Well, I’m done with my first day of thrashing my car around the track and I surprised myself, my car performed a lot better than I expected, and I was able to pick things up pretty well and was doing a fairly good job out on the track (at least that’s what the instructor told me).

The day started at about 8:15 when I arrived at the track. I taped up my headlights because I didn’t want them getting damaged because things can get kicked up on the track and hit and damage the lights. At 8:30 they called us into the tent and we had an hour-long beginner’s course. It was basically “here’s what to expect from your car out on the track and here’s how to control things”. So after the class, we were paired up and assigned instructors. My instructor drove my car first, to show me the track and the best way to drive my car around it, and then after a few laps we pulled into the pits and he went into the other guy’s car and I followed them for a few more laps.

We came back in, had some more classroom time and then went back out. This time the instructor was riding shotgun and teaching me how to drive as I drove it around the track. After that run, we had lunch and then we all went solo. The third run we did was when I began to really push my car. I had those tires squealing around corners and was going as fast as I thought I could through them. But as the day wore on, I got a better feel of the car and was more able to push it even further.

We did a total of 5, 25-minute runs throughout the day. During the last half of the 4th run I had my instructor ride with me to see if I could improve more or if I had bad habits I had to get rid up. He told me that I was hitting my lines really well (that’s a good thing), which basically means I had my car in the right spot during the turns. But there was one turn that was giving me trouble, and he gave me some pointers about how to get through it faster. Overall though, I was getting a very good feel of the track and how my car reacts to the input I give it.

By the end of the day, I was beat. All the adrenaline rushes while I was on the track took their toll on me and I just felt like passing out when I got back here to the hotel room. I had an absolute blast out there today and I’m very much looking forward to tomorrow. I have a better understanding of how my car works and I actually underestimated its potential. I have plenty of pictures (around 350) that I’ll eventually post up; I’m on dial-up right now and I’m not about to go through and just try to upload a ton of pictures right now.

I may blog more tonight, we’ll see how I feel though. We’re all going out to a restaurant for dinner, and then I’m planning on just coming back and crashing. It’s been a long, intense day and I have loved every minute of it.