A short write-up on the Porsche driver’s education and briefly discussing the
capabilities of the old 3.2 Carrera.
The pictures from the driver’s Ed can be found here
(
http://home.bredband.no/froder/porsche.htm).
After several weeks of poor autumn weather the sun decided to grace us with its
presence. I have no problems with driving in the rain with my 3.2 – but I always
prefer a dry track over a wet one.
There were 10-15 of us who met just north of Oslo at 07:20 a Saturday morning.
The drive up to the Valerbanen racetrack (150 km) took almost two hours.
The day
started with breakfast and a short introduction to what we were going to experience.
- on the page referred to above you can find the program for the day.
There were approx. 30 fellow Porshcephiles there for the day –everybody showed
up in their own cars. It ranged from 944 NA to 911TT and GT3 RS. My car representing
the budget-approach to a fun day at the track.
There were 5 instructors there, two factory drivers and three “hired in” racecar
drivers. The norwegain representative of this crowd – Roger Sandberg took
us to the basic principles of weight distribution during braking, cornering and exit.
Furthermore he discussed the ideal way around a curve – and the how people
approach this differently.
The practical part started with showing how NOT to sit in you car while driving.
As you all know; up right, wrist over steering wheel and back firmly back in the
seat etc. etc. My group then drove of to the northern part of the course for
some time trials. We were timed in a Boxter S around a Go-Cart circuit – fun
This took about an hour before we drove on the track.
The instructors had divided the track in two halves. The instructor first drove
each participants car, with the owner in the passenger seat – all the time the
rest of the bunch followed the same line. This also took almost one hour.
The same
thing repeated it self for the other half of the track
The two last exercises before lunch were done on the wet section of the track.
This racetrack is also used as a driver license course. Living in Norway means
driving 4-5 months in snowy conditions, therefore when you take your drivers
license one of the practical lessons is maneuvering in slippery conditions –emergency
braking etc. We did slalom in close to zero friction condition, and driting around
a long 220degree corner - that proved to be very difficult!!
After a nice lunch we drove our cars flat out on the course, tying the corners
together – trying to master the finer skills or racecar driving
This was for me the highlight of the day – test driving the new 997.
It’s one
of the most emotional experiences that I’ve had with a car – I had total confidence
in it after 3-4 laps… To put things in perspective; I have driven my 3.2 on numerous
track events and Auto-X, starting to really know how it handles at MY limit.
The same level of confidence appeared in the 997 after just couple if minutes...
The car talk’s back to you during acceleration, breaking and cornering – telling you
exactly what are happening, and what will happen if you don’t back of….
I felt
like Walter R. for a few minutes. All the time an instructor with the name of Dirk (
Factory Driver) gave me corrective input, asking me to brake later, alter my line,
not use the curbs etc. etc…
After this (way to short session) Dirk took me around the track –and showed
me the true capabilities of the 997S – It was truly embarrassing! I had not
scratched the surface in terms of it performance envelope. He carried so much
speed into each corner, controlled the tendencies to drift wide with ease, and at
the same time positioned the car as such to exit with maximum speed. Truly amazing :shock:
When discussing the capabilities of my car, compared to the newer 911’s,
is difficult to make a general statement. Out of the box the newer cars are way
faster. Then you must decide what kind of driving exercises that you would like
to optimize your car for… My car is fairly good on the smaller Norwegian race tracks (
Valerbanen & Rudskogen). I have not yet taken it to ArticRaceCircle.
In the national PCN (Porsche Club Norway) slalom cup I finished third this year
(my first year). Beaten by a RUF-converted 964 and a BoxterS.
For this event we have devidied Porsche cars in three categories;
- Front engine (924/944/968/928)
- Rear engine (911/914/Boxter)
- R- series (any car with slicks, roll cage, racing seat etc..)
-
My car normally outperforms original 964/993/966 on this type of events. But then
my car only weighs 1180-1190 kilograms and are tuned to an approx. 250 hp.
This equals to 4.76 kg / hp which is not that bad. This combined with
RUF sway-bars,
turbo tie-rods and sport shocks make my car a reasonable competitive vehicle.
Examples:
964 4 = 5.84
964 3 = 5.52
993 2 = 5.03
I holded a techart tuned 993 (appr. 300 HP) up to 100-120 km/h, then he pulled away
For more PCN pictures – look no further:
http://www.porsche-club-norge.no/galleri/
I have not yet started to plan what to do this winter to improve for next year
– but I have a strong feeling that I have to look at my driving skills – rather
than paying shit loads of $$$$ for upgrades….
I found a really interesting site that will teach me some theory
http://<br />
http://www.redlineren...iversEdEd.html
- let me know if you have found similar sites that can help me....
Have fun – or laugh trying
Frodefe
Porsche World Roadshow / Racing school
Linear Mode
