.

We came to a stop in the chicane bypass well off the track and I checked the tires - sure enough, left rear is totally flat. We pulled behind the wall and changed to the mini-spare and were able to drive back to the pits when the session was over, but Rux's day at the track was done.

Looking at the tire revealed a cut on the inside sidewall. When we drove by Turn 7 on the way to the pits it became clear what happened. The curbing at the outside of the turn has 'tigers teeth' with a sharp edge that sticks up well above the soil. Not an issue if one stays on the track but because M went off almost parallel to the curbing the inside sidewall of the tire rode along the jagged edge and was damaged. As soon as the car got up to speed on the front straight the tire failed.

All in all it could have been much worse but M is not happy about things that keep breaking - last year the 748, now this. She handled every incident perfectly but I can see where it can be frustrating. Hopefully she's done with these setbacks for a while.