Nürburgring Video I did with Walter Röhrl & Olaf Manthey

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So I’ve been going to the Nurburgring to drive in Touristenfahrten or so called ‘TF’ public days driving about 12 years now. I do laps, as many do, in cars which for some reason I end up ensuring are a bit too quick for my skills. Every time I get a bit quicker and more experienced, I get impatient and get something more powerful. And so it has progressed from my old 2.5 litre 8 valve Porsche 944 all the way to the CSL that I run these days with a friend. So much for the lesson that all who have driven there have been taught that a 19 year old kid in an old Golf on local plates is usually quicker than everyone. I guess I’m catching up to the car’s capabilities by now. Certainly passengers seem to enjoy the experience.

Picture: The 944 – AKA the Bumble Bee, which I did my first hundred laps in.

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And this is the CSL, AKA Apollo.

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But really for me the Ring has always been about a lot more than just the driving on TF days. I love the community. In the evenings I’ve usually got a guitar in my hand in the Lindenhof in Nürburg playing strange interpretations of rock classics along with the owner Marco on his grand piano. I probably spend more time doing this with a beer not far away than I do behind the wheel on the track. Over the years I’ve made friends and found out about the place. It was a bit of a shock to find out how the local government had to sell the track into private hands to make up for losses incurred by the fraud of the finance minister. It was also pretty sobering to hear about how the community’s economic survival relies in part on the TF public days which I’ve enjoyed so much.

One thing that makes local people scared for the future is dangerous behaviour on track and even on the public roads, and it’s been getting much worse in recent years.

One such moron. Possibly great fun for the guy driving, but illegal, possibly dangerous and just the sort of idiocy that is ammunition for people who want to shut public driving at the Ring down:

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The first thing I should admit is that I was far from mature when I first came to the Ring. I crashed on my second lap, and the first cars that I regularly drove there were underinsured for the Nordschleife (as most British cars are for the Ring) until we finally registered the current car in Germany.

Anyway, I was in my repmobile on the M6 near Middlewich about two years ago and started singing, as songwriters sometimes do, some new lines that made me laugh. It started with thinking of the confident new arrival proudly telling his friends ‘these local kids don’t know what TF means’. Think of the local teenager in the Golf who’s quicker than most.

On the following Saturday at home, in about 5 minutes, I wrote the rest of what would become the TF Song.

It’s a satire I guess about the type of tourist driver on the Ring I probably was myself those years ago. Overexcited, not bad willing, but given the right (or wrong) circumstances, not far off dangerous. The locals laugh at these guys. They may say they want to ‘win TF’ or Touristenfahrten, but the only prize on offer is the golden pineapple, which perhaps translates as the ‘wooden spoon’.

Anyway, I played the song for some friends at the Ring, and they all seemed to like it.

Then it dawned on me that although it was funny, being riddled with jokes about newbies who think they’re quicker that Sabine Schmitz, it also had the potential to maybe highlight something about the Ring that I wanted to change, or at least get people talking about a bit more.

So I corralled my friends from over the years, made a few phonecalls, and came up with the idea of a certain rally driver teaching me the way of moderation, and afterwards a race steward giving me his old car to drive off into the sunset.

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I play the boy racer kid, with the help of a diet and some makeup.

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Walter Röhrl plays, er, Walter Röhrl.

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And Olaf Manthey plays a safety marshal. Obviously.

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As well as to promote the cause of safety and respect in a non-patronising and possibly funny way, we did the whole thing for the benefit of EiFelkind, the children’s charity run by one of the private family race teams from the VLN race series paddock. In the end, we were quite pleased with the result.

Here’s the link to the video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mIMBq9o8rwM

The band is the Heizer Monkeys.

Hope my fellow PHers enjoy it.

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Hi mods

This shouldn't really be in Reader's Cars. It's a thread about how I put together a music video starring two of the greatest legends of world motorsport. Just had a couple of shots of my Ring cars in it.

There isn't really a category for what this thread is.

Readers' Cars isn't right.

Thanks

Joseph AKA Legal Knievel

[tozerman]

[Pflanzgarten]

Love the place, heading back there this year after a couple of years off. I'll be at one of Darren's excellent DN events but I don't mind admitting, I love TF more.

It might be more dangerous, financially risky and not as good for unspoilt laps but I just love TF. The buzz, the camaraderie, the danger, it all adds up to something peculiar that some people just don't get.

Dicing with superbikes on a busy Saturday or warm, sunny evenings in summer when it's nearly empty. A very special place

[Rick101]

Fantastic

[Chunkychucky]

Awesome post and thanks for sharing

Only been once in 2017, but managed to do 4 laps in a R4R Swift Sport during the TF session, as it was the evening of the driver's briefing for the Circuit Days trackday the next day TF was dead! Great fun in the Swift, flat out pretty much everywhere with the amount of grip and brake pads it had

[missing the VR6]

Brilliant, very well written.

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Thanks for nice comments guys!

Just wanted to share the adventure with PHers. The forum has been very much part of the journey.

[jamesbilluk]

Very enjoyable read! Thank you. It's a shame it's not in General gassing for more people to see.

[doogalman]

Do I know you?

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doogalman said:

Do I know you?

If you are the famous Roy Hastings of Nürburgring Life, then it’s a yes!