,
 |
Time for dinner! It stays light until about 9:30 pm in Germany so it’s still bright daylight. Our meal is prepared at the trackside. It is schnitzel which is a breaded and fried cutlet. It is just like Tonkatsu if you like Japanese food. It is served with gravy but I was wishing for some katsu sauce and rice. German food is heavy on meat and dairy and light on vegetables. I can’t understand why Germans are so skinny. I only saw a few fat Germans and they were more stout and sturdy than fat. I think its because Germans walk FAST. It seems like everyone walks at a pace 2x faster than Americans. I found myself nearly jogging. Even though we walked fast for miles covering this race, I managed to gain 8 lbs, but enjoyed every bit of it.
|
 |
The Nordschleife loops through and around the town of Nurburg for nearly 16 miles. In the center of town is the famous Nurburg castle which we didn’t get to really see. The castle is in the center of town.
|
 |
Import Tuner, DSport and MotoIQ representing in the press room! We planned to have frequent updates but were stymied by the corked up Internet connection.
|
 |
During our one week stay in Germany, we saw exactly two pick up trucks, a Nissan Frontier and this Dodge Ram. Germans don’t like pickups and prefer super fast turbo diesel vans.
|
 |
After the Vintage race there was a drift event. It was amazing, there were probably over 30,000 screaming enthusiastic fans watching drifting that was like something you would see at a local drift day. Our Pro Am drivers would shred on these guys! However, there were more people at this event than any in the USA except perhaps the Formula D finale in Irwindale. Check this BMW out, now you know where the Motorex guys ran to!
|
 |
This Team Falken car seemed to be the best guy. I think the Irish are probably the best European drifters by far. D-Mac, James Deane and Eric O’ Sullivan kick ass.
|
 |
Hey, here is the German drift car we snapped a pic of a few days ago. The BMW 3 series is like the S13 of German drifting.
|
 |
Hundreds of thousands of race fans descend upon the town of Nurbrug but it is still pretty orderly although hard to find any parking. The weather was cold, dark and gloomy for most of the event. Nurburg is known for its unpredictable weather.
|
 |
Dinner time again, we go to a famous restaurant in Nurberg, the place is known to be a hang out for the top drivers and cool people. The name escapes me probably because I was falling asleep. as you can see here. Since I don’t know who they are I am not sure if they were there. I did see a lot of works team jackets.
|
 |
The best dish is known as “rump steak”. This was the best piece of ass meat that I have ever had. It is served on a red hot rock and you cut and cook pieces of it sort of like a Korean BBQ.
|
 |
DSport’s Mike Ferrara is about to dig into his Rump Steak. Somehow that sounds bad.
|
 |
Manthey, the most winning team in the 24 hour race’s history having been undefeated in the last 4 races hosted us in their awesome VIP lounge. Manthey’s main sponsor is Haribo, maker of the gummy bear. I could not resist punching out the bear. It looked too happy.
|
 |
A Euro-spec gummy bear. It looks more clear than a USDM spec one. It is also a little harder and more gummy. I don’t like gummy bears but the consensus was that Euro-spec tastes better than USDM spec. We were making plans to grey market these gummy bears.
|
 |
The Baller status Manthey lounge. It was stocked full of good food, drink waitresses, floor to ceiling glass windows overlooking the track and big screen TV’s–everything you need. I was nervous and on my best behavior lest I offend some important German person who might be in here.
|
 |
The Manthey lounge has this cool GPS screen which showed the car they were supporting, its position and where it was on the track at the time. Look how many cars they support! No wonder they are not Tuners…
|
 |
Somewhere during all of this madness we had time to visit RingºWerk. This is a huge amusement race theme park on the track grounds. They had displays of many cars from the history of the race.
|
 |
Many OEM suppliers had displays featuring their technology on various parts of a modern car. Borg Warner had a large display.
|
 |
Various bits of Borg Warner Turbo technology.
|
 |
Getrag had a whole exhibit on transmissions. Jeff investigates the moving cutaway of a FWD transmission. It’s surprising he is interested since it doesn’t have anything to do with either drinking or chasing tail.
|
 |
KW our hosts had a really awesome display featuring performance damper technology. KW suspension is born on rough German backroads, the Autobahn and the Nordschleife.
|
 |
A piece of a wrecked GT2 car found new life as part of the KW display, a cutaway of how suspension works.
|
 |
A KW Motorsports 3-Way adjustable McPherson strut as found on the Dog III on display.
|
 |
This display shows how BMW’s KERS system works.
|
 |
Shumi and Oliver go way back.
|
 |
This is a racing Semi Truck. Semi Truck racing is pretty popular in Europe.
|
