The mark of being a true Nurburgring expert? It's not knowing the secret 'racing line' through Adenauer Forst or which kerb you can or can't take through Hatzenbach. It's knowing instinctively which lane you need to be in to catch the correct exit off the Brussels 'ring road.
Amazing who you bump into in these parts
Speaking of which it was as I joined said eighth circle of hell that I spotted an Brit E46 M3, stickered up in some approximation of urban camo and, I guessed, headed the same way. Drawing alongside I dropped my nearside window to exchange pleasantries with the driver, who turned out to be
Mission Motorsport's Jim Cameron - Tankslider to many on PH. Stood to reason really - who else would drive a track slag M3 with a collection of immaculately ironed shirts hanging from the rear passenger grab handle?
Funny thing 'community'. PH is a vast and sprawling one in its own right of course but within it are multitudinous overlapping smaller ones, getting ever more tight knit the more your drill down into it. And the loose and informal 'ring community is one I have dipped in and out of for over a decade now. Like any such gang there's a powerful sense of belonging from shared experiences racked up over the years, typified by things like bumping into people you know at 5pm on a Tuesday afternoon half way round the Brussels ring road. And then passing sweets between moving cars in an attempt to stave off both hunger and madness.
Polizei inspired fag break, thankfully just routine
At Nurburg Jim and I would join the numerous groups of Brits making the trip out for the 10th Destination Nurburgring. As the infamous tourist drives become both legally more sketchy for (probably) uninsured Brits the appeal of investing all your Nurburgring credits into a properly organised track day event makes a lot of sense. Like many there I've cut my teeth in Touristenfahrten but had become disillusioned with the clowns and closures.
But first we had to get there. After traditional 'ring trip rituals like vaulting the turnstiles at Belgian service station toilets we had a car swap and Jim's passenger Lionel joined me in the F-Type for the remainder of the ride. Through Mission Motorsport Jim's created a community of his own, one that overlaps in many instances with PH and beyond. Lionel is one of the ex-servicemen attempting to bring some focus to a life shattered by injury both physical and mental. He shrugs off the loss of his leg as a mere inconvenience; the memory of the two comrades killed in the same incident alongside him would appear to have had the deeper legacy.
Just the job for dusting off rusty track knowledge...
As Jim would later put it, if you gathered together a group of ex-servicemen and told them they were going to meet at an airfield for 'a bit of a group hug' followed by some life coaching and schooling in how to get by in civilian life nobody would attend. Chuck in some hooning about in cars, however, and all of a sudden you've got something to, well, rally the troops. Jim's mission is to give guys like Lionel - young, baseline financially secure and yet traumatised by life-changing injury - something literally to get out of bed for.
I'd see more of Lionel and the other boys later in the trip. First I had to face some demons of my own; namely a track I knew well in the broader strokes but the details of which had become a little fuzzy through a few years' absence. A Radical with the man who drove one around the Nordschleife in just 6min 48sec probably wasn't the car to be finding my feet in. More on this in due course but, suffice to say, finding yourself rotated through 180 degrees and facing oncoming traffic on the entry to Schwalbenschwanz with a frantic instructor shouting into your earpiece to get the car moving was not the gentle re-immersion I was seeking.
Tourist drives on a GP track; German logic
Back in the Jag I attempted to get back on that horse and make my Destination Nurburgring experience a more positive one. A task made somewhat easier with a V8 F-Type with 550hp, instant car park pulling power and one of the naughtiest exhaust crackles ever created. Again, more on this in due course but the Jag and I bonded, anyone who rode in it loved it and if I'd set up a temporary dealership in the corner of the car park I reckon I'd have done alright from it. As well as familiar faces it was nice to meet some new ones too, including Adam who hitched a ride alongside me and talked about life with the 3.8 997 RS he bought to replace a McLaren 12C, Carpooler George Bentinck and his
nicely modded BMW 130i, some on-track dicing with Andy with the 'UR 2 SLO' BMW Z4 M Coupe some may know from Sunday Services and following a surprisingly rapid turbocharged MX-5 belonging to a small but vociferous gang of Mazda fanatics. Special shout to the chap with the 'period' Zender kitted Mk2 Golf GTI too.
Just your typical rural German guesthouse
With a lot of closures on day one and rumours of an evening opening over at the GP a few of us headed over there for some proper tyre abuse. With two unused Nordschleife laps on a spare 'ring card - equal to two 15-minute GP sessions - I was good to go. And it was utter madness. A smiling gent opened the gate to the pitlane, bikes and cars lined up and ... off we went. No briefing. In many cases no helmets. And a mix of cars from people carriers to fully caged 911s. In my second session I lined up behind a DeLorean, a Ferrari 456 and a Testarossa with a sullen youth in an Astra estate behind me. Literally it seemed there were people diverting from the drive home from work to do a session - can you just imagine nipping off the A43 to do the same at Silverstone?
A barbecue followed, beer intake tempered by the fact I had to drive back to the Lindner village 'frat house' meaning a walk through the peaceful village of Welcherath in the evening heat. And this is what I love about these trips; sauntering past a small guest house in a remote German village and finding a gaggle of fly splattered Porsche 911s parked outside, the most rubbish of which was a 997 GT3. I swear I could still feel the heat radiating off the brake discs.
Jag man Willi checked car over for us - danke!
Day two saw more of the same, cut short by the need to hit the road by lunchtime to make my crossing home. Not before dropping by the Jaguar Land Rover Nurburgring test centre to have the car given a once over by friendly custodian Willi. He got the car up on the ramp, poked, prodded and examined and then peered over his glasses to ask "You have done a lot of laps, ja?" Maybe. "Uh-huh. You were at the GP track also?" he asked, prodding away at the underside. "This is interesting..." He sent me off with a clean bill of health and uncertainty about whether he thought I'd given the car a pasting or had simply been a wuss for not requiring a fresh set of tyres.
Regardless, that familiar sense of relief washed over me as the F-Type morphed from tyre smoking mentalist to wafting GT car and the Nurburg castle receded in the mirrors. Good to be back. But better, as ever, to be leaving in one piece.
Dan
A little taste of the Jag
[Thanks to: Unique Track Days, Destination Nurburgring, Willi at the JLR test centre]
