Cross-post from the W210 forum...I know this should probably have been publicized earlier, but I didn't think to post it up. There was an CLK55 at the event...anybody from here?

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I was back at Lime Rock on Friday for another HPDE, and took Mom's whip this time instead of mine. The experience was no different -- it was awesome! I was also bumped from the novice group to the intermediate group, which allowed me to solo for the first time as well. Here are a couple of shots from Friday:




Some impressions of driving my mom's 2001 E430 vs. my 2000 VW Passat 4MOTION:
- with a curb weight of only 150 lbs. more than my 4MOTION and an additional 75 HP under the hood, I was cookin' at the end of the main straight with the E430 (115 MPH indicated vs. 105 MPH indicated);
- with only RWD, getting the E430 around the corner is a lot more difficult than the 4MOTION (along with the added weight), but I sat in on the advanced group class and tried something called throttle-lift-induced oversteer -- which worked!
- the OEM E430 brakes suck. They haul the car down, but during my second track session (out of four scheduled), I managed to trip the brake lining indicator AND the brake fluid indicator. As a result, I had to baby the brakes the rest of the day. (Anybody know how to change pads on a W210 E-class? :o )
- the OEM tires also suck (Goodyear F1 GS-D2) -- very little grip in the corners and they squeal like an SOB...but then again, what do you expect of autobahn tires?
- the E430's TouchShift really isn't conducive to h/p driving -- I'd shift from third to fourth WANTING an upshift, and the damn thing holds third all the way to redline. Also, I'd ask for a downshift, bang the shifter, and the rebound on the shifter would actually cause TWO upshifts. WTF?

Enough griping -- all in all, a great day. The only downsides were that right before my third track session, an instructor in a Golf sheared a shock tower bolt, which caused him to roll his Golf (I have pics of the aftermath somewhere, they're still on my camera), so I lost a bit of track time there...and right before my fourth track session, an advanced driver in a current-gen (and highly modded) Carrera missed a gear setting up for a turn (the Uphill turn, for those of you that know Lime Rock), locked up the rear end and flipped and totalled his car, thus ending the event for the day...so I missed out completely on my fourth track session.

Check www.scda1.com for next year's schedule, I'll probably go to Watkins Glen and New Hampshire International Speedway for those two...I think I've had enough of Lime Rock for now.

 

Glad you had fun! Most MB events they require a minimum pad thickness and brake fluid be flushed 6 months prior. Yep, street tires suck! :P

Norm

 

Heheheh...as you can see by the Corvette behind me, this wasn't an MB event.

Actually, I checked -- I had quite a bit of pad going into the event, and I think the brake fluid had been changed fairly recently. Oh well...

 

Bump...here are pics of that wrecked Golf that I mentioned in the first post:




Ouch!