Day: July 1, 2011

On The Limit: Porsche World Cup Nordschleife Onboard

You are going to want to watch this. This takes serious skill, or balls, or maybe it is just plain stupidity I don’t know! I have no idea how these drivers do it. He can’t even see at times!

Event: Porsche World Cup
Venue: Nürburgring Nordschleife
Driver: Sean Edwards
Team: Team Abu Dhabi by tolimit
Car: Porsche 997 GT3 Cup (no ABS)
Conditions: Very very wet!

As a prelude to last week’s Nürburgring 24 Hours held on the daunting Nordschleife, Porsche brought together several of its one-make series into one six-lap World Cup event. This included the Porsche Supercup (which normally supports F1 in Europe) and national Carrera Cup championships from Germany, Britain, France, Italy and maybe more.

Supercup and Carrera Cup Germany driver Sean Edwards entered the race and his Team Abu Dhabi by tolimit team fitted an onboard camera. Here are some highlights including the start and opening lap on the GP loop and a part of the long track, before a full lap on the Nordschleife itself.

This is why I am not a racing driver, or if I was I could never race something as powerful as a GT car, I would’ve been killed several times over! The reactions and car control are just astonishing.

Thanks to @habibif1 for the tip via Twitter and to Sean Edwards for uploading the video to YouTube. I’ve not arranged this with Edwards or tolimit, but it is available under a standard YouTube Licence which allows sharing.

Goodwood This Weekend

This weekend is the Goodwood Festival of Speed and I’ll be attending on Friday and Saturday and I’m sure I’ll bump in to a few people from the online community.

Perhaps I’ll even bump into a famous name or two, not that I’ll have any idea what to say as my mind always, always goes blank in that situation. I do plan to get plenty of photos and videos especially because this year there is a big IndyCar presence, including current drivers and cars which never usually happens because until last year they raced at Watkins Glen on this date. This marks a rare UK appearance for many of them, even including the UK drivers who are usually too busy with racing and public appearances in North America (or Brazil) to please the sponsors.

There is also the biggest contemporary F1 presence for some time, possibly ever, and the usual array of classics from across the racing spectrum. Sadly there will be a lack of current sportscar drivers and cars since both the ILMC/LMS and the FIA GT1 series are racing in Italy and Spain respectively. There might also be a smaller motorbike crowd since MotoGP and British Superbikes are also racing. With the huge reputation the FoS enjoys these days I find it amazing racing series deliberately schedule events against it.

This is the first time I’ve attended two days of the Festival so I hope to take it a little easier than usual – they say it is a garden party but I’m always rushing from place to place to see everything in a single day (the site is huge). I hope I can take it easier this time. I’ve also never been on the quieter Friday, usually Saturday and Sunday are my preferred days but both are choc full of fans a few rows deep, you only get really close to the cars late in the day as people thin out but then time becomes limited.

So I hope to report back on Sunday, and who knows I might find time on Friday night for a quick update too. I’ll be commuting the 2 hours each way from home on both days because amazingly the cost of fuel is still lower than the cost of a hotel room on FoS weekend in the Chichester area… ought to have checked earlier I suppose.

I haven’t forgotten about posts for Belgian GP Sunday, LMS Silverstone or the Donington Historic.. will get there eventually!