Tuesday April 17

Competition Day #3, we arrived at the rail station in Narbonne, then traveled by coach to the section of the station where they unloaded the cars. We stood around and waited for a while.
As you can see, it was another fantastic morning. There was a cool breeze, but the sun was warm. After we got through the gate to the train yard, we walked over to the car hauler and pulled the car off. While waiting for our turn, I spotted this thing:
It's a bike that was converted to use car tires and has a sealed side car. It was really an interesting bike.
We packed back into the car, fired up the GPS, consulted the route book and headed out of town.

It was about an hour ride and then we arrived at the track. And I can tell you this: Dunlop found some prime property for their track. The map below shows how close the track is to the sea. It's in the upper left of your screen.


Click this link to explore the area on Google Maps.



Not a bad place to be for those who work there everyday. And certainly a great place to spend a day playing with cars in the Mediterranean sun.
Here we are unpacking just after arriving.



It's really easy to find our car in the sea of silver and gray cars.


Next up was lunch time!

Here, you can see some of our wonderful Dunlop hosts having lunch with us. They sure do know good food.





Check out this desert table!

It's got one of my all time favorites, creme brulee.

After lunch, we took some time for our food to settle and looked around. The pictures that follow, can not even start to do justice to the beauty ofthe country side, sea and even the track.


Just off of the proving grounds there were, what appeared to be, vineyards. I am not sure if they were connected to specific wineries or just sold their stock, but I am sure that it is delicious.

This was between us and the sea.

You can see the same view, in a wider angle.




The steeple is in the center of the frame, between the flag poles..



Back to business, we suited up and got more information about the events for the day. We were going to split up into three groups for the first part of the afternoon: a lead and follow group to get familiarized with the big track, a session of wet handling and time at the drag strip. No word on the competition portion yet, just that it would involve the big track.








My group went out on the track first and did a number of laps rotating through the group. The track was pretty exciting. There is a pretty long front straight that goes into a tight right and into a downhill that was broken up by a cone chicane and then into another right. Then flat on the gas until braking for the hard left into a right then hard on the gas, braking for a right at the end of the straight and then track wide through the left into another left and then back right to get setup for another uphill slight left into a right holding
the gas wide open for a run down the front straight. All told, from standing start to standing stop it was about 110 - 115 seconds of adrenaline rush. We did a few laps and then switched drivers, then did a few more laps.


Next we went out to the the wet handling course and drove with the traction control turned on through a precision handling course covered in water.
All the drivers did several laps, finding the limits that the vehicle stability control, traction control and ABS would let us get to. It was a lot of fun. The safety systems kept the cars running pretty straight and true.

Then it was time to turn the TCS and VSC off and have a little fun around the long sweeper...

By looking at the car number, I think that one of the instructors was driving the above car. Everyone loved this exercise, but had varying levels of success.

I got one good slide in...











And for the the rest I either had too fast of a vehicle speed to rotate the car or I was too slow to counter steer and ended up spinning out.




(Like So)

Ralf is on the radio letting me know that I should be a touch faster next time. Or something close to that.




After play time, we went over to the drag strip for our race there. When we arrived the format was explained to us. It would be heads up racing, starting with the two partners going against each other and then moving on from there. It was different from a traditional drag race in that we would start from a roll. The timer would start when the starter dropped the flags...













And then ended when the flags came down at the finish.

It was supposed to be scored in a bracket fashon, so as each pair of racers competed, the winner would advance to the next round until there was only one racer that was undefeated and the scoring would run down the list. However, due to some unforeseen problems, what actually happened is that each teams time from their final round was used and we were ranked that way. It was a little confusing at the time, but in the end, it all worked out.






After the drag strip, it was back up to the pit area to find out about the scoring opportunity known as the Mireval Masters.














This event consisted of a standing start, then one lap as quick as you could then coming to a very fast stop inside of a cone gate. If your car stopped outside of the box (either not far enough into or too far past) you had to move your car until it was in the box and then the clock stopped. It sounds pretty simple but I would guess that we were braking from about 170kph into a box that was only slightly longer than the car.














The final team score would be tabulated by adding both team members times together and the lowest overall time team time is the winner. There would be more than one car on the track at a time, but we were sent off at relatively long intervals so that you were really only racing the clock.





Egon and I hopped in Goldie and took another lap of the track as a group and then lined up at the grid. We decided that I would run first.






Back into the car and then wait for my turn to come up at the start line. The start looked like this.









We got a count down...



Three...











Two...












One...















GO!







And the finish, like this:



So not only did you have to stop in a very short box, but you had to do it in front of a crowd that was sure to heckle if you missed the mark.









I had a run that was not fantastic. I really had a hard time with the section in this picture, I came in way too fast and scrubbed off too much speed before heading up the hill. I knew it was bad when I did it, but at that point there was nothing more to be done, but drive the rest of it like the wind!







After I got back Egon got in and was ready to go. With Mr. Bouncy as co-pilot, Egon gives the thumbs up and storms to a really quick lap.















As with all of the competition events the scores were tabulated and then checked again and given to us over dinner. This meant that it was time to pack up and go after a quick tire inspection. It was determined during the tire inspection that a number of the teams needed new fronts after two very hard 2-driver track days. We were one of the teams that got new fronts, so we spent some time changing them in the pit area.



Manfred, Frank and Lee are enjoying the afternoon sun















As we were finishing up with our tire change, the media crew came up to the Clark(e) brothers, Egon and I and asked if we would be interested in do a photo shoot on the track. Of course we said yes! We spent about another 35 minutes on the track and the photographers got some fantastic shots of the two cars dicing it up.










That was some of most fun we had all day and when it was over, we got a splash of fuel and it was back on the road.

We did hit a little bit of traffic.














Everyone survived the French roundabouts during peak traffic hours.














We were also treated to spectacular colors as the sun set.




After some tricky navigating through Cap d'Agde we arrived at the Hotel du Golfe and checked in.


We sat down to a very tasty dinner that started off with this delicious salad





Being on coast, fish was a big part of dinner.






There was a really cool wine room adjacent to the dinning room. We sampled some fine French wines and waited for the results.








With the competition being so tight after day #1, we were all very anxious to hear the results.




First we got the Drag Strip results where we placed a slightly disappointing 7th. The drag race turned into a strategy game and we had a bad plan. We were still in the hunt, but would really have to step up our game to stay in the top 5.




Next came the Mireval Masters results. Thanks to Egon's seriously quick lap we took a very respectable 3rd. It was too early to really tell, but it looked like it was going to be a very hard fought race all the way down the down the line.

Team USA I was leading with 670 points, followed closely by team Netherlands at 650, team USA II at 620 and then USA III at 570 and rounding out the top 5 was team Germany at 530pts.









As soon as the results were posted, all of the teams began to pour over them and make a plan for tomorrow at the off road trials.




At this point we also started the new tradition of putting a sticker on the car of that days winner. Here you can see Erik and Erik celebrating their victory at Mireval.
After dinner and some general socializing it was time to head to the room and get ready for our trip into Spain and the Off Road trial section.



Until next time, when Egon says "The rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain!"

Monday April 16th, 2007

After a good nights sleep at the Motodrom Hotel at Hockenhiem Ring in Stuttgart Germany it was up and to the track for running and stretching in preparation for both our long day attacking the 'ring and for the upcoming running and biking competition in Spain.




We took a short walk under the track and ended
up just inside pit lane.






We took some time and warmed up in the pits area. After some brisk walking and light running, we were sent out on the ring to do a lap and get our heart rates up to the Polar OwnZone to give everyone a taste of what it was to come in Spain.


It was a beautiful Spring morning, there was a little mist on the track that made the experience of running on a F1 track even more surreal. It quickly burned off and we had a clear track.

As we ran up the parabolic straight, i got to thinking about how fast we were going to get going at the end. Let me tell you, I couldn't have really been ready for how fast it was.

Here is our fearless leader Silvana in an easy gate enjoying the morning.



She makes it look easy, while the rest of us are out there chugging along.





After our warm up run, it was time to circle up the group and do some stretching.



If you look at the picture, you can see that somebody was really confidant in their driving skills and was out doing dough nuts before we got there. I wonder if there were any pit lane penalties handed out for that stunt.






After the run we were comparing what our watches were showing for our heat rates, I think that there was a problem with Lee's watch

... (mine is red, his is gray)



Next up was a tasty breakfast buffet of all the tasty German goodness. I'm not really sure why these guys look so serious, it's all in good fun, right?

After a quick shower, we emptied out of our rooms, packed up the cars and moved the show into the infield of the track for a quick briefing where we got to hear about the days activities.

So they talked...













and we listened...







We were told that in the morning session we would do some reconnaissance laps in a lead and follow format and that the Rookie group (the Americans) would have to take a few low speed runs at the hairpin turn at the end of the famed parabolic striaght.

We all lined up and Ralf stood in the infield just before the corner and gave us pointers about braking points and turn in.














The Dunlop Sport MAXX tires gripped pretty well and helped show off that the 350's were still setup with comfort in mind.




Can you say body roll? I'm not sure if it was Egon or I that was driving, but I know that whoever it was should have been off the brakes by that point. That is why we test, right?






There was a quick briefing about things to watch for at full speed and then it was back to the pits.













After the time spent at the hairpin, we each did a few full laps of a lead and follow exercise to familiarize ourselves with this famous course. We then parked the cars and went in for a fantastic lunch buffet.

After carb-loading at lunch we met in the Baden-Wurttemberg Center for a drivers meeting.














Dunlop ran the event with stereotypical German efficiency, so we signed in for all of our drivers meetings and were penalized for being late.













After everyone had assembled, we had our drivers meeting. We learned that we would be scored, not on lap speed, but on how well we drove. Specifically, we were scored on cornering execution, braking and accelerating. The driving instructors would be placed at key (but unknown to us) points on the track to watch and evaluate our driving. The scoring on this event would not involve any timing equipment and would be totally subjective.

After the meeting, it was back to the garage to have another look at the course map, devise a plan and get ready to ride!







What's that I see ahead?

Ah yes, it looks like victory!








We took one warm up lap and then it was time to grid for the start of the judging.
We went into grid in the order that we finished the carting race the day before and Manfred started us, two cars at a time by waving the German flag.


All lined up and ready to rock and roll!











We had a pretty long session to prove our skill and as time went, the group spread out and you got to concentrate on cutting the perfect corner after hitting the braking marker exactly.










We went in two groups, I went first and then Egon loaded in the car and headed out to the grid.













Is that the look of a guy who is ready to do battle, or what!


Egon took off like a mad man and looked great.





Only time would tell what the judges thought.



Here, trusty #14 charges through the famed Motordrom







After the second group ran, we gathered up again to hear the results and opinions of our fearless leaders.


There was good news to be had! The instructors said that they were pleased with the group as a whole and shocked to announce that the "rookie" Americans had tied for first and taken fifth!





Needless to say that we were all surprised to see how well we had stacked up against this group of international talent and were curious to see how things would go as the competition progressed.









At the end of the day, this is how things looked. It was a strong start for the Americans as a whole, but it a very long competition and anything can happen. Egon and I were happy with our finish, but hoped to move up at some point. After all, just being top 5 in a field this deep is an honor.







We got into a group again and took a photo to commemorate the successful finish of the first full competition day.



That's a great looking group of people, don't you think?








After the photo opportunity, it was time again, to pack into the Z350's and head down the road to Stuttgart and load onto the train for the overnight trip to France and the Dunlop test facility at Mireval .

Till next time, keep it on track!

Welcome to the second day of 2007 World Finals!

April 15, 2007

Competition Day number one! We were up early today, wakeup call was 530am, breakfast started early and we were to be on the bus to the Dunlop Factory by 730. After a quick European style breakfast, all of the teams met up in the lobby.

And then on to the bus...

The city of Hanu was very cooperative with the event. They were gracious enough to close down the main city square, give us the police escort and then provided these buses. They were easy to move the luggage in an out of and were fairly comfortable.

Once we arrived back at the Dunlop factory, it was time to load the car with our luggage for 10 days worth of rally and special stages.

After the car was packed, it was a short walk
across the factory to the briefing room where we were given our road books, introduced to the instructors for the trip and given the format for the events.

These are our fearless leaders. These brave souls will be our guides for the next 10 days as we travel from Hanu to Malaga. They take care of every detail: racing, routes between events, lodging, food and of course the safety of 70 people moving 3200km

Also at the briefing we found out that in the afternoon there would be a demonstration of the off road vehicles, a motorcycle stunt show and a two kart races. There was one kart race for the DDC participants and another race that I understand was some kind of local finals in another contest where the winners were awarded with tickets to the DTM race at Hockenheim the next weekend. That sounds like a pretty cool contest and award.

The first thing we did was check out the off road course. There were two events in that area. First there was a precision throttle / brake exercise where there was platform with a watering can hanging from the top on a pivot of some kind, filled with water and clear glass tube underneath. Attached to the watering can was string that was tied to a tow hook on the front of a Nissan Murano. The Murano was parked on an incline with the back end of it pointed up hill. The goal of the exercise was to use the throttle and brake together and back the Murano up the hill just far enough to tilt the watering can far enough to fill the tube. Sounds easy, right? I thought so too! This was one of the hardest things we did all week. Due to the construction of the platform it was very difficult to see the angle of the watering can and hard to see where the stream of water was going.

The second event at the off road course was a team event. Dunlop laid out a course in a small field and the goal was to drive one lap. Oh, and the driver was blindfolded and had to listen to verbal instructions from his teammate about turning and accelerating / braking. It's hard to describe the sensation of driving with out seeing and having to listen to some one else's instructions for how to drive and just trusting their judgment.

Egon and I had a lot of fun with these two events and realized exactly how important communication is between teammates. There is one event like this during the competition and now we have an idea of the commands we need to use.

After playing at the off road area it was time to get started on the kart racing. While we were not scoring any points in this event it was used as the deciding factor for position on the road when leaving the dunlop factory for our first nights transit to Hockenheim for our first night on the road.

The format was one open practice / qualifying, session one sprint race and then a final. During the practice / qualifying session, a pit stop with a driver change was required. The fastest lap per team was used to grid for the sprint race.

For practice the competitors were split into two groups by finishing time and each group ran a sprint race. From each of these sprint races the top three teams were sent to the final.

We did pretty well in the qualifier and sprint race
and were able to qualify for the final. In the final there were six really quick teams. Our plan went like this: that I would try my hand at starting and see if I could pick up a few positions before handing off the kart to Egon to bring it home. Here Egon and I talk about pit strategy. Stop as far foreward in the pits as possible, get out to the right, in from the left, and the guy that just got out give the other one a push-start.

The start went well and I went from 5^th to 2^nd by the first turn and then it went all wrong for me. I got tangled in some traffic and was spun out a few laps in. I picked up ground on the people in front of me during my remaining laps and handed the kart to Egon. He was blindingly fast and able to pick up a couple a of places and by time the 15laps were over we made it back up to 4^th place. Although it doesn't mean anything points wise, it was nice to be on the road early. As you can see, the racing the was really tight. This was one of our first indications that the racing was going to be really tough.

Action in the pits!

Egon and I felt that it was very important to have a solid plan for the pit stops. We worked out signals for when to pit, how to tell the driver they are going fast enough or need to go faster or if they felt like they could go a few laps further. I'm not sure how much faster it was than what everyone else did, but it was very nice to be organized about the non-driving part of the competition and concentrate solely on the driving. We used the same process at the second

karting event in Spain and it paid off!

Now that place on the road was set, we had some time to watch the ATV and Sport Bike stunt show.

The guy was pretty good, doing 12 o'clocks (wheelies that are straight up) on both bikes:

But everybody has their moments and this guy had a back side dismount he wasn't hurt and was back up and riding again in seconds. I'm always impressed by these stunt guys and their sense of balance.

We then got packed back in the 350Z's and headed to the main gate of the factory for the official start of the race.

Then it was on to the Autobahn for our first taste of driving on these famed German roads. Thankfully the trip was uneventful and the whole crew arrived in Stuttgart safely. What is in Stuttgart you ask? Why none other than the famed home of the German F1 race at the Hockenheim Ring!!

It was quite the sight when we showed up to check in with a parking lot full of Nissan's:

Hotel Motodrom, our home for the night:

After a quick briefing in the hotel lobby it was time to unpack and head in for a much needed dinner

Lastly there was time for a little exploring before bed. I wandered down the access road for the track and hotel and found some cool stuff.

A Museum that wasn't open.

And an ad for an upcoming event at the track

And the thing that made me happiest, an open gate to the stands. It seemed liked an invitation to head right on it and have a look around.

So I sat right here: and watched the sun set behind the Baden-Wurttemberg Center

For reference, I was sitting in the red section of seating in this picture. I was all the way at the top, in the right corner.

At this point it was late and I was really tired so it was back to the room for as much sleep as I could muster and then up early for stretching and running on the track.

Stay tuned, more updates to come :-)

Speed TV's Josh Bevan has written another installment of his 5 part series on the 2007 DDC World Finals. As always, it's a good read. Click here to check it out.

And Egon reminds you, enjoy responsibly!

Hey Sports Fans, our very own Team USA Josh Bevan of Speed TV.com has published the first of a five part series on the DDC. Click here for the article.

Check it out and don't forget to visit the Speed TV forums and look around.

I've been so incredibly busy with work and home that I haven't finished my write up of the event. However, as summer grinds on and it gets to be too hot to move, I plan to write more.

Don't forget, there is still time left to sign up for the 2007 DDC, do it and you too could be a star!

Until next time, PROST!

April 14, 2007

Saturday was a new day; I slept until 10 and really woke up feeling like a new man. I went down to the lobby and met the rest of the group for some brunch. Everyone was feeling better and looking forward to a full day. First on the list of things to do was watch F1 at the lobby bar, go out for another walk and find lunch, then back to the hotel to meet with the rest of the teams and have the opening day ceremony. To that plan, I added a 45 min run through Hanu and on a great path by the Mine River. The run was hard, but by far one of the nicest I’ve done this year. It reminded me, just a little bit, of running by the Huron River in the spring time, just after a good soaking rain.
We watched the F1 boy’s mix it up in qualifying and then walked to the Am Markt where there was a farmers market going on. There was fresh fruit, eggs and all types of vegetables.

While we were there, Dunlop De started their setup for the opening ceremonies. I was lucky enough to catch Picasso giving a nod of approval to the Dunlop Motorsports truck.

Next, they started bringing in all of the vehicles that we would use over the course of the event. They were almost all silver, but there was one orange and one black one. I think the orange ones are faster.

Back at the hotel, we were all asked to put on our new driving suits for the official welcome to the city, introduction of all the teams and the key ceremony where we were introduced to our cars.

The Director of Dunlop and the Mayor of Hanu were on hand for the introductions and the key dispensing as well as a bit of twirling around our heads like a helicopter…
We got car number 14, much to our surprise, it was the orange car. Some people also call this color gold, so we nicknamed our car “Goldie.” We can only hope that it’s a sign of things to come.
There we are:
At one point Egon and I weren’t listed on the Dunlop.de website as attending the world finals, so I threatened with Pirate flag stickers to put over the American flags, but they are really harder to find than you might think.
The 350Z that they gave to us for the trip is the top of the line model. Nice interior of course, 6 speed trans and a sports clutch along with the big Brembo brakes, but most importantly, we got wide 19in wheels with the newly developed and released Dunlop Sport Maxx GT series 235’s front and 285’s in the back. This should stick like glue both on the road and during our two track events and almost 2000 rally miles on the street.
Here is team USA in the front row, we had a good day.
Behind us are teams from Germany, France, Switzerland and Nissan.
After the greeting ceremony and the dispersing of the keys, we got an escort by the police to the Dunlop factory where we left the cars in a park ferme or impound over night.
Tomorrow is the kick off where we get our route books and the rules for the road. We will compete for starting order on the transit to the Hockenheim Ring for our Sunday night’s stay and competition on Monday. It looks like there will be a team event where Egon and I will race against the other competing pairs for initial position on the road. The track is an improvised affair setup on the patio outside of one of the manufacturing buildings. I took this photo as we were waiting for the shuttle back to the restraint for dinner.

Hello Sports Fans! Sorry this is so late in coming, but not surprisingly this whole trip has been a whirl wind and it doesn’t look like there is any chance of it slowing up anytime soon.

Way back on April 12th, 2007 I got on a plane in Detroit headed for Dulles and then finally to Frankfurt for the start of the 2007 Dunlop Drivers Cup World finals. This plan was complicated by snow / rain in DC. Our flight was over an hour late leaving, thankfully the plane to Frankfurt was late getting to DC which caused a huge ruckus and a flurry of phone calls trying to get everything straightened out. In the end, we were blessed and everyone got on some plane or another and to Frankfurt within 3hrs of each other. This might not sound impressive, but remember that we had people from California, Texas, Florida, Ohio, Maine, South Carolina and Michigan all trying to get somewhere. I’d say that a three hour window is pretty good. It’s even more amazing that five of us made it on the same correct flight together.
The flight was a pretty easy one, no major turbulence, a couple of OK movies and a little sleep.
After several trips through immigration and a couple of baggage claims later we all had our bags and met our wonderful Dunlop De hosts. Then we all stood around

And stood around some more. Then, that’s right, we stood around some more.

Finally the last member of our group got there. Even though she was missing her baggage, she was intact and in pretty good spirits.

Finally, it was time for the jet lag to set in and the fun to begin.

To the hotel we went to unpack, have a second to, ah, freshen up and then back out we went. The general opinion was that the best thing to do for jet lag was get out, see the city, have some lunch sample the local specialties and generally see the local sights. So see the sights we did. We found the brothers Grim:

We found an old church that looks like it got bombed out at some point:

And some other great historical stuff:

And of course, the Best Worscht in town! And a big thanks to Egon for posing in this picture to show how we all felt about the food there, it was really great.

After that, it was back to the hotel for a nice 2hr nap, quick shower and then off to dinner with our most kind German hosts. At dinner, I ate the most delicious schnitzel and had some locally traditional Apple Wine. By the end of dinner, I was wiped out and it showed. However, in the confusion, I didn’t get any group photos so I will get a few later when we do the picture swap.

Next up, the opening day ceremonies!