Well, since making it out to the expo wasn't an option for me after all, I was fortunate to be part of an event less than an hour from my house.. I recently joined a local prelude owner's club(a spinoff of the Toronto group - and more on my prelude in a post later today), which has some people really into attending HPDE's and such.. Well, Phil Wicks was holding a one day school/HPDE at Gateway International Raceway and some of them were going, so I was lucky and able to register at the last minute..

All in all it was a fantastic event.. It was being provided for the Prelude Club, Mini Club, Porsche Club, and Ferrari Clubs of this region.. Well ran, with the exception of the lack of desire of instructors to actually instruct people in the intermediate group(I'd never been on the track before in my life and had to practically beg for one).. Corner workers were excellent, even going so far as to black flag the occasional exotic owner who refused to let people by continuously, and all drivers in our group seemed to be conducting themselves in very safe and controlled manners.. The track layout itself was a new one for me, a NASCAR banked oval track using 1/2 the oval and the infield for the road course.. very flat on the infield, but the big banked turn was pretty cool..

Fun day, for sure.. i got 8 20+ minute sessions, lots of classroom time, and free lunch from Subway(as well as breakfast from somewhere else), all for a lot less cost than a NASA weekend.. I expect to attend the September event in Nashville, since I enjoyed this so much.. Now, onto the pics of my R(the only one there), the others I was with, and all the beautiful exotics attending(360 Modenas, 911 Carreras, Countach Kit Car, etc etc) with us:






































my thoughts on the day:


missed not being at the expo, but at least I got to get on track anyway!


pics courtesy of the STL Prelude Club..


Modified by mstewar at 4:02 PM 7/27/2004

 

NIOCE!!!!

glad you had some fun while we were getting hammered

 

Marky! Looking good man! Missed you at EXPO! Glad you got some seat time though! I like the decals on 55, deff starting to look like a Race Kaa! I will come out west and do a track day with ya ASAP!!

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Smitdog &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I will come out west and do a track day </TD></TR></TABLE>

Hmm......

Sounds like fun, I'm in

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Smitdog &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Marky! Looking good man! Missed you at EXPO! Glad you got some seat time though! I like the decals on 55, deff starting to look like a Race Kaa! I will come out west and do a track day with ya ASAP!! </TD></TR></TABLE>

thanks y'all..

and yeah steve-o.. finding lots of tracks are around here.. worst case we'll have to meet up at Mid-Ohio or something..

 

Very nice. You get a rear sway bar on that bitch yet?

 

Whoah! Sizzling..

 

Looks good Mark...Gateway is fun, just watch out for the wall, haha.

I still need to give you a call since I'm in the area right now.

 

nice cars - looks like you had a great day!

 

360 :droolage:

 

nice pics

 

How many ferarris did you own?!

 

Some of those preludes dont look to badd

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by sscguy &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Very nice. You get a rear sway bar on that bitch yet?</TD></TR></TABLE>

lol.. always had a rear bar.. I'm still lacking a front bar.. I think I'm going to leave it that way too..

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Rguy &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">How many ferarris did you own?! </TD></TR></TABLE>

0.. haha.. I actually ended up not being around very many in my rungroup.. and I expect that most of them were decent drivers.. the same could not be said for those in the beginner group I heard though.. I also got owned by some very nice porsches and a couple vipers.. I had my way with a couple vettes, a boxster, a jetta, a couple of the other hondas and some mini's though.. hehe..

 

Good times! I may have to roll with Smit

 

nice, is that a F50 i see in one of those pics?

 

Looks like you had a damn good time without us............YOU TRYIN TO SAY SOMETHIN SUCKA .

 

Great pics Mark! That's more exotics than I've seen at one hpde. Let me know when the next one is and we'll own some ferrariz.

 

that's just like a dream I had the other day.
Except I was driving the R, had huge pectoral muscles, and a bevy of race queens satiating my every need, and fulfilling every whim.

Cool pics!

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by hypa &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">that's just like a dream I had the other day.
Except I was driving the R, had huge pectoral muscles, and a bevy of race queens satiating my every need, and fulfilling every whim.

Cool pics!
</TD></TR></TABLE>

oddly enough, most of the women there were with us, the "lowly" honda/subaru/etc owners.. only a few women with the richie crew.. maybe they just left all their trophy wives at home..

 

4x4 looks good Mark

Brian

 

Looks like alot of fun. Those Ferraris are awesome and this Esprit S4 is sweet.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Brian*Blue95M3 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">4x4 looks good Mark

Brian</TD></TR></TABLE>

&lt;---- No COmment........ Runs for cover........

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by mstewar &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">lol.. always had a rear bar.. I'm still lacking a front bar.. I think I'm going to leave it that way too..
</TD></TR></TABLE>

Blah, my bad. Does that not affect front suspension geometry? And have you tried the car with a front bar as a comparison?

 

Mark, you think the car handles better with no front sway bar?? And you want to keep it like that??